The End is Just the Beginning (a Bad End Friends story)

Chapter 7

Mabel was about to tickle Bipper. She had him pinned, she had planned, but so did he. He elbowed her in the face, sending her off him. Bipper got up before she could recuperate.

"Weakness is for humans," he said, but Mabel was not paying the body stealer any attention. She was looking for the journal. She found it snatched it up. She curled up into the fetal position preparing for some kind of pain inflicted by Bipper, but it never came.

Then Bipper started to scream. Mabel looked up, worried for her brother, when Bipper kicked her in the chest. Mabel and the journal flew back a few inches. He grabbed the journal, sent a wave of blue fire out towards the crowd, and fled the crumbling theater.

Mabel went into shock. She sat on her knees in a daze, staring at the wreckage they had caused. She couldn't process what had just happened and could just sit there until Wendy, who was one of the only able-bodied family members, came and got her off of the stage with comforting words to a paramedic that had shown up a moment before.

Mabel did not talk much after that, which was uncharacteristic of her, but what did she have to say? The sock opera was a disaster, the theater in ruins, Stan had a broken rib from fallen debris, Soos had burns along his arms, hands, and back from protecting the others, and Wendy had a concussion.

Not to mention the loads of dead: Manly Dan, Wendy's father, the town's officers, who were found hand in hand, and the Northwests were just a few of those struck down by Bill's murder spree.

The town had a mass funeral, everyone there battered, bruised, or, of course, dead. But Mabel did not cry. She wasn't even sad. She was determined since she had a search party to organize.

They searched for weeks, Ford eventually joining them, until one by one, they stopped searching. The FBI finally declared Dipper dead.

Even after the case was closed and even after attending her twin's funeral, Mabel spent every second she could in their room as she tried to think where Dipper could have gone.

One day, Stan came in to bring Mabel food.

"Hey, Pumpkin. You doing all right?" Stan said slowly.

"Yeah, I think I've gotten him this time, Gunkel Stan!" she explained, not looking up from a map covered in little red 'x's. "I think..." She trailed off because Stan had put a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"Sweety," Stan said gently as Mabel turned her head. He looked her dead in the eye. "Dipper is gone, but your birthday is coming up soon. Maybe we could celebrate it? Invite a few friends over, have some cake-"

"Dipper's not gone!" Mabel screamed. "We need to find him and all you want to do is party?!" Red tinged her vison and next thing she knew, both her uncles were dead on the floor, and Mabel was soaked in red.

Once she realized what she had done, she sank to her knees and started to cry, but the sobs soon turned to chuckles then to hysterical laughter.

Her uncles were right; she should celebrate their birthday, Mabel thought. Maybe Dipper will come back. He has to come to his own Birthday Party.

Mabel went to work planning her birthday extravaganza. She went into town to give her invitations to everyone.

The day finally came. Mabel put on her birthday sweater and went to the front porch to wait for her party guests to arrive. Mabel sat and waited all day, but no one came. She waited all night, and yet still no one came.

Eventually the sun rose, with it the light of a new day.

She laughed. Mabel laughed as something broke inside her and as tears of disappointment leaked from her eyes. While singing, "Happy Birthday to me," softly to herself, she skipped to the storage room and grabbed a partially empty can of gasoline and a box of matches. Mabel poured the contents on the Shack and lit a match.