The Remnants of Time (Original Version)

Dipper's Secret

In a dark living room of a house, the outlines of the two children suddenly appeared in a purple light, before finally disappearing with another bright flash.

When the light finally died down, Aris and Athena were standing there, on the carpeted floor of their house.

It was a small room of about ten by seven feet. It had pale periwinkle walls, beige carpeting, and a tan couch with simple cushions. There was also a television screen bolted to the wall opposite of the couch. Hanging on the walls were also several pictures of younger versions of the twins.

Athena examined the room cautiously, before finally turning towards her brother.

"Alright, I don't think Dad's made it home yet" she said.

Aris let out a sigh of relief.

"We made it back in time."

"Two minutes and thirty seconds to get back home before I noticed" said the voice of someone new. "I'm surprised it took you that long."

The siblings both tensed, before turning around rather reluctantly.

Standing there was none other than Dipper Pines.

He was a man in his early forties, with naturally tousled chocolate colored hair and a rosy, rounded nose. He had an average build and height for someone his age, though he looked shorter because he was slouched over tiredly with his hands on his hips.

"Dad!" Aris said, forcing a rather nervous smile onto his face. "W-what's up?"

Dipper sighed in frustration.

"You kids know the rules: no leaving the house before 10:00 am or later than 4:00 pm. If you want to go somewhere outside those hours, then I have to be there with you."

"Your rules are so stupid!" snapped Aris. "We literally can't go anywhere!"

"I have to be able to keep an eye on you" Dipper replied through gritted teeth, as he tried to force a calm tone into his voice.

"Did you really have to install a security system to do that?"

"Well it appears that doesn't matter anyways, since you've found a way to bypass it" snapped Dipper, as he held up a remote, and used it to turn on the TV.

The screen flashed to life, revealing the security footage of the entire house. Aris and Athena appeared to be playing a game of chess in the footage.

Athena in the footage smirked at her brother, before placing her knight a few spaces forward.

"And checkmate!" she said, as she held out her hand smugly. "Now hand it over."

Aris in the footage was muttering curses under his breath as he reluctantly reached into his jacket pocket and brought out a Caffeinator 8.0 bar, which already had a bite out of it.

He placed it grudgingly into her hand.

However, Dipper pressed the rewind button until the time in the corner read, 4:30 pm.

In the footage, Aris had plugged in a laptop into the TV, and was typing commands into the keyboard as Athena was packing a green backpack beside him.

"I'm hacking into the security system" Aris was saying in the recording. "I'm uploading footage of us from three months ago instead. This should cover up our disappearance."

"Ok, but we still can't be gone for too long" Athena was saying, as she shoved another item into the backpack.

She then turned back towards her brother.