#The House on Telegraph Hill

[holyviolence]

WATCHED IN 2023: I had a strange feeling that Aunt Sophie saw through me. I wondered, if I could have spoken to her, whether she would have understood. She did look kind and wise. Yet I couldn't help myself from feeling that something was wrong in this house. 

THE HOUSE ON TELEGRAPH HILL (1951) DIR. ROBERT WISE

[the-best-of-letterboxd]

The House on Telegraph Hill (1951)

[kristenswig]

#55. The House on Telegraph Hill - Robert Wise

[directorsnarrative]

The House on Telegraph Hill • Director Robert Wise

[byneddiedingo]

Valentina Cortese and Richard Basehart in The House on Telegraph Hill (Robert Wise, 1951)

Cast: Valentina Cortese, Richard Basehart, William Lundigan, Fay Baker, Gordon Gebert, Steven Geray, Herb Butterfield, Natasha Lytess, Kei Thin Chung, John Burton, Katherine Meskill, Mario Siletti. Screenplay: Elick Moll, Frank Partos, based on a novel by Dana Lyon. Cinematography: Lucien Ballard. Art direction: John DeCuir, Lyle R. Wheeler. Film editing: Nick DeMaggio. Music: Sol Kaplan.

The key to a successful thriller is to keep the audience from asking those questions you're not supposed to ask: Why did X do that instead of that? What caused Y to act that way? Would a sane person really behave that way? And when the film ends, have all the loose threads been accounted for? The House on Telegraph Hill just barely manages to dodge those questions, except at the end. It's sometimes rather clumsily put together. For example, we are led to believe at the beginning that the film is being narrated in voiceover by the protagonist, Viktoria Kowalska (Valentina Cortese). But in mid-film we watch a conversation that Viktoria could not have overheard. We later find that the voiceover is actually Viktoria telling her story to investigators, but the momentary break in point of view is jarring. The ending, too, feels rushed. We have invested enough time in the story that we need a clearer outcome for Viktoria and others. The premise is a familiar one, given a postwar spin: A woman pretends to be someone she isn't and suffers the consequences. In Viktoria's case, she was a prisoner in the Belsen concentration camp, where she befriended Karin Dernakova (Natasha Lytess), who died there after telling Viktoria that she had a son who had been sent at the start of the war to live with her aunt in San Francisco. When the camp is liberated, Viktoria, who has no family of her own left in Poland, finds it expedient to assume the identity of Karin, whose papers she has been given for safekeeping. Viktoria is well-meaning; she doesn't really plan to defraud anyone, but through a rather rushed-through series of circumstances, she winds up in San Francisco pretending to be the mother of Karin's child, Chris (Gordon Gebert). Not only that, she also marries Chris's guardian, Alan Spender (Richard Basehart). So now she finds herself in an elegant mansion on the top of Telegraph Hill, playing mother to a boy who stands to inherit a fortune. And of course she also finds herself in danger. Cortese's performance makes some of this credible, but it was her only important film in America: She married her co-star, Basehart, and returned to Italy. He went with her, but except for Federico Fellini's La Strada (1954) and Il Bidone (1955), his European films were undistinguished, and he returned to the States after their divorce in 1960. The House on Telegraph Hill is plenty watchable, if only because of cinematographer Lucien Ballard's use of the San Francisco location.     

[bens-things]

The House on Telegraph Hill

1951 Directed by Robert Wise

[nerd-at-sea5]

yellowjackets fav books from my books hc's

lottie - the haunting of hill house, a hero born and the song of achilles

natalie - the locked tomb series, radio silence and last night by at the telegraph club

van - one last stop, percy jackson - specifically the titians curse and the lord of the rings series (+ the hobbit)

tai - infamous, all 7 harry potter books, and the a good girls guide to murder series

shauna - the goldfinch, a secret history and the hunger games series (+tbosas)

jackie - the six of crows dulogy, the seven husbands of evelyn hugo and the mixed-up files of mrs. basil e frankweiler

[salemsdog]

faut faire danser les femmes.

My story begins in the end. With the sun beginning to char my porcelain, riding red and violet over miles of atomic mass. By the end of the road, my shoes were worn with broken nature. But before my death, I rode a mountainous sea away from a barrel-chested man, namely put as my husband. The rock first came to me in a nightmare while aboard the SS. Mary. I had traveled overseas before, and it was a quirk of fact that the ship, no matter how goldy, always cradled like a misrun carriage, bumping over unpolished granite. So shook the landscape in my nightmare as well. There was a mincer in front of me. It was placed beside a rock. In the dream, the widescape was covered in thin sheets of sand. The trees were wild and howled like wolves strewn into the raging sky. Careful she crept; she was not me because the I in my dream had no feet. Simply an eye of the mind that granted a view of myself from whatever window looked down onto this horacescape. I directed her to walk closer to the mincer. It was then that the rock started to bellow out in simple waves of anguish. It was yelling to be set free against its ugly titanium restraints. She almost pitied it. The woman would take the mincer with a static, almost illuminary hand but stare at the rock with an unmoving notion. Salt wavered into the air as her limbs began to feel spent; she could feel the boat pulling her back to the shores of minimal consciousness closer every nanosecond, grappling her away from the original deed. The rock was lying dead like a cold fox, claiming its early spot in hell. Waiting for the final gut of termination. She could crush the rock, but what then?

It didn��t make her a predator.

I would have vowed to never harm my husband once I had awoken in my saddened condition and out of that harsh story. For it would bring me lower than the man himself. I knew I was now truly running, running away from the midwave heat that bit close to my clothes and flamed the cage that once housed my books, my telescopes that let me talk to the stars late in the evening when my husband singed tableside decks with his less than pleasant cigars. That did not stop the wafting from following up to my attic window desk of cinnamon and sage. My hand would soon slip during a Sunday night preparation. Sending the iron stove into flames. I had no children and no cathel. Only the prophetic nightmares that came with sniffing the dark herb that crawled its way around our lowly manor of the Greylands. This city chewed with iron teeth and ordered around symmetry like no other grandiloquent beast of the nile. My husband’s old trophies of gunfire gave proof to that undeniable fact of discord that harbored no matter what section of the earth you journeyed forth. They sit stacked mildly rusted under his mantleplace, topped with fleets of dust and mice shit. Before settling, I knew no bounds to fiction. I was as free as a clipped animal could ever get. But once trapped inside a new hellish biome, those old newspapers and telegraphs of the world above became my primary resource as another additive to my perpetual escape. Meconium, isocyanate, the air of another hellnever roadside three thousand miles from ours. All futile in my grand ruse of escape. So I ran, caught to the nearest station west of that long country road. Farther and farther till the SS. Mary was no longer a dream on a yellow postcard lost among the plethora of letters sent in from faraway ports of the world. A secret subscription I had along with the many other secrets I kept from my man.

It rose above anything I had ever seen in my life and took me far, far away.

There was a shortage of oil on our land being stolen by a neighboring townscape just north of the rolling hills. The red men they were called. Their thieves would hound every plant that drenched oil from the underearth. Weaning in heinesy and destruction caused an uproar in an already fatale patriarchy. Our people were starting to see straight through tradition and into welfare. It took the turn of a thousand tides—the crease in the economy—to fully shelter this idea of severity. Our foundation was losing itself. Soon there were no more ports to transfer goods, no more fleets to deliver those postcards I so greatly admired per month. So there I sat, perched between litters of luggage and briefcases of fine men and women boarding the middle-class section of Mary’s idiom. Watching as the moon followed our ship to the enemy lands. Waiting for the sky to shift into a new sun, waging a war blessed foul. A great woman once said sweat is the tears from God shedding down a lubricant for the wind. It took running from my husband to fully furnish the belief and inspire a devil within me to work this war like it was my bitch. Down a winding road and past crowds of townsfolk once I had reached beyond the Pillsbury pines and down crossroads over the next.

Once I had pitted rest, I could breathe into an air of freedom. Though this was the land of thieves, I had never felt such liberation. It had been shrouded by a hand of doubt along the journey, but once I set food on that port, the sky seemed to smile, though it was dark. Lines of people stretched beyond the dock. I bristled my way through the red men and women, most likely refugees from our gray land, returning with the upcoming tension. For it was better to die in your homeland than in a foreign region of gray.

My first pit stop arrived at a little colosseum of wine and scum. A harlet house off the ends of the coast, needing but a small stroll to reach. There I thought more about the rock in the dream, furrowed the lace fabric between the tips of my fingers and composed a conversation with a stranger. I introduced myself to the other woman by the name of Aerodromea. She returned with Venetia Lamauth. Venetia wore the dress of service, a reminder of another blast upon destiny the more she spoke of her life in a mellow, rustic voice, strands of blonde curtaining her cresed forehead. Though she’d chuckle and promised matters of satisfaction with her life, there were patches of fur on her coat. Her Greek nose tinted pink and a swooping tail tucked under the bench. This she could not see. She would speak of hellhounds and endless labor while I poured additional liters into her glass cup, eyeing her hawk-eyed husband all the while. Locals seemed to take my untimely visit rather cautiously. For good reason, of course. By the time dawn was heaving shots of navy into the dark skies, I had visited more women than postcards had ever visited the steps of my manor in those five years of unbearable habitance. Their tails were always tied messily, some with oozing blisters and painful-looking creases where the fold had been tied. Their noses were sometimes swollen or greased with expensive lotions in an attempt to mask the protruding fact, etching closer and closer to the surface of realism.

In the dark hours, they’d complain of an instrumental burden. God, it was loud they’d say, leeching my hands as if I had been the only acknowledgement of liability in centuries. The screeching strings blended against the howls of wind in a sorrowful juxtaposition. Waning restless nights for them all.

The first I took was Venetia. I instructed her to leave her coat and wreath of restlessness. She brought forth her finest Jane shoes and let down her honey lemon hair. We plowed hand in hand through the forest. I begged God to keep this opportunity close in hand as we followed those breathing strings through shrubs and dry logs left for dust in the dark. The first glimpse of the violin-wielding beast appeared behind the shade of a red willow. For it had been my first time seeing the thing face to face as well. My grip only tightened in Venetia’s hand as she held still, her breath shallow. For I had but a dream to go off of; this was a foreign sight to Venetia’s eyes I had to remember. Soon the plains were not reliant on the two of us. Both the houses were empty and scarce of life. The grasslands are blooming with thin-nosed critters. The beast’s violin became rushed and ridgid throughout the nights to come. Weaving in knowledge to me that we were improving and changing as a people. The hunt persisted and, in turn, the absence as well. Left for catharsis in the wind and rid us of this ancient rigorous distraction on the forest floor. Pooling like thick oil.

“Who am I if not misunderstood?” her gayety was sweet as jewels.

Venetia murmured in a hushed tone as she clasped my hand in hers, her gaze lingering over the carcass. We welded the night together as air raids rang out, shaking the dirt around our feet. Every limb of the beast was strewn in a puddle of rubicund. By dawn, Venetia’s eyes were glassy and her fingers blistered and bruised in destined work. A morning croaked, and a chorus of silence followed. Charing my skin and lacing back the cradle of the Mary. Both lands were quiet now; not even the rock under us spit a tune.

[citizenscreen]

Valentina Cortese and Richard Basehart at home with their son, Jackie. Cortese and Basehart met while making Robert Wise’s THE HOUSE ON TELEGRAPH HILL (1951) married in March of 1951 and divorced in 1960.

[lookismslut]

Recommending my favourite LGBTQIA+ books for Pride Month :)

The Death of Vivek Oji by Akwaeke Emezi

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo.

Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart.

The Violent Delights by Micah Nemerever

Not My Problem by Ciara Smyth

Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling

[cinemaautomobilia]

1950 Mercury Convertible - "The House on Telegraph Hill" (1951)

[usafphantom2]

NGAD EXCLUSIVE: Air Force secretary cracks door for unmanned next-gen fighter

In an interview with Breaking Defense, Frank Kendall suggested the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter decision is farther off than estimated, as the service rethinks the threat landscape.

Michael Marrow

Lockheed Martin Skunk Works concept art of a sixth-generation fighter

Lockheed Martin Skunk Works concept art of a sixth-generation fighter. (Lockheed Martin)

FARNBOROUGH AIRSHOW 2024 — Amid a revolution in air combat, the head of the US Air Force said Saturday he’s “reasonably confident” America’s next-generation fighter aircraft will have a pilot, leaving the door open, however slightly, for a radical departure from a fully manned system.

“I’m confident there’s going to be a sixth-generation fighter. I’m reasonably confident that it’s going to be crewed,” Kendall told Breaking Defense in an exclusive interview over the weekend.

That the Air Force is seemingly unsure whether the aircraft will need a pilot, and presumably a cockpit to house them, suggests the service may need to revisit even the most basic requirements for its Next-Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter, even as it had originally planned to award a contract for the aircraft sometime this year. Speaking broadly of potential changes, Kendall said it would be “reasonable” to conclude the Air Force needs to go back to do a more substantive analysis on the NGAD’s design and capability requirements.

“We’re having conversations right now about what to do and how to move forward,” Kendall said, pushing back on recent comments by Air Combat Command boss Gen. Ken Wilsbach that a down select for NGAD was likely coming in 2024. “What [Wilsbach] said is not the last word on that.”

Kendall has recently raised the prospect of serious changes to NGAD, suggesting in previous interviews that the Air Force was working to ensure the service has the right concept — and for a reasonable price. Expanding on his thinking, Kendall said a key consideration is the overall price encompassing the air vehicle and engine, noting that the powerplant is “just a piece of it” and “not by itself a big driver.”

RELATED: GCAP partners showcase new concept for next-gen fighter jet based on evolved design

Floating the potential for an unmanned NGAD in the wake of his comments about the need to redesign the jet may set off alarm bells among the Air Force’s infamous “fighter mafia,” who take great pride in the service’s pilot tradition. But, analyst J.J. Gertler of the Teal Group said, it is a sign that Kendall is taking a serious approach to considering all his options to avoid “driv[ing] the team in one direction or another.”

“We knew that [the Air Force was] reconsidering the design of the system; we knew that they were measuring at least twice before cutting checks. Like any good pilot, they are running through a final checklist before getting in the air,” Gertler said.

And, he wrote in email, it makes sense to at least consider an optionally manned design because “really any modern combat air system that is not designed to be uninhabited is still optionally crewed.”

For example, modern technology like networking and fly-by-wire controls means “it doesn’t matter where the operator is sitting. In fact, the decision to make a platform inhabited drives the design and capabilities much more than a decision to make it uninhabited. So in a very real sense, uninhabited becomes the default unless there is a reason to put a person in the platform,” Gertler said.

Air Force officials have telegraphed for years that NGAD will be expensive, with Kendall frequently using a metric of costing “multiples” of the already pricey F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. But with pressing modernization needs and ballooning costs for other critical programs, officials are now openly questioning whether their ambitions are affordable.

“If you look at what we do in our five-year plan — that is on the Hill now — to our foundational accounts in the out years, it’s clear we did something there that’s not going to be, you know, sustainable,” he said. “We’ve got to fix that problem too. So we’ve got a number of affordability issues over the five-year plan that we had to address. And we also have to go to look at and verify, if you will, that we had the right concept [for NGAD].”

Another consideration, according to Kendall, are the facilities that underpin the fighter’s operations. “The infrastructure that’s required to support an F-22 class aircraft, if you will, leads to some vulnerabilities. Runway length, for example,” he said.

Gertler observed that judging from previous comments made by officials like Kendall, “some delay in the central airframe component of NGAD not only appears likely, but is already underway.”

“It may not have been a common practice in the past, but there’s a lot to be said for designing to include reality rather than the world as it was when you started the program or as you wish it might be 40 years from now,” he added. “A procurement schedule that doesn’t allow adaptation to changing reality won’t yield a relevant system.”

SecAF Kendall speaks at SLOC

Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall speaks with students and guests during the Senior Leader Orientation Course at Joint Base Andrews, Md., July 24, 2023. The course provides training for newly selected brigadier generals and senior executive service members. (U.S. Air Force photo by Eric Dietrich)

An ‘Accumulation’ of Threats

Since the advent of the F-22 program, the Air Force’s concept for achieving air superiority has revolved around the idea of a stealthy sensor-shooter that can slip past enemy air defenses and take out threats before being detected — an operational concept the service calls “penetrating counter-air.”

Kendall said that concept hasn’t changed much since the early 1990s, when he briefed Dick Cheney, then the defense secretary, about what was considered the gravest set of threats the F-22 could face: the layered Soviet air defense systems of Syria.

But battlefields have changed in the decades since, and Kendall said the Air Force now stares down a list of Chinese threats that include increasingly sophisticated air defenses, advanced counter-stealth technologies, and new sensors and weapons built to vastly increase the range a target can be detected and destroyed.

RELATED: As Air Force deliberates sixth-gen fighter plans, much is at stake for Boeing

When asked whether a new technology had emerged that had potentially blunted the NGAD concept, Kendall characterized the growing threats as “an accumulation over time.” But he also hinted that an alternative operational concept could drive changes to NGAD requirements.

“It is natural to assume that, if you have a certain generation of something, that you’re going to go buy the next generation of that, and then it’s going to have some similar characteristics, a similar operating concept, but be better than the one you already have,” Kendall said.

“That philosophy was what drove where NGAD is headed. But we’re not up against Syria anymore. We’re not up against the Soviet Union anymore,” he said. “We’re up against China, primarily, as the pacing challenge. And we’ve got to be sure we’re doing the right thing.”

Richard Aboulafia, an aerospace analyst with AeroDynamic Advisory, noted that the Air Force’s consternation over NGAD’s operational requirements “point to the idea that true air dominance and air superiority might no longer be feasible” – an idea further underscored by both Russia and Ukraine’s difficulty establishing sustained control of the skies throughout the war in Ukraine.

“It speaks to a world where there’s a lot more lethality, there’s a lot more diffusion of threats, and there’s less of a chance of truly obliterating the other side’s air defenses, in which case your use of resources looks very different,” he said.

Ultimately, Aboulafia said that he believes the Air Force needs a crewed sixth-generation fighter, but the service faces a “fundamental contradiction” in its design requirements and budget that could drive delays. Affordability concerns would naturally push the service to a smaller aircraft with less range, but a more advanced Chinese threat could necessitate a larger, more capable, long-range jet that would cost more money.

“I don’t know which is the [right option] and it’s possible that they don’t know, but if there is a redesign, it’s two very contradictory directions,” he said.

Kendall, for his part, said NGAD is not just about the platform’s capabilities itself, but how it fits into a budding kill web that synchs up forthcoming drone wingmen known as Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA), space capabilities and a new crop of weapons.

“It’s going to need to work with CCAs. It’s going to need to work in an architecture which includes space-based support and other off-board support and an architecture that uses our most advanced weapons,” he said. “So we’ve got an opportunity here to really just be careful and make sure we’re on the right path before we make the final commitment.”

@Defensecomnews via X

[oldshowbiz]

The House on Telegraph Hill (1951) is mostly filmed on a Hollywood backlot, but it does feature a couple San Francisco locations that basically look the same today.

Among the actual locations are the Union Grocery at 301 Union Street and the dead end overlook of Montgomery Street.

[posttexasstressdisorder]

Crazy, man, crazy...

https://www.cchrint.org/2023/01/06/cia-psychiatrist-jolly-wests-1960s-lsd-mind-control-experiments/

[darkspine10]

GF Fanfic - Amidst the Pines, Beneath the Falls

Pines Pawns 2.0 (7,311 words) by darkspine10

Chapters: 2/?

Fandom: Gravity Falls

Rating: Teen

The Pines household was in a suburb off from the main high street, but it didn’t take long for them to follow the trail of destruction to the centre of town. Telegraph poles had been toppled over and lay across the street, sparking occasionally. Burst water mains fountained over the tarmac, and a few people stood beside cars that had mysteriously skidded to a halt and broken down. Dipper shivered in the crisp morning air. This winter chill had been another reason he’d been hesitant to indulge Merrise and leave the house. He was still not used to seeing the valley’s trees bare of their leaves. In his memory it was always an eternal summer in these woods.

The devastation continued near the spire of the wooden church on the hill at the end of the street, but the Pines’ destination was a two-storey building beside the river, on the street opposite the history museum. The building was unadorned, appearing abandoned from outside.

As the door opened into a darkened space, a tiny jangling bell above the door rang for only an instant, before Pacifica reflexively reached up and grabbed it. Her fingers clenched tightly around the bell. She let the others inside before gently closing the door. Merrise looked at her quizzically. “Sorry Merrise. Hate that noise.”

Her daughter sympathetically grinned and hugged her side. “That’s ok. I don’t like fireworks either.”

The inside of the building was dimly lit, with curtains over the front windows blocking most of the light from outside. Dipper wandered along aisles covered in all sorts of strange memorabilia such as dreamcatchers, new age crystals, and wooden figurines. One entire row was devoted to t-shirts with magic eye patterns on them, catching his gaze and giving him a headache if he stared too long.

There was no-one to be seen at the main desk, but hearing the sound of a muffled voice Dipper leant over the desk. Lit by the glow of an old CRT tv screen showing a woman with her legs folded in a yoga pose, his sister was sitting in a similar way and staring at the screen. She hadn’t noticed him or the others entering.

Grinning to himself, Dipper tapped Mabel on the shoulder. She flinched and did a forward roll, bringing her arms up in a defensive position. Her eyes lit up when she recognised him through the gloom. “Dipper!” She scrambled to her feet and flicked a switch, lighting up the store and revealing to Dipper’s eyes her sweat pants and a tasteless bright green vest top. A slogan on the shirt read: ‘Note to Self: Be the Change’, in luminescent orange, almost distracting enough to draw the eye away from her tattooed arms.

Mabel threw her arms around her brother, forcing the air out of his lungs. A second later she broke the hug, straightened herself, and coughed into her fist. “Ahem, Boss Mabel at your service, can I interest you in a rainbow coloured fidget spinner?”

“Hello to you too,” Dipper said, gasping from the embrace. Since they’d last met up she’d cut her hair again, sporting an undercut on one side that showed off silver piercings on the same ear.

“Aunt May!” Merrise ran up and Mabel picked her up into a spin.

“Hey there, take it easy kiddo. We saw each other like last week.”

Merrise squeezed tightly. “I know, but it’s still nice to see you.” She let go and started wandering around the aisles, her attention constantly diverted by all the objects for sale.

Pacifica leant on the desk. Mabel gave a little wave to baby Leah, who gurgled happily on seeing her aunt. “So this is that secret project you were working on over Christmas,” Pacifica said, glancing around the store admiringly. “Setting this place up. Is that what you do now, you run an indie store?”

“Not just any indie store, Paz, this is- Hold on.” The woman on the tv was continuing to give yoga instructions. Mabel kicked the eject button with her toe and the black tape slid out, plunging the screen into static.

“Isn’t VHS a dead medium?” Dipper asked.

“Uh, is paper a dead medium just because tv became a thing?” she replied snarkily as she placed the tape on a shelf.

“I mean, not really,” he mumbled. “You can still read books without relying on an outdated machine from thirty years ago.”

“Anyway,” Mabel said, shaking her head and spreading her arms out wide, “welcome to Pines Pawns! Your all-in-one place to go for art supplies, kooky knick-knacks, and outsider culture.”

“This is so you,” Dipper said, folding his arms and smiling. “Your own little hippie outpost.”

Mabel nodded proudly and perched on a stool behind the desk. She put on a pair of butterfly glasses, her eyes boggling out from behind the circular rims. “Newly opened this week, and Zera and I have already had a bunch of tourists come through.” At the mention of Zera, Dipper briefly glanced at Mabel’s hand. Seeing her wedding ring being worn was still something of novelty. She’d only started wearing it out in public recently, having previously kept her marriage a secret. Now she was out and proud. Getting married to an alien had taken more getting used to for Dipper and Pacifica.

He was about to ask where her wayward wife was, before Mabel noticed him standing around awkwardly and said, “Take a look around.” At her command, Pacifica and Dipper joined Merrise in exploring the store. Their daughter’s attention was fixed on a number of shimmering rocks in a glass cabinet. “Over there’s the crystal shelf. We got kyanite, azurite, labradorite. Plus, more than half the cast of Steven Universe I’m pretty sure. There’s a shipment of plushies coming in next week, ooh, and we’re also hoping to open a co-op food bank to help the homeless. I got the name from Grunkle Stan and Ford’s parent’s place. They used to sell antiques and jewellery. This isn’t technically a pawn shop, but I wanted to carry on the family legacy.”

“By selling cheap tourist souvenirs and new age crap,” Pacifica said, though her tone wasn’t harsh and she snuck a small grin. She picked up a snowglobe containing a miniature replica of the valley, floating cliffs included. “It’s like you’ve recreated the Mystery Shack gift shop through your own lens.”

“Uh-huh. I made an arrangement with Soos, so I’m not stepping in on his turf. My merchandise doesn’t overlap with his, and I’ve got fliers to lead people to the Shack too.”

“How very professional.” Pacifica’s critical eye roved over the store, but she was genuinely impressed by Mabel’s effort. A lot of work must have gone into acquiring all the merchandise on display. No wonder her sister-in-law had received so many ‘hush-hush’ messages when they’d been together last. “So why were you down on the floor stretching out? You weren’t ‘visiting the astral plane’ again, were you?” Pacifica made quote marks with her fingers, remembering her tour of the arcane study-lounge Mabel had created in her house for just such a purpose.

Mabel shrugged. “We’re usually quiet this time of day. No biggie.” She grabbed a plastic jar from the desk and started eating a cookie from within. When Pacifica raised an eyebrow, judging her for the high-calorie content of the snack, she waved her off. “What, so I can be a bit of a slob sometimes. I need positive reinforcement when I exercise!”

“You call that exercise?” Dipper said, laughing to himself. “Wow, you learn a few basic spells and suddenly you’re relying on them for everything and letting yourself go. Pretty soon I’ll outclass you as the Alpha Twin, in strength at least.”

“Yeah, you wish,” she mumbled as she chewed. “It’s great that you guys could make it over here at last. I’ve been dying to show this place off. I figured that since I’m settling down at last that I could finally have a go at running place like this.”

“Mabel, this is awesome, really.” Dipper put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll always admire your chameleonic ability to resettle in a way that feels totally natural. Anytime I’ve moved house it’s been a major upheaval.”

“Chameleonic?” Mabel sneered. “You don’t have to speak like one of your journal entries, Mr ‘Author-Man’. You’re right about moving though, your place still looks like a show home.”

“Only because we spent the last few months repairing it from a Firebird attack.” He wasn’t going to mention today’s damage needing repair, he’d get to that soon enough. For now he wanted to let Mabel have her chance to show off to the family. “Look at you though. All that moving around you did as a protestor, you can just rock up and it’s like you’ve lived in a place all your life. Seattle, Sapphire Bay, that time during college when you went to Haven Springs.”

“Ah, that last time I was just chasing the girl who worked in the flower shop. Puppy love. With Zera I’m making a real go of things. This is my new pad from here on out. Besides, it’s not like it didn’t take effort. All the purchasing arrangements and redecorating and buying stock. Plus you know how hard it was for me to choose to come live in the Falls.”

Dipper looked left and right, making sure the others were out of earshot. “You sure you don’t need any help from us? I mean, Pacifica-”

“Yeah yeah, just cause she’s conventionally attractive you think she can man a desk better than me or Zera?”

Dipper scowled. “I meant financial help, Pacifica’s a wizard with that stuff. She can help you balance the books on this place. It can’t have come cheap. What, did you sell off the Stan O’ War II or something?”

Mabel waved a hand. “Oh no, nothing like that. She’s still moored in Seattle. It was easy, you know Chiu-Tech? Well Candy tells me anytime they’re about to drop a new product and we buy up stocks on the cheap. That’s how I got the windfall.”

“Mabel, that’s- that’s insider trading! You can’t just do that!”

“Lo siento, no hablo inglés.” Mabel winked at him, then nonchalantly fiddled with the pieces on a chess board she had laid out on the desk.

Dipper shook his head, both shocked and amazed by his sister’s audacity. Then again, he wasn’t really one to judge. He’d been pinching every penny for the last few months. He liked to say he was technically on paternity leave, though he’d been out of stable work for over two years now. His only income was from selling photographs to local newspapers and wildlife magazines, as well occasional freelance support work for the observatory he’d worked at while living in Trenton. With Pacifica’s intermittent writing and illustrating career having barely gotten off the ground, the couple were in somewhat precarious straits when it came to finances.

“You really are something else, Mabel,” he muttered.

She flashed a glorious smile that almost won him over. She dropped it and craned her neck when she saw Pacifica leaning over one of the shelves along the wall of the store. “What you got there, sister? Careful not to touch the merch, it’s all brand new.”

Pacifica stood up straight and held out the silver pendant she was wearing. It was in the shape of a Pine Tree - long ago gifted to her by Dipper - and it was spinning around in the air of its own accord.

“Ooh, I know what that means,” Merrise said, hopping up and down excitedly. She stared at the same set of shelves but couldn’t see anything that intriguing. There were paperback guidebooks and postcards, more crystals and trinkets, but nothing outright odd. “What is it?”

Slyly grinning, Mabel cracked her knuckles. “Oh, that. Wha-bam!” Mabel dramatically slammed her finger down onto a button behind the counter. Nothing happened. She rolled her eyes. “One second.” With her elbow she thumped the countertop. A creak of mechanisms sounded, and one of the shelves along the wall rotated. “That did it!”

The items that replaced those there before were superficially similar, easily mistaken for the same brand of novelty trinket. But with a keen eye, Dipper came over to examine them. A row of crystals now sparkled with crackling energy. Potion bottles contained mixtures he knew would do more than act as a placebo. In the place of the guidebooks were scrolls, covered in arcane etchings and symbols. He looked back to see his sister barely holding back a toothy smile of satisfaction.

Pacifica’s pendant was no ordinary piece of jewellery. He’d enchanted it himself to act as a detector for magical and otherworldly auras. It was now rotating even faster, reacting to the contents of the shelves. Pacifica picked up a blue gem and held it up to a strip of sunlight. As the light passed through the gem, it landed on the case of a relaxing nature sounds CD which began to gradually reduce in size. She rotated the crystal until the CD started growing again, then put it down. “Thought so,” she declared. “This stuff is real.”

“Really magic,” Merrise intoned, her gaze darting here and there to take in all the objects on the shelf. A jar filled with coagulating purple fluid extracted from a crashed alien spaceship. Small circuit boards that had once been vital components in the portal below the Shack. It was like coming face to face with a live exhibit of rare artefacts from one of the journals.

“Where’d you get all this stuff?” Dipper asked, fighting the urge to compare this catalogue to his own journal.

Mabel shrugged. “We found most of it together over the years on our adventures. I figured I might as well offer some to the discerning magically inclined customer. Or maybe we can cater to the magical folks who live in Gravity Falls. They might want to trade some of this stuff.” Without warning she pressed the secret button, flipping the shelf around. Dipper and the others had to pull their hands away quickly to avoid getting caught up in the mechanism. “That’s only a small sample of our merchandise. Trust me, most of this stuff is fake. If I learned anything running the Shack it’s that the schmucks eat this stuff up.”

Pacifica strolled over to the desk “Saleswoman, artist, purveyor of magical goods. You’re a regular polymath,” she said, impressed by the store’s presentation.

“Well, the poly part’s correct at least. That reminds me…” Mabel tapped the tips of her fingers together. “I don’t suppose you guys have met anyone new passing through town have you? Zera and I might be on the lookout, and if you can help-”

“No Mabel, I’ve already said, I’m not helping you find another partner,” Pacifica said in deadpan, trying to convey how unappealing she found the idea. “I’ll let you keep your relationship drama to yourself, thank you very much.” She couldn’t hide a small blush, which made her husband and daughter start to giggle at one another. “Anyway, we came here for a reason.” She flicked her eyes between the twins.

Dipper led Merrise back to the desk. “Right, yes, enough of all that. Mabel, we need your help: Rumble McSkirmish is back!”

His sister had a vacant expression. “Who?”

Dipper frowned. “You don’t remember? No, I guess you weren’t with me that day.” He snapped his fingers. “Oh, I know, he was around during Weirdmageddon.”

Mabel pursed her lips. “Lots of people were around during that. We had to share our bedroom with half-starved unicorns and the Multi-Bear. I didn’t have time to memorise everyone!“

“Well, nevermind. Anyway, he’s back with Giffany-”

“Oh my god!” Mabel jumped back and toppled off her chair. In a tangle of limbs she pulled herself upright. “Uh, sorry about that.”

Merrise was at her side with a concerned expression. “Is she really all that bad?”

“You’ve probably not seen her at her most possessive.” Mabel shivered. “How’d she come back from the oven anyway? I thought she was melted for sure.”

Merrise was slightly shocked by the revelation that the twins had thrown Giffany in a fire, but Dipper didn’t have time to rehash the past. “I tried to fob my precocious daughter off with a video game, that’s what happened. Apparently it's a crime worthy of karmic punishment these days.”

“What does this chick have against Mr Ramirez anyway?” Pacifica asked. “That guy seems like he could hardly hurt a fly.”

Dipper steepled his fingers. “Let’s just say that Giffany wants to be his ultimate waifu. Melody’s an inconvenient obstacle, their kids too. Meanwhile Rumble will fight anyone he considers an enemy. The result is a highly unstable, paranoid obsessive, who’ll lash out against anyone or anything that gets in its way.”

“So two super-dangerous video game peeps fused into a deadly hybrid?” Mabel looked thoughtful, then shrugged. “Sounds like an average Tuesday. How do we stop them?”

“I’ve got some ideas. There’s one easy option for defeating Rumble: we let him beat one of us to a pulp so he gets a game over. Not very enticing, that one.”

“I can see why you came to me for help,” Mabel said in a dry tone. “Have you got the cd disc that Giffany came on? Or Mr McSkirmish’s cabinet I guess.”

“Nada, they’ve abandoned physical form and gone fully digital.”

“No handy phylactery to smash then.” Mabel stuck out her tongue, deep in thought. Merrise watched her elders closely, curious to see the moment when an idea would strike.

Pacifica drummed her fingers on the desk, wanting to help find a solution but with no experience of this specific type of threat. “I could offer to play them at something. Some kind of trivial contest. I could probably beat them, even if I’m rusty. What about-”

A muffled voice from the back of the store interrupted Pacifica’s stream of thought. “I’m back, at last. Don’t ask me why it took so long.” The voice was familiar to the Pines, and they weren’t even slightly surprised when a fish-like alien woman brushed through a beaded curtain at the back of the store with a cardboard box in hand. Zera, Mabel’s wife from another world, wore a white vest top, showing off her ample arms which Mabel swooned at. It was clear one half of the partnership was making up for her wife’s slovenly ways. Zera dumped the box behind the counter and flipped one of the knotted tentacles that passed for hair over her shoulder. Water droplets ran down every inch of her exposed, scaly skin. “That is the absolute last time I help you shift mystic talismans from the Crawlspace. The haggling took me forever, I’m not even sure this shit is worth all that- Oh, we’re not alone.”

Mabel aimed finger guns at Zera. “Hey baby, look who’s finally visiting.” With some pride she spun on her seat to aim at her brother’s family.

Zera smiled at her in-laws, revealing rows of pointed teeth. “Hey kid,” she said, ignoring Dipper and Pacifica and going directly to Merrise. “How’s school treating you on this planet?”

“School’s boring,” she said, frowning before defiantly grinning. “That’s why we’re here, on an adventure!”

“I like to hear it.” She winked at the girl and then leant on the counter next to Mabel. “So what is it this time? A repressed memory demon? Incomprehensible multiverse creatures? Is it stranger than I am?” She winked at Merrise again, drawing out a giggle.

“That depends,” Dipper said, “It’s not alien or magical, but it’s some kind of technology gone wrong.”

Zera feigned disinterest and examined the talismans she’d brought in. “How mundane. Nothing remotely as exciting as me.”

“Nothing is,” Mabel said dreamily with her head slumped in her hands, eyes fixed on Zera.

“Ahem,” Pacifica coughed into her fist. “If we could get back to the pixels rampaging down main street?”

“Oh, right. Well this is the perfect opportunity to show you my other cool project.” Mabel hopped off the stool and kissed Zera on the cheek. “Watch the store for me, we might get some old ladies once the bingo hall closes. I’ll be back for dinner. Now, follow me you guys.” As she went she threw on a pink jacket that had been lying in the corner, covering up the colourful pattern of tattoos up both of her arms. Emblazoned across the two halves of the jacket was a rainbow streak, trailing stripes of purple, green, and orange that culminated in a bright yellow star.

She headed for the rear of the store. Dipper was already craning his neck back there, trying to see past the curtain. “I was wondering where Zera popped up from.”

“I don’t know if this is cooler than having my own store, but it’s still pretty awesome.” Through the curtain she entered a cramped storeroom with bare cement walls. In the middle of the room was a square metal hatch, rusted brown with age. The hatch was lying open, and Mabel started descending into the hole down a ladder bolted to the wall.

“Oh great,” said Pacifica, sneering. “You’ve got access to the sewers. What a joy.”

Mabel just laughed and shook her head. “Come on, you’ll see.”

“Have fun, May,” Zera called disinterestedly. She had already moved on to picking through the talismans and playing around with the sparkling points of light that emanated from the box.

Merrise was next to follow her aunt, eagerly scrambling down the ladder excited to see where it led.

As Dipper put his foot on the first rung, Pacifica touched his arm. “If we’re going into danger we should leave Leah here. She could get hurt.”

Mabel’s voice came echoing from down the tunnel. “Don’t worry, Z’s great with babies.” Dipper raised a single eyebrow but didn’t say anything. Pacifica unslung her daughter from her pouch and handed her over. Leah was pliant in her aunt’s arms, though Zera held her outstretched.

Pacifica waved goodbye to her daughter, before her smile dropped and she put up with the unglamorous task of descending the ladder. Dipper was last to leave. “Keep good care of her. Hopefully we won’t be gone too long.”

“You can trust me, Dipper. Good luck stopping… whatever it is.”

Dipper disappeared from sight down the ladder. His head then popped back up and he pointed two fingers at his eyes, then back to her. Zera nodded and rolled her eyes, assuring him she’d be careful.

The instant his head disappeared down the hatch again, Leah burst into tears. “Easy does it, it’s just your Aunty Z.” Zera smiled uneasily, revealing rows of sharp fangs which only made the baby’s cries louder. She ineffectively bounced the squealing baby at arms length. “Come on kid, work with me here.” She balanced Leah on one arm and reached into the nearby box. Dangling one of the talismans she’d bargained for in front of the girl’s face seemed to calm her nerves. Zera sighed. “They’d better be back soon. Mammal babies are so helpless. You know, I was a tadpole for only a week. True story.”

At the base of the ladder it was pitch black. Mabel pawed along the brick wall until she turned a switch that sounded with a clunk. A dim passageway of concrete walls was illuminated, stretching perpendicular to the store as far as the family could see. Metal support struts formed archways, while jagged pipes snaked along the wall. Merrise cautiously strolled forwards, fascinated by the prospect of what lay at the end of the tunnel. Dipper tapped the stone wall with a pen and turned to his sister. “You didn’t build this.”

Mabel folded her arms. “How do you know? Maybe we did it on the quiet, through black-market contractors.”

“No, I mean you really didn’t build this. The cracks in the concrete, the weathering and rust on those pipes, all of it leads me to assume that this tunnel is over fifty years old.” His eyes glanced upwards and he traced the direction of the tunnel. “Looks like it goes under the main high street, to have it installed you’d probably have disrupted the road for a week or more, but there haven’t been any reports of traffic issues.” He flashed a wry smile. “And for another, that safety sign on the wall behind you has a 1970’s copyright notice on it.”

“Oh,” she said, deflated, turning to look at the sign before shrugging and skipping after her niece. “Zera and I found this place when we were digging around in the backroom.”

“Fascinating,” Pacifica said icily as she trudged slowly along the tunnel. Her eyes darted frantically to the ceiling, as blizzards of dust drifted to the floor with every step. She didn’t trust the roof not to cave in at any moment.

They heard Merrise’s voice echo from ahead. “Is it this way?” She’d come to a red safety door along the right wall, at what appeared to be the halfway point of the underground passage.

Mabel shook her head. “That leads to an accessway for the river. It goes underground for a little while before showing up again on the surface. Zera uses it to cool off and rehydrate sometimes. But that’s not the main show.”

She led the others onwards. Some of the lightbulbs above were flickering or broken. They walked in and out of darkness, placing hands on the wall to keep in a straight line. Stepping over a pile of bricks, Mabel entered into an even dimmer space. She pulled a box of matches out of her jacket and struck one. Her face was lit by an orange glow for only a second before she cursed and dropped the match. Plunged into darkness again, the family could only hear her struggling to slide out another match. A swift strike and they were lit again. “Ow!” Mabel waved her hand and sucked on a finger as the match smouldered on the ground.

She was about to try for a third time, when Pacifica held up her palm. “No, please let’s not go through that again.” A solid streak of light nearly blinded Mabel. Pacifica held up her phone’s flashlight, allowing Mabel to successfully conjure a flame, which she used to set light to a wooden sconce set into the wall.

Satisfied, Mabel blew out her match and put the box in her jacket pocket. She surprised the others by slapping her forehead and pulling out a lighter from the same pocket. “Whoops, forgot I had this.” The steady flickering of the flame was as nothing to the powerful phone torch, but was still enough to throw Pacifica’s scowl into relief.

Dipper blinked as his eyes adjusted, and noticed that the walls were now rougher, made of large stone bricks. A twinge of memory struck him. “Hey, are we where I think we are?” Mabel winked at him and he felt a buzz of excitement.

“Well I’ve got no clue.” Pacifica’s thumb swiped on her phone screen. “GPS is a bust, no signal down here.” Her eyes looked upwards to the ceiling. “Wonder how many layers of earth are between us and the sky? We could be anywhere.”

“Let me open your eyes.” Mabel wagged her finger and led them down a short flight of stairs to a velvet curtain, which she delighted in splitting apart theatrically. “Ta da!” They were in a circular chamber with a low arcing roof suspended by columns. A small pool of water had been excavated from the exact centre of the room. There were further torch sconces and she went around spreading the fire from her lighter.

While Merrise ran around the room, poking her nose into every nook and cranny, Pacifica folded her arms, not deigning to stroll into the dark. “Care to explain this place?” Her voice echoed, and she was vaguely unsettled by finding an entire space like this had existed right under her nose all her life.

“We’re underneath the history museum, this was all built by McGucket,” Dipper explained, “Along with help from the Society of the Open Eye-” He shook his head. “Sorry, they were the Blind Eye back then. Forgot they had a rebrand.”

“Those memory-wiping cultists? More ‘first summer’ nonsense.” Pacifica frowned, aggrieved at once again having missed a vital formative adventure in her husband’s life. “Well, if you had to run around in these mouldy old catacombs I’m glad I missed it.” She hoped her haughty air would cover up her minor disappointment from the others.

“You could have a great Halloween party down here,” Merrise’s voice echoed, and Pacifica panned her light to make sure she didn’t get lost down a hidden side passage. “Mom, get a picture of me under this arch!”

Mabel proudly slapped one of the columns, sending another cascade of dust. “A secret cult HQ right on my doorstep. Is that the coolest, or what! I figure they must have used the building over the road as some kind of backup entrance, to get down here without anyone in the museum seeing. Now it’s all mine! We can get up to the street this way.”

“That would be great,” said Pacifica, who was the least impressed by this brick dungeon. “Well, it would be great if we were any closer to stopping the rampaging love couple up there.”

“Oh yeah,” Mabel said, frowning. “We still haven’t come up with a solution. Dipper, what about you? Any genius ideas popped into your head thanks to my presence?”

He was off in the corner, his eyes tracing a pipe affixed to the wall. “Actually, now that you mention it… do you remember the way to the Hall of the Forgotten?”

“Absolutely, broseph. Sígueme and I’ll show you the way.” The route Mabel led them on seemed like an inexplicable labyrinth of passageways. She had a serene confidence guiding them as she took several turns with seemingly no indication of direction.

Finally they reached an arched tunnel that dead-ended at a thick set of wooden doors. The shape of an eye was moulded across the two doors, with a red cross painted over both. Mabel heaved casually against the doors and Merrise slipped inside as soon as there was a gap wide enough. She gawped at a carved statue of a hooded figure, arms outstretched, standing at the far end of the room. Someone had placed one of the blue and white caps from the Mystery Shack on the statue’s head, and it sat at a crooked angle.

Surrounding the statue were hundreds of small glass tubes, some placed upright around the statue’s base reverentially, others piled into huge messy heaps. Merrise picked one up but it was hollow. There were two more torch sconces in the room, but Mabel had evidently grown tired of relying on Pacifica’s phone or peering through the gloom. She turned on a makeshift extension cord on the floor and an LED lamp installed in the corner bathed the room in a steady electric glow. Merrise’s gaze was drawn upwards. The roof was tangled with a maze of circular glass pipes, each one leading from an unseen source and turning ninety degrees down before dead-ending in this alcove.

Dipper had seen it all before, and ignored everything else to go straight to a brass machine with a darkened screen lurking in the darkness at the edge of the room. He inspected it briefly before nodding to himself. “Perfect.” Pacifica blinked as she was last to enter the room, but had barely a second to take it in before her husband snapped his fingers. “Mabel, I need you to run back to your store, on the double.”

“Righto!” She saluted, then spoke in a hushed voice, “Uh, what for?”

“A little self-help.”

Mabel’s expression widened with understanding, and she shot off like a meteor back out of the hall. Pacifica turned to Dipper with a single eyebrow raised. “Are you being cryptic for a reason or do you just get off on it?”

He smirked. “Bit of both. By which I mean I’ve got an answer for our rogue video-game problem.”

Merrise heard this and halted her digging through the glass tubes to bound over the scattered piles to her parents. “What’s the plan then?”

“A little taste of their own medicine. We’re going retro.”

The townsfolk of Gravity Falls were in a panic. When an 8ft tall mass of pixels careened down the high street, their instinct was to ignore the disturbance. It was the town’s motto after all, to never mind all that and to let the weird be weird. Preferably out of sight and mind. But this was too much to ignore, especially once the multi-limbed hybrid started lobbing fireballs and bolts of static around the place. The pair of fused game characters had ambled towards the old wooden church at the end of the street, lingering near the statue of Nathaniel Northwest, still dusted with clumps of snow.

“I think it is time to admit that I do not know where we are,” Rumble McSkirmish said no less enthusiastically than he said anything else. “All I know is that Soos or this Shack are not located in this vicinity.”

A second mouth tore its way up the creature’s melded face. This one spoke in the high-pitched rhythm of Giffany. “It must be here somewhere!” she yelled in a staccato, before frowning. “Anything outside the mall is unfamiliar to me.”

“Likewise! Hee-yah! Yah!” He let off some more punches mindlessly, shaking Northwest’s statue. A layer of snow fell from the shoulders of the town’s so-called founder. “We need an electrical connection, some way to bridge the gap.”

Giffany caused their joined eyes to squint. “All this organic greenery makes me sick. Find us a physical construct to merge with, now!”

“Yes, beloved, of course.”

“And don’t get snappy with me!”

“Hey, you two!” The pair twisted their neck 360 degrees. Across the street was a blonde woman, with her hands in her pockets and a nonchalant slouch. “Mind the statue, it’s a family heirloom. On second thoughts, go ham, smash it up, see what I care.”

“What do you want, puny weakling?” Rumble grunted, walking to loom over the person who’d dared interrupt him mid-rampage.

She could only shrug. “I’m Pacifica. I hear you two are the best. Best fighting champion, best fantasy girlfriend, whatever. But you’ve got no competition.”

“Competition?” This was Giffany’s shrill voice. “We already know we’re superior!”

“Prove it. You want a real challenge? I’m an elite gamer,” the woman said. Pacifica outwardly grinned, while inwardly cringing hard. She hoped this plan would work without having to say such embarrassing trite for much longer. The things she did for her husband. “Catch me if you can, losers.” She broke into a run, down the high street towards the river.

Rumble and Giffany, angered by this show of irreverence, set off in an ungainly pursuit. They were decidedly unbalanced, with Giffany’s delicate legs holding up a muscly torso and far too many arms to stay stable. Pacifica had the advantage, keeping ahead as her enemies lolloped after. She crossed the bridge over the brook and backed into the museum. “Better hurry, this is a limited time only sale, last chance to preorder.”

To the game characters, this sounded exactly like a siren call. Ignoring all other objectives, they hurtled into the museum’s entrance, knocking one of the doors of its hinges. A woman manning the reception desk looked up. “What the?” She could only watch, mouth agape, as the rage-fuelled creature stomped past, knocking displays aside to chase their quarry. Pacifica made an inward note to try and explain things to the harried receptionist, but this would have to come later, after more pressing matters.

“That’s it, Rumble ‘n Gif, follow me, this way.” She made her way through the corridors of the museum, past displays of frontier life, covered wagons and stuffed bison, tracing the path of one of the pneumatic tubes running along the roof. She went slowly enough so that the pair never lost sight of her. Arriving at the room which housed the secret entrance to the underground passageways she pressed a hand to one of the carvings of an eye nailed around the room. With a hiss, the fireplace in the corner slid away into the wall, unsealing a staircase. She took the steps two at a time, ready to conclude her role as bait.

When she reached the Hall of the Forgotten her daughter was waiting, poised for action by the closed doors. “Are they coming?”

“Hot on my heels. Has Mason got everything ready?”

Merrise nodded and squeezed through the narrow door gap into the hall. Pacifica waited, her back to the door, catching her breath and hoping this crazy scheme would pay off. It was hardly the first time she’d put her faith in her husband’s ingenuity.

From around the corner came Giffany and Rumble, hunched over in the narrow tunnel. They were wide enough to get wedged, only able to advance by dragging themselves using their multiple arms. “Another rival to defeat,” cried both the voices in tandem, confused and tired from the chase. They fell to their knees in front of Pacifica, flickering as if out of energy, and insulated from electricity and internet signal down in the depths.

“Almost there,” Pacifica teased, before slipping behind the door.

Summoning up a wave of energy, Giffany and Rumble surged forwards, knocking the door aside. The room beyond was bathed in darkness, lit only by a faint and shaky light. Across the room was a tv screen, crackling with static. Suddenly a face appeared, joined by a voice partly lost in hiss. “F-f-fixin’ it with Soos!”

The four eyes lit up. There he was, Giffany’s idol, as pure and beautiful as she remembered from her years of dusty inertness. His head hovering amidst a halo of crackling green light. “Finally.” Her voice had begun to fray, echoing and fading. Various clips of Soos played out on the screen. Rumble used a powerful leap to cross the chamber. The pair fell in front of the dark glass screen right when Soos’s face melted away. The screen showed a static blizzard again, which the two constructs found reassuring. Almost without consciously thinking, they dissolved into a shower of pixels that flowed towards the screen. Out of the haze, they could be seen emerging onto the screen, now separated again, taking up only a few inches.

“What, where?” Giffany looked around, unable to see her Soos. Her face quickly expanded to fill the screen. “No, let us out!”

Still miniature in comparison, Rumble looked around, fear and loss etched in his well-defined cheekbones. “A trick? No, how can this be?”

“And, cut there.” Dipper flicked on the lamp and stepped over to the fuzzy image of the pair, now contained.

“Dipper Pines?” Rumble said, aghast. “We will simply break free and emerge once more, to become victorious!”

“And rip out your beating heart along the way!” Giffany shrieked, her hands pawing against the glass from within.

“Not if you two end up on an even more primitive piece of technology. Say bye bye, guys.”

“No!” The pair screamed out in defeat as Dipper switched the screen off.

He could hear the tubes inside the screen powering down with a fading hum. Satisfied, Dipper kicked the table that the brass contraption rested upon and it spat out a black box from the centre mechanism. Gingerly stepping close, Merrise grabbed the box out of the machine and tapped her fingers on the black casing. “Is it over? Are they gone?” She played around with the spinny white circles embedded in the side of the box, then stared down it lengthwise. “Is this thing supposed to be doing something?”

“What you’ve got there is a videotape, a VHS,” Dipper said.

“A video? How do I make it play?” She jabbed at the case again to no avail. “Where’s the touchscreen?”

“It doesn’t- kids these days. It’s not a touchscreen. Or any kind of screen, it’s a tape, you have to insert into a player hooked up to a tv.”

She squinted uncomprehendingly at the tape, before accepting this and smiling. “Cool.”

“It’s also now a dangerous and cursed object,” Pacifica said, grabbing the video out of her daughter’s hands. Merrise pouted, but deferred to her mother’s caution. “They’re really stuck on this old thing?”

Dipper nodded. “Normally a simple CRT monitor or VCR recorder setup wouldn’t capture the complex code of Rumble or Giffany. But this is a slightly more advanced interface, designed to process and play back stored memories via electrical impulses.”

“One of McGucket’s inventions?” Her husband nodded, and she let out a sigh of relief. “Then it’s all over, hooray. Thank goodness your sister happens to be a hoarder who never throws anything out no matter how outdated.” She twiddled one of the sprockets, watching the tape within spool and unspool. When the shiny black strip caught the light she could see Giffany and Rumble’s frozen expressions of anger and defeat. “What do we do with them now?”

“Couples therapy, I think.” Pacifca scowled, not appreciating the joke. “I’m hesitant to wipe the tape. Those two might have been crazy, but we tried burning Giffany once and she came back good as new. Best to leave them stuck on this thing.” Dipper wrote a note in his journal, intending to deal with the pair more decisively at a later date. “I’m sure we can find somewhere safe to store them. Probably in a cardboard box we can shove in a closet and forget about for another decade or two.”

Pacifica leant against Dipper, nuzzling against his cheek. “Sounds fine to me.”

He crossed his arms and smiled at her. “You’re all heart, Paz.”

“You know me so well.”

“Don’t I just.”

Merrise pushed between her parents, and interrupted their flirting. “Why don’t we leave the tape down here?” She took the tape and tossed it onto a nearby pile of tubes which rattled as they were knocked out of place.

“That’s not a bad idea,” Dipper said, stroking his chin. “They’ll remain insulated from electricity and internet signal down here in the depths. A perfect prison.”

“That’s my perfect girl,” Pacifica said, ruffling Merrise’s hat. “Come on, let’s get out of here, I need to see some sunlight again, and to make sure Leah hasn’t gotten into any trouble with her aunts.”

Dipper turned off Mabel’s LED tower, then put his arms around the girls and led them towards the exit “Another adventure complete. You know, this makes me want to see if we have any tapes lying around in a box somewhere at home. Might be fun to see if there are any home movies on them.”

“So,” Merrise said, “These tapes are like those DVD things you have at home?”

“Exactly. We can’t watch everything online. You can pry my physical media collection out of my cold, dead hands.”

“Now who’s the philistine?” Pacifica said, nudging Dipper in the ribs. “All we need to figure out now is how to pay to fix the smashed wall in our living room.”

“A loan from Aunt May?” Merrise put on her most adorable look, and her parents shared a look of teasing exasperation.

Dipper shook his head in mock weariness. “You’re devious, you know that?”

Merrise flashed a wicked grin. “I only get it from the best.”

The door to the chamber fell shut behind them, now home to one more memory that was best left forgotten.

[ladyhoneydee]

30 Day Song(fic) Challenge: Day 5

Today's Song(fic) Challenge prompt was "A song by the first artist you ever loved", and so I have a confession: for the first six years of my life, I was a massive Parrothead. That's right! My first beloved artist was none other than Jimmy Buffet. I had such a dream of going up on stage at a concert during the song "Brown Eyed Girl" (as I was, importantly, a girl with brown eyes. However, for today's song, I went for a spin on "Coconut Telegraph", a classic about a very gossipy town, featuring our favorite Hateno!

I Swear, It's Just Between Me and You

Game: Post-Breath of the Wild

Pairing: Zelink

Word Count: 1435

Keywords: NPC POV of relationship, except it's the whole town, hehe

Their first mistake was to be new in town, and therefore very intriguing to the locals, who always loved a mystery. Their second was to tromp right past Seldon on horseback—sharing a saddle, did you see?!—with faces plied with exhaustion—just why were they exhausted, hm?! Their third was to cozy up in their little love nest for weeks—has anyone even seen the blonde girl leave the house once?—building up the anticipation to staggering heights. And their final mistake was for their love story to be so interesting.

Read the fic on Ao3, or under the cut!

“Did you hear?”

“Did you hear?”

“I heard that—”

Word spreads fast in Hateno, for a village where a third of the residents are under ten or over eighty (or both, but they try to ignore that weird Sheikah scientist up on the hill when they can), and another third are in the fields all day. After festivals, rumors ripple up and down the hills of the town, passed from mouth to eager ear. Every villager knows of a newcomer within a day, no matter how transient their stay may be. And nothing stays secret for long. 

Still, that couple tucked next to Firly Pond make it almost too easy. 

Their first mistake was to be new in town, and therefore very intriguing to the locals, who always loved a mystery. Their second was to tromp right past Seldon on horseback—sharing a saddle, did you see?!—with faces plied with exhaustion—just why were they exhausted, hm?! Their third was to cozy up in their little love nest for weeks—has anyone even seen the blonde girl leave the house once?—building up the anticipation to staggering heights. And their final mistake was for their love story to be so interesting.

“Did you see that?” hissed Amira to Nikki from across the washbasin, eyes wide.

“Walking arm-in-arm like some antiquated knight and lady! It’s just the main street of town. What do they think they’re playing at, all fancy?”

Nikki gleefully shared the news over dinner, and Nebb had some compelling details to share. “That’s the swordsman who showed me all the weapons! Maybe he really is a knight!”

Nikki had been quick to tell her son that the Hyrulean military had died with its royal line a century ago, but that didn’t stop the rumor of the knight spreading like wildfire through the village kids and home to their parents.

Weeks passed with little change, and the gossip threads stretched thin. The Knight would escort the Lady to the general store, and they’d buy goat butter and fabric by the yard, and return to their home after a circuit around town. 

“I think she’s making her own wardrobe,” Amira said one evening, prodding Pruce in the side to get his attention. “I work with clothing all day, you know—those cuts and styles of fabric are for everyday essentials. I wonder why she needs replacements for everything?”

“Why are we discussing this in bed?” groaned Pruce. 

“I heard that her entire town was burning down, and he rode in on a white stallion and saved her! Her leg was trapped under a beam and she couldn’t get free, but he saved her!” Azu crowed to the gaggle of surrounding kids. “That’s why she has no clothes, you know.”

“She has no clothes?” gasped Narah. “How terrible!”

“I heard from Narah that she walks around town…naked?” 

Uma gave Prima a dubious look. “Your inn is in the middle of town. Have you ever seen her walking around town naked?”

“Well…no. No, I haven’t.”

“Shouldn’t believe the first thing you hear from a little anklebiter!”

And yet, the next morning, a pair of nearly-new chemises were waiting on the Lady’s front porch for her, just in case. 

A few weeks later, the town was humming again, because the Lady was out and about.

Nebb would tell anyone who would listen how pretty she was in her green dress, how well it brought out her eyes. Tamana wanted to braid her lovely blonde hair back in intricate patterns suited to her station. Sayge placed a very pointed notice on the bulletin board with an offer for new residents to come ‘round to the dye shop for one free garment.

“She’s a little odd, I think,” Senna said surreptitiously. Thadd, one eye out for suspicious activity, leaned in closer to hear. “I saw her playing in the mud like a child, fitting together guardian parts! And then she ran all the way up the hill to the lab! She’s not very ladylike, I’d say.” She perked up. “Although if she gets mud in her dress, she might want to come dye it!”

The Knight got his fair share of talk, too. Koyin and Ivee privately agreed that if he wasn’t obviously meant for the Lady, they would both be interested in his sturdy frame and strong-and-silent personality, but as it was, they supported her wholeheartedly. Manny, recognizing the Knight from his failed attempt to woo Prima, attempted to spread rumors about him—“He eats rocks! I think he only bathes in the pond outside his house!”—although these crashed and burned just as badly as his romantic overtures.

The day that the Knight and Princess took their turn around town holding hands…now that one fed the gossip mill for weeks. Especially when, two sightings later, they were back to linked arms.

“Oh, I hope that everything is alright for them! The Knight’s eyes look so pained when he looks at her, all that longing…and the way she looks at him when she thinks no one can see! They must be in love, don’t you think?” 

Rhodes patted Ralera’s hand. “We’ll just have to believe they can find the same happiness we did.”

They did end up holding hands again, if you were curious. But shh! That’s a secret!

And then…there came the day of the spring festival.

The Knight and the Lady had lived in the house next to Firly Pond for two seasons now, and the townspeople had grown used to the Lady’s antics—and the Knight’s, as well, which had been unexpected, to say the least; no one had actually believed Manny when he’d said the boy ate rocks. What they hadn’t seen before was the young couple dancing or drinking.

“I know we call her the Lady, but it really seemed like she was doing some sort of court dance at first! Dear thing, I’m glad she lightened up after a few reels.” Clavia tutted her tongue concernedly.

“Did you see the way they packed away those wildberry spritzers? Their faces were as red as the juice by the end!”

“That might’ve been blushing, though. Did you see how they were looking at each other? How closely they were dancing by the end? Save room for Hylia, I say!”

“The way he dipped her, I swear, I would’ve just fallen over on the spot.”

“That’s because you’re just clumsy, Sophie. How about the way she spun him out and led him from behind, though? I would’ve swooned.” 

It was agreed that they were, perhaps, a very dangerous couple. Truly, it was for the best that they were falling in love with each other, and no one else. 

The summer was long and sultry. The fields sizzled with humid warmth from the ocean, and the townsfolk lazed about in the heat, stories flowing off the tongue with even greater ease than usual. The Lady and the Knight hadn’t been that interesting lately, but it was the principle of the thing that counted. Depending on who you asked, you might hear of a betting pool slowly building, about when the couple might approach Reede for a marriage license. The mayor—“Killjoy!”—was very zipped-lipped about the whole thing, much to the bettors’ disapproval.

Of course, it was on the most normal of dog days that the biggest bombflower of them all ignited.

“Teebo, Teebo! I saw the Knight and the Lady kissing!”

“Karin said they were walking down the path towards the beach, and just stopped right there! She had him pinned against the tree by the end of it, and they were both smiling like fools when they finished!”

It was the hottest topic of the summer. That one kiss kept the town buzzing for weeks, until…they started doing it everywhere. All the time. The center of town. On horseback, heading west. Frolicking on the beach. Walking up to the tech lab on the hill. In front of the goddess statue. It just wasn’t quite as interesting to share if everyone had the chance to see it for themselves.

If you were to look very closely at the faces of the Knight and the Lady after a kiss shared in the middle of town—which, of course you wouldn’t, because that would be rude, you have to give them privacy and only stare a little bit—you might see a subtle flavor of amusement, buried beneath the desire. Some theorizing might net you the thought that maybe, just maybe, the jam they’d planted in the cogs of the rumor mill might be intentional. Some sweet, silly revenge, perhaps, from an adoring, fun-loving couple, on a town that never quite stops talking.

Of course, you didn’t hear that from me!