Chapter Text
He was shaking. Shaking, panicking, and running his fingers through his knotted chestnut locks.
Marriage. He thought, an arranged marriage between me and-
Another hand made its way to his own and his thoughts were cut short. He looked up at his twin sister, Mabel, he thought sadly. A fake- yet reassuring- smile stretched across her face, her eyes were red and slightly puffy from crying. She squeezed his hand and then whispered to him.
“It’s okay Dipper, it’s not your fault,” her voice hitched here but she continued, “It’s just circumstance.” She smiled sadly and a wave of guilt and nausea hit him. I’m sorry he thought.
It’s during Dipper Pines’ 18th year that his marriage is arranged for him by his parents. His marriage to Pacifica Northwest, wealthy daughter of local Duke and Duchess Preston and Priscilla Northwest.
This wouldn’t, shouldn’t, have been a problem. But it was, it was because Pacifica and Mabel had been secretly together for nearly four years now. They were happy together, a happiness which was in short supply, and if anyone deserved that happiness it was his sister Mabel.
And now, he thought, I’m the one keeping her from that happiness.
The horse drawn carriage came to a sudden stop just outside of Northwest Manor. He felt even sicker than he had that morning.
Sleep had evaded him the night before, and he looked as though he was a walking corpse, with pale skin, purple rings underneath his eyes, and messy tangled hair.
He sighed tiredly. “I’m sorry Mabel.” He said. She laughed humorlessly and then responded, “What do you have to be sorry for, Dip-Dop? It’s not your fault, I just-” Before she could finish her sentence the carriage door opened, and standing just outside the carriage were their parents, Lord and Lady Pines.
Unlike their son and daughter, both Lord and Lady Pines had a jovial air about them. Their smiles were wide and real, their eyes filled with both pride and happiness. If only they knew the truth, Dipper thought.
Mabel tried for their sake to be happy, or to look happy, but it was strained and obviously fake. Dipper didn’t try, all he wanted was for this day to be over, for the practice wedding to be over. He wanted nothing more than to escape to the surrounding woods, to explore and discover things; odd beings or objects, anything to remove his focus from this dreadfully awful day.
Upon their entrance, the Pines were led to a parlor room by one of the many maids bustling about the house. It was there that the Pines found the Northwest family awaiting their arrival.
The maid then spoke up softly, “E-excuse me, Duke a-and Duchess Northwest, the Pines have arrived.”
“We can see that, now leave so that we may go about our business.” Preston Northwest responded coldly.
The maid nodded silently and took her leave.
Preston then spoke again, “Now, if we could finish this quickly I would greatly appreciate it.”
“Yes, yes of course, just lead the way.” Lord Pines responded quickly.
The few hours after that were absolutely dreadful.
Dipper had attempted to recite his vows nearly eight times before he dropped the ring.
His parents looked on mortified and Mabel concerned, as he rubbed his hands over his face and eyes. Sighing, Dipper dropped both his hands to his sides and said to the whole room, “I, I need a break. I’m sorry, it’s just,” He sighed again. He then picked up the ring off the marble floor and left the room without another word.
Dipper exited the building and headed straight towards the woods. The surrounding forests always made him happy. They were peculiar, filled with weird creatures and oddities known only to him and people like his Great-Uncle Stanford.
Soon after escaping the stuffy and uncomfortable practice wedding Dipper found himself lost in the forest. Practicing his vows aloud for the inevitable official wedding between himself and Pacifica which would have to happen eventually.
“With his hand, I will- I will-” he sighed again. Walking forward into a clearing Dipper soon noticed that the moon was already out. How much time had he spent wandering about the woods?
He didn’t care to think too much about it, but he did notice that his feet were aching and decided then to sit down on a nearby rock to rest before heading back towards town.
Back towards that awful wedding.
Back towards his unchangeable fate.
“Why is that fate chose this for us? I just want to be happy.” It was after those few words had been spoken that Dipper noticed change in temperature, and the spindly hand-shaped branch peaking up from underneath the earth.
Curiously he prodded at it with his foot.
It was sudden, one minute he had been curiously inspecting the peculiar hand-shaped branch, and the next his foot had been captured by the odd thing.
Fighting to escape from the obviously supernatural creature he had just been inspecting, Dipper accidentally fell backwards off of the rock he’d been sitting atop uprooting whatever had been attached of to the weird branch and taking a small part of it with him. He lay there a small half second, mystified by what had just happened. The hand-shaped portion it had followed him down but was now crawling up his leg away from his foot. It crawled all the way up to his hand where it then proceeded to intertwine both its and Dipper’s fingers.
What!? He thought, both horrified and intrigued.
Dipper then proceeded to stand up and attempted to remove branch hand from his. To his surprise he found that the thing that had intertwined itself with his hand was not a branch, but a skeletal hand.
A skeletal hand belonging to something that, most likely, had been human once upon a time.
Something which was probably still alive.
Exhilarated, Dipper peaked back into the small clearing hoping to get a peek at what the hand had been attached to.
This is so much better than that awful wedding.
It was then that he noticed the hand-less arm peeking out of the ground and then the other more fleshy hand attempting to free itself from the ground.
Dipper then made the subconscious decision to help whomever, whatever was in the ground out. Grabbing the other, more human looking hand Dipper tugged until he heard the break in the ground and felt the other half of the creature pop out of the ground. Letting go of it, Dipper looked the odd creature over.
He watched as it poped its back and proceeded to shake the dirt out of its hair. When it was finished with that, it stood up and stepped out of its shallow grave. It, or he, then looked up at Dipper through his oddly blue, almost white bangs.
The sight of the nameless man, was enchanting to say the least. He looked like death, with ghostly almost white skin, a head of messy soft-looking pale blue hair, the skeletal arm with no hand, and the exposed rib cage that could be seen through his tattered and ripped suit.
But, Dipper thought, he also looked alive, more alive than any one of the various citizens found in the less rural parts of Gravity Falls. His eyes were gold, shining with life, and the paleness of his complexion made the freckles peppering his face all that more striking. He was grinning, a bit crazed, but stunning nonetheless.
He was a sight to behold, and he stole away Dipper’s breath away, that was until he opened his mouth.