Never Trust Your Demons

59

"Wooowee!" Gideon climbs once again on top of his truck. "I dare say y'all almost had the jump on me there for a second, but this ain't your Gravity Falls anymore! Out here, I win!"
"He's monologing," I hiss. "Isn't this, like the part we catch him off-guard and get away miraculously?"
"I think we used up all the miraculousness getting here," Wendy grunts in reply as Gideon claps and gets thrown a conch horn, which he blows.
"Bill's henchbats will be here any minute to retrieve y'all," He says smugly. In the distance, I can see a cloud of said bats flying from the fearamid.
"Crap, that is a lot of eyebats..." I gulp. But seriously? Are that many needed?
"MABEL'S MINE NOW!" Gideon continues, laughing maniacally.
"...is she?" Dipper questions suddenly after a second.
"Well, yeah," Gideon scoffs, "I have her trapped, ergo, Mabel is MINE!" I can't help but notice the uncertainty in his voice.
See that's what I was talking about, the whole catching off-guard thing...
"Gideon, listen to me," Dipper continues. "If I've learned anything this summer it's that you can't force someone to love you," I suppress an "Aw" as he glances back at Wendy. You're "over" her, huh, champ? "The best you can do is strive to be someone worthy of loving."
"Oh, I'm worthy o' lovin'!" Really? Because I'm really not loving this. "These prisoners love me!" The prisoners surrounding us cheer in agreement.
How. You are a pig-nosed child. How did you even survive that long in prison with these guys and-more importantly-somehow become their leader?!
"But Mabel doesn't," Dipper presses.
Or us, I continue to add on mentally.
"...Because you're selfish!"
Is that it? The only reason?
"But you can change! Bill thinks there's no heroes in this world," For some reason, I feel a bit sheepish as Bill is mentioned. It could be the fact that no one knows I still sort of have feelings for the sadistic triangle fellow? "But if we work together and fight back, we can defeat him! You wanna be Mabel's hero? Stand up to Bill, and let us save her!"
"That's crazy!" Gideon squeals. "You know what Bill would do to me if that happens?"
"What, you scared of Bill?" Ghost-eyes asks.
"To be fair..." I glance around at the ensued chaos around us.
"No, I ju..." Gideon stammers. "It's a complicated situation!"
"Look inside, Gideon!" Dipper continues his speech. "If all this is for Mabel, then ask yourself what Mabel would want you to do!"
Gideon pauses, looking at a piece of paper he pulled out of his hair. "Dipper..." He says softly. "Will you tell her what I did?"
"O-Of course..." Dipper stammers, apparently a bit surprised that all worked.
"I hope you're right about this," He says nervously. "Guys, new plan!" He turns to his henchmen. "Bill's minions are gonna be on us in seconds. But I'm not gonna let that dumb triangle be the warden o' me! Y'all ready for a good old fashioned prison brawl?" The prisoners cheer and drive toward the fearamid. "Henchmen, rollout!"
"Whew!" Soos sighs after a second. "And I thought I was gonna have to throw down!"
I laugh. "So when'd you have time to practice all that?" I joke, punching Dipper's shoulder lightly. Then I wince, touching the top of my forehead lightly. "Okay, yeah. Thinking's starting to hurt now..."

After that and a short stop to bandage my apparently bleeding skull, it's fairly easy to make it to Mabel's bubble, which is much bigger than I originally thought.
"Okay, remember, guys:" Dipper begins. "This is a prison bubble designed by Bill. We've got to prepare ourselves for what we find in here."
"And something tells me it could be the opposite of what you expect..." I mutter quietly, remembering what Bill said about it being her self-made utopia.
"Whatever it is, we'll do it together!" Soos smiles. "For Mabel!" He puts his hand in the middle of the semi-circle we've formed in front of the lock.
Wendy puts her hand on top of his. "For Mabel!"
"For Mabel," I agree, joining them. The three of us look expectantly at Dipper.
Dipper puts his hand on top of our, a determined look crossing his face. "For Mabel."
With that, he take the key and unlocks the padlock. The chains around the bubble fall to the ground.
Cautiously, the four of us enter the bubble.
"Mabel! Mabel!" Dipper calls, looking around desperately. The thing is...what is there to look around at? All around us is a white void. Even where we just came through of blank nothingness. "Okay guys, Bill has taken over the town and if his weirdness spreads he's gonna take over the whole world," ...Thank you, Mr. Exposition... are we in like the beginning of the second half of a two-parter and for some reason need to update the audience of our current situation? "Our first step to stopping him is rescuing Mabel, but he's got her trapped in this strange prison bubble."
"What is this place anyway?" Wendy asks.
"Some utopia..." I snort under my breath. "Does anyone else think this void's a bit bigger than it first seemed outside?"
I freeze at a cracking sound. We all look down and see rainbow-colored fractures coming through the floor
With no warning beyond that, the floor caves in and we fall screaming.
And surrounded by rainbows.
Seriously, this is starting to hurt my eyes.
"Guys, if I die," Soos says suddenly. "I wanna die hugging!" He grabs Dipper, Wendy and I in a tight... chokehold/bear hug.
"Soos, you're choking me!" Dipper cries out.
"S-soos! Let go!" I manage to choke out.
"Let my body be your shield!" Soos ignores our struggling.
Our shouts are cut short as we land on something bouncy.
"Huh?" Dipper stomps on the ground a couple times. "Is the entire ground a... bouncy castle?"
"Do you hear 80's music?" Wendy looks around.
"And does the air smell like childlike wonder?"
I raise an eyebrow. "A...ctually, yes, and I don't even know what that means..."
We turn around to find one of those net/entrance things found on bounce houses. Opening it, we find something out of a kid's cartoon show. Rainbows, sparkles, more rainbows, boy bands, cuteness, little animals, and every "girlish" thing you could imagine.
"This is Mabel's prison?" We go through, entering the world.
"It's fun-o'clock everyone," An announcement echoes throughout the world. "Today's weather calls for rainbows with a chance of dance parties. If you are the owner of a unicorn with a top hat, please come to the ice cream beach. Your unicorn is being towed."
There's a brief pause.
Then I throw my hands in the air.
"Okay, I'm already done with this."