SerenDark

She/Her ❖ Artist Twitter Carrd Ko-fi Art tag: #Seren's Art [Favorite series] ❖ Soulsborne, Arknights, MadoMagi/MagiReco, Tales Of, Half-Life/Portal/HLVRAI, holoTEMPUS, Gravity Falls ❖ [Commissions are closed.] ❖ Currently working on finishing my existing backlog.

[serendark]

🎉I NOW HAVE A SHOP!! 🎊🎉

HUGE thanks to @acggoods for accepting me, I'm so excited to finally have merch! :D

Please check it out!

• Rainbow Acrylic Keychains of ALL 31 Magitober 2024 chibis

• Broken Glass Acrylic Keychains of all 8 Billford Week 2025 pieces [EDIT: These are now Glitter Acrylic instead!]

🛒🔗 https://acggoods.com/store/serendark 💖

I will draw unique art for brand new items eventually, but for now, I'm really busy with zines and commission work, so please take this old stuff ;w;

I know it's not all necessarily the best art for keychains, but I hope it's still cool!

[serendark]

💖 SHOP UPDATE 💖

All of the chibis I illustrated for the Connect zine (AVAILABLE HERE!) are now available as:

Clear Acrylic Keychains

Die Cut Holo Stickers

Thank you so much for supporting @connectfanzine, and thanks for considering my shop! https://acggoods.com/store/serendark

[zzoupz]

Here comes the sun

And I say, "It's all right"

[guardianspirits13]

aro(sp)ace

[lewadny]

happy june to everyone, especially my fellow aroaces

[lewadny]

Listen

LISTEN

I'M SCREAMING THE MAIN SEQUENCE *IS* THE AROACE FLAG WHAT

[coldbronzemoon]

hi btw in case you were wondering: i am a writer for the across the multiverse zine!! (@gfacrossthemultiversezine) if you like my fics please consider checking out the zine's preorder on the 15th. please also consider checking it out if you love @nropay's art as much as i do, or if you want to see the wonderful writing and art of a bunch of other contributors. so much cool art and writing!!

[sillyrapids]

reality is an illusion & the universe is a hologram

[tempusedax-rerum]

hey do you wanna learn some new words?

Of course you do. Here's a bunch of words my List of Words I Need to Use Somewhere (including the ones I've already crossed out).

Genuflect: to bend the knee or touch one knee to the floor in reverence or worship Querulous: full of complaints; complaining Threnody: a poem, speech, or song of lamentation, especially for the dead; dirge; funeral song Evacipate: a fake scrabble word used in the movie Primer. Fake meaning = to undo the consequences of your actions by changing the original circumstances; to erase your own history Prescient: knowledge of things or events before they exist or happen; having foresight Stochastic: of or relating to a process involving a randomly determined sequence of observations each of which is considered as a sample of one element from a probability distribution Estivation: summer hibernation Alveola: a small cavity, cell, or pit on the surface of an organ (often the lungs) (plural = alveoli) Antiphrasis: the use of a word in a sense opposite to its proper meaning Calumnious: slanderous, defamatory Prolix: extended to great, unnecessary, or tedious length; long and wordy Probity: honesty, integrity Accismus: an ironic rhetorical device, in which one feigns indifference, or makes a pretense of refusing something one desires Viridescent: greenish Bivouac: a usually temporary encampment under little or no shelter Eigengrau: the dark grey seen behind the eyelids Prevarication: to deviate from the truth Insouciant: nonchalant Prurient: marked by or arousing an immoderate or unwholesome interest or desire (sexual desire especially) Execrable: detestable, wretched Oleaginous: oily Zugzwang: the necessity of moving in chess when all options are to one's disadvantage Exegesis: exposition, explanation Pleach: interlaced or plaited trees Meretricious: tastelessly showy and falsely attractive; pretentious Harridan: an ill-tempered scolding woman Flensing: to strip off blubber or skin Sibilant: having, containing, or producing the sound of or a sound resembling that of the s or the sh in sash Puerile: juvenile, childish Verisimilar: having the appearance of truth; probable Ebullient: boiling, agitated; liveliness and enthusiasm Commensalism: a relation between two kinds of organisms in which one obtains food or other benefits from the other without damaging or benefiting it Dubitative: tending or given to doubt; expressing doubt Sophistry: subtly deceptive reasoning or argumentation Importunate: troublesomely urgent; overly persistent in request or demand Perfidious: treacherous, disloyal Tyronic: amateurish Imperious: arrogant, domineering Supercilious: coolly and patronizingly haughty Sinistral: left-handed; or relating to the direction of the whorls on a gastropod shell Vociferous: marked by or given to vehement insistent outcry Shibboleth: a word or saying used by adherents of a party, sect, or belief and usually regarded by others as empty of real meaning; a truism or platitude Vituperative: uttering or given to censure: containing or characterized by verbal abuse Parochial: of or relating to a church parish Sotto voce: under the breath, in an undertone (in a stage whisper kind of way) Perspicuity: plain to the understanding, especially because of clarity and precision of presentation Perspicacity: acuteness of perception, discernment, or understanding Oblique: not straightforward; indirect; obscure; hence, disingenuous; underhanded; perverse; sinister Panegyric: formal or elaborate praise; or a eulogistic oration or writing Zeitgeber: an environmental agent or event (such as the occurrence of light or dark) that provides the stimulus setting or resetting a biological clock of an organism (“time giver”) Suprachiasmatic nucleus: the part of the brain which acts as a biological clock and measures light input Inchoate: not fully formed Ululate: to howl or wail, especially in two short sounds Concomitant: conjoined or co-occurring

[sorrowfulwill]

headcanon that wendy knew about both dipper’s crush on her AND robbie genuinely thinking this twelve year old boy would actually steal his girlfriend

[3liza]

why is pjackk back unbanned?

Post by @3liza · 1 image

💬 1  🔁 0  ❤️ 60 · reference post about the "phantom report bug" · this post is not rebloggable because i need to be able to update it and ed

^^^ i spent all night and yesterday compiling information about a "phantom report bug", where people are getting emails from tumblr support about TOS reports they did not file. pjackk was banned off one of these phantom reports, i told tumblr support about it, and now he's unbanned. i think @garaks-padded-bra was also banned erroneously off a phantom report, so hopefully that will get reversed soon as well

PLEASE CHECK YOUR EMAIL FOR PHANTOM REPORT EMAILS. if you spot any, even if theyre old, tell me about them so i can add them to the list (linked above), and report them to tumblr support. POLITELY. tumblr support wants to fix this.

[abyssalzones]

I'm unsure if there's some other way we're supposed to let you know about these phantom reports (no replies enabled on posts/askbox is closed/dms aren't open to non-mutuals) so public forum is my last resort but I just checked my email and I have a report filed (which I did not and Would not make) against a post reblogged by @/intactics, of a semi-nude artistic portrait, email dated april 9th 2026.

Don't know if this qualifies as this exact bug since the post is flagged as "mature content" now but considering the subject of the post it could just be a cross-contamination problem with tumblr's other biggest content moderation issue where it seems to erroneously flag anything that so much as suggests nudity, even the kind of thing that would be perfectly okay in public artistic spaces.

[3liza]

appreciate the heads up but just so it is clear ^^^^ this was at the link i put at the top of the post. the submission button should work, but if it doesnt, the tag is a great option because it's wide open rn. please report the phantom report email you got to tumblr supprt and ty for letting me know about it too, i wil put it on the list!

[kerink]

here are all the illustrations i made for my submission to the @gfnonfictionzine ! this was such a fun and unique experience. i had a blast really digging into a character i don't typically focus on and centering the story around his world view.

thank you again to the mod team and everyone who beta read for me!

click here to read the digital zine and click here to preorder a physical copy

[clarisimart]

Sneak peek of some merch I made for @gfacrossthemultiversezine!

It has been an honor and pleassure to be included in the Across the Multiverse zine, there’s a ton of truly incredible, talented people in it!

You won’t want to miss it!

Preorders open on June 15th!!!

[cthulhu-of-the-night]

Hey everyone, here's a sneak preview of the merch I worked on for the @gfacrossthemultiversezine! I'm very excited to show yall what I've done for the zine. I had the most amazing time working on this project with so many wonderful people!

Preorders for the zine start on June 15th

[cherrysoos-scribbles]

woah what's this? a sneak peek at the comic i made for @gfacrossthemultiversezine?? no way!

i'm so beyond excited to share this comic with y'all! this zine's got so many insanely talented artists and writers, and such a wonderful and dedicated team putting it all together. thank you AtMV mods for letting me be a part of this, it's such a huge honor 💕💕💕

don't miss out!

PRE-ORDERS AVAILABLE STARTING JUNE 15TH!!

[gfacrossthemultiversezine]

Our next artist is @cthulhu-of-the-night! They were a real triple threat, making spot and margin art for both @/fiddlestans and @dark-lord-of-awesomeness' fics, and made a plethora of awesome merch! Be sure to check out their other works, like their Janitor Ford AU and Tarot Card project!

[witchinatower]

The neurodivergent urge to collapse to the ground and wait for the universe to solve all your problems for you...

[ckret2]

Chapter 115 of human Bill Cipher getting uncomfortably comfortable with joining in on the Mystery Shack's shenanigans: if Waddles is gonna lay an egg then by god they're gonna make a tourist attraction outta it.

And: Stan and Bill try to further convince Mabel that sometimes lying to people for money is okay.

Plus, Dipper and Ford visit the farm. Yaaay.

####

As they drove past the Mystery Shack's parking lot and the first tourist cars of the day, Ford glanced at Dipper. He was sitting with his arms crossed, glaring out the windshield.

Ford wasn't sure how to comfort children. Or other people, but he sort of assumed children worked a bit differently and therefore were an extra challenge. He hesitantly reached out to pat Dipper's shoulder.

Dipper asked, "Did he ever do that to you?"

"What?"

"Spoil whatever you were investigating by giving you the answers."

Ford sighed. "No, but there was never a time I didn't want whatever answers he was offering."

"Really?" Dipper frowned, and for no reason Ford could name he briefly felt ashamed. "But, you're an investigator! Why would you want to get all the answers without getting to investigate yourself?"

"The way I saw it, if he answered all my questions, that meant I could move on to my next questions even faster," Ford said. "His answers never ended my research, only accelerated it. I didn't have to spend that time trying to independently discover facts somebody else already knew. Einstein couldn't have developed his theory of special relativity had he not been able to build upon the classical mechanics of Newton." He realized he was edging dangerously close to saying the same thing Bill had said to Dipper—why reinvent the wheel?—so he cleared his throat and hastily added, "And, in the end, I was a poorer scientist for it. Trusting Bill's unsourced claims without question or verification no doubt contributed to my vulnerability to his manipulation. I was naive."

So much of what Bill said had been verifiable, though. He had told Ford where to find invaluable magical artifacts, and Ford had found them; he had taught him new and forgotten languages, and Ford had then been able to read them... he had taught him how to build an interdimensional portal. He had lied about the danger and what was on the other end, but dammit, the portal was real and so was all the science underpinning it. And Bill had given that to Ford.

But even if only one out of a hundred of Bill's claims was a lie (and "1 out of 100" was a laughably low estimate compared to the reality), Bill could make that one time devastating enough to outweigh the other ninety-nine. It wasn't worth it. It never had been.

But Ford would be lying to himself if he said he didn't still want all of Bill's secrets.

####

When Wendy came in, Soos told her about Waddles's miraculous egg.

By mid-morning, a tourist overheard them discussing the egg and expressed delight that the Mystery Shack's employees remained "in character" even when they weren't doing a tour and asked about the egg.

Within an hour, Stan heard about the public's interest in the egg and ran to tell Soos his brilliant idea.

And by lunch, Soos and Stan had pushed the living room furniture out of the way and hastily constructed a false room out of bed sheet "curtains" around Waddles's nest, connected it to the door to the gift shop, and covered the Employee's Only sign with a cardboard sign that said, "See the world-famous egg-laying pig! ($50 each, no flash photography)".

"After all the money Waddles cost me last summer, it's about time he starts paying me back," Stan said, hanging up a banner that read "SOME EGG!"

"Can we really call Waddles world-famous?" Mabel asked. "That feels like false advertising."

Bill said, "Some of the tourists are international! He'll be world-famous once they get home! It's not dishonest, just prematurely honest."

"What he said." Stan stepped back to admire the tableau. Waddles sat on his nest beside his egg like he was waiting for someone to take his yearbook picture. There were two spotlights on Waddles and the egg, which Mabel complained would make him too hot, so he'd been given sunglasses. Stan said, "Perfect!"

The sunglasses slipped off Waddles's face. He chewed one of their end pieces. 

Bill said, "Wouldja look at this setup! Isn't this a pretty picture!" He framed the scene between his fingers. (After a second, he remembered to frame it in a finger rectangle rather than a finger triangle.)

"It sure is! Good work with the curtains, pumpkin," Stan said, patting Mabel's head. "The tourists will be begging to take Waddles's picture!"

Bill hesitated. "Yeah! The tourists." For a moment, he'd been imagining how this spread would look drawn in Ford's journal. Because he would be drawing this in his journal, right? This had to be the best thing that'd happened to Ford all summer.

When Ford inevitably wrote about this day, what would he write about Bill?

####

"Interesting paint job you got there," Farmer Sprott said.

Dipper and Ford looked back at the lady wizard with the majestic beard spray painted on the side of Stan's car. "My great niece painted it," Ford said.

"Mhm. I'm more partial to pastorals over this high fantasy stuff," Sprott said. "Anyway, what can I do you for?" He fixed them with a wary look. "I hope you aren't here to steal more of my cattle."

"Mor— wh—? I'm no cattle thief!" Ford said indignantly.

"Oh, oh, you're the other one! Well, that's fine. Come on in," Sprott said.

They'd dropped in on Fiddleford, who didn't know anything helpful—apparently pigs hadn't laid eggs in Tennessee. Or been given eggs. Perhaps it was something that only happened to local pig breeds. Which was why their next stop was the farm where Waddles had been born and raised.

As they followed Sprott onto his property, Ford whispered, "Stan's been stealing cows?"

"It was Mabel's idea. She wanted to save one from being butchered," Dipper whispered back. "It had eight legs and laser vision."

Ford considered that. "It's a good thing I wasn't here," he said. "I would have stolen it, too."

####

"What's with the camera?" Sprott asked. Dipper had pulled his camera out and was filming anything he could see: the farmhouse, the petting zoo, the pigs and cows, Ford, Sprott.

"Oh, just documenting our ongoing investigation," Dipper said. (He'd groused in the car about his filming success this summer—he'd already missed out on filming a giant space axolotl, and the dancing zombie footage he'd hoped for from Robbie was corrupted—and he didn't intend to miss anything else cool.)

"Investigation?" Sprott asked, immediately on his guard. "Into what?"

"Um... the strange and paranormal things in town?"

Ford added, "I'm an unusualogist."

"Oh! Oh, sure, that's all right, then. As long as you're not looking into any secret societies! What do you want to know about?" Sprott asked. "Witches? I could name a few witches in town if you're interested."

"Maybe later," Ford said. "Actually, right now we want to know about your animals. Have any of your pigs ever had eggs?"

"Eggs? Nope! Not a one!"

"Ah." Dead end, but Ford supposed that wasn't surprising. Dipper lowered his camera with a sigh.

Proudly, Sprott added, "Not in over twenty-five years!"

Ford blinked at him. "Pardon?"

Dipper said, "As in, your pigs had eggs twenty-six years ago?"

"Maybe one or two, but we haven't had any slip-ups since then," Sprott said defensively. "We've been very proactive about removing any we find in their sty. And twenty-five years is a fairly impressive stretch, if I do say so myself!"

Ford's hands itched for his journal and pen. He reminded himself that Dipper was filming all of this. "You see, my great-niece got a pig last year that was raised on this farm—"

"Ah yes, old Fifteen-Poundy, I remember."

"He's more like hundred-poundy now," Dipper said.

"That so!"

Ford went on, "And this morning, he appeared to have... had or received an egg. We're trying to find out how."

Sprott's face went grave. "Then you ought to get it away from him as soon as possible."

Ford and Dipper exchanged an alarmed look. Before they could ask why, Sprott went on, "No—you say he got it sometime last night? Then it may already be too late. I reckon the thing inside that egg has already changed. Sorry to say your only choice now is to destroy the beast inside. But whatever you do with it—just don't bring it 'round here."

"Why?" Ford asked. "What's in it? What will it do?"

Sprott shook his head. "I dare not speak of the devilry that beast shall rain down upon your heads. But take my word for it, now—you don't want to find out the hard way."

Ford was already on the verge of bolting back to the car. "How long do we have?"

"Oh, usually up to a week. Heat like this, though, it might only be a couple days."

He only marginally relaxed. Then they had time—it was indoors in the air conditioning. Still, though, he didn't intend to put off dealing with it. "You've handled these things several times, I take it? Is there any way to vanquish the beast aside from simply smashing the egg open and risking unleashing it sooner?"

Sprott nodded. "Yeup. Drop it in water."

"Fascinating! Does the purifying power of water dispel whatever magic formed the egg? Or is it because of its alchemical associations—fire in the form of summer heat gives it life and fire's opposite water takes it away...?"

"Just drowns the thing."

"Oh."

"But your usual egg-smashing tools will serve just fine. Hammers, large rocks, bags of bricks..."

Ford wondered what went on in this man's kitchen. "Thank you for your time. I'll let you know if we have any follow up questions." For now, though, it was more important to get back to the shack as fast as possible.

As they headed back to the gate and their car, Dipper asked, "What do you think is in it?"

"An excellent question. Nothing good, I'm sure." He was wracking his brain for any pig-related monsters he might have heard of. The demonic money-stealing Babi Ngepet? No, that was allegedly a human shapeshifter, like a werepig. Something similar to the Beast of Dean, a boar which would grow massive enough to fell trees? Or like Fengxi, the two-headed boar which flattened villages and summoned rain? Why an egg, though? "I suppose we'll have an opportunity to examine the remains of whatever comes out of the egg and find out that way."

Dipper grimaced. "Mabel's gonna hate that."

Ford knew she would.

In the car, he cranked the a/c as high as it would go as soon as he turned the car on. He had a pretty high heat tolerance, but a car sitting outside in the July sun was beyond his limit. "We'll have a chance to explain the situation to her before we take the egg," Ford said. "It's a good thing we've been keeping it out of this heat."

####

"Whew!" Soos wiped his forehead with his already sweat-damp suit sleeve. "Man, I don't know what it is, but these two spotlights we've got on the egg? They're usually pretty hot, but now they seem super mondo hot. It's like an oven in here!"

"It's these 'walls' you put up." Bill poked at one of the blanket walls hung up around the nest to cut it off from the rest of the living room. "Plus that air conditioning unit we had to turn off so it wouldn't blow the sheets around."

"Oh, yeah! That would do it," Soos said. "Mystery solved!"

"Not to mention all the body heat left by the tourists cycling through here. This room is like a sweat-powered sauna," Bill said. "With the addition of itchy synthetic fiber blanket walls and carpet to soak up the heat and body odor."

Stan grimaced in disgust.

"Hey, speaking of," Bill said, "did you know some bee species kill wasps by surrounding them and cooking them with their own body heat? Kills a lot of the bees too, but—"

"Knock it off," Stan snapped. "I'm getting hotter just from listening to you."

Waddles—now shielded by a parasol, with a fan aimed at him—appeared perfectly content with this arrangement. He'd only left his nest a couple times—to take care of pig business and to grab a couple of extra blankets for the egg—and only when Mabel was in the room to guard it. She'd been drawing on the egg with crayons all morning.

"I can put up with the heat for the kind of money this pig's bringing in," Stan said, bending down to pet Waddles. "The money's pouring in almost as fast as the sweat!"

The door opened and seven tourists came in. Stan muttered, "Speaking of which, here comes $350." He raised his voice. "Welcome to the hall of the wonder hog! Come witness this once-in-a-lifetime miracle!" He stood aside to reveal Waddles, straightening out a "Pictures: $20, each" sign as he did.

The tourists cooed appreciatively, albeit not quite as enthusiastically as the tourists who'd been by before the room had heated up. One woman asked, "Why's it so hot in here?"

"All part of the show." Stan said. "The rare South African Moroccan Swine hails from the tropical rainforests of Portugal! The heat replicates its native environment—for the good of the egg, and so you get as authentic an experience as possible."

"Grunkle Staaan, that's not true,” Mabel said. "Waddles came from the farm outside town!"

Mabel..." Stan muttered warningly from the corner of his mouth.

"Who are you?" one tourist asked.

Stan laughed nervously. "This is Mabel, the owner of the pig. But she's not part of the tour."

It was too late, though, the tourists' interest had switched to her. "Can you tell the story of where the egg's from?"

Mabel shrugged. "Waddles is just a normal pig and we found him with the egg this morning. That's all."

The tourists muttered in disappointment and filed out of the room. None of them stuck around to take overpriced pictures.

"Hey—wait!" Stan called. "She didn't mean it!"

It was too late. When the door swung shut, Stan turned to give Mabel an exasperated look. "Remember the important lesson we learned last summer about lying?"

Mabel crossed her arms. "That sometimes it's okay if it's for the greater good, like protecting your grunkle from going to jail for a crime he definitely committed—but these are tourists, not cops!"

Bill said, "Sometimes entertainment is part of the greater good!" Stan nodded enthusiastically.

At Mabel's skeptical look, Bill said, "Look, just come with me. I've got something to show you."

"Yeah—go with the demon, sweetie," Stan said. "He's good at this sort of thing."

Mabel sighed, but tucked her crayon box under the curtain where it wouldn't melt. "Watch out for Waddles!"

In the gift shop, Bill said, "Remember, this is the Mystery Shack, not the history museum. Nobody's coming here to learn the truth. They don't believe any of the shack's cheesy displays and they won't believe whatever story you tell them. And lying doesn't count if no one believes it!"

"Really? Are you sure?" Mabel asked. "Because I always thought most of them believe Grunkle Stan's stories because they're kind of dumb."

Bill laughed. "Okay, sure, most humans are dumb. But they're dumb in a specific way." He gestured around the gift shop, taking in the crowd of browsing customers. "Everyone here thinks they already know how reality works, and nothing you say will change their minds. Some of them came in believing in magic and mystery, and they'll buy anything Stan's selling—literally and figuratively. The rest of them? They believe in no gods nor wizards. If Bigfoot walked right up to them, they'd talk about how the actor really needs to get that gorilla costume dry cleaned. They won't believe anything Stan or you say—even the truth. They're here to play along. This is a game of make-believe to them." He jabbed a thumb toward one tourist. "Watch this."

He edged up next to the tourist checking out the snow globes and said, "Boy, that sure was a tour, huh! Hey have you been to the shack before?"

The woman said, "Not since I was a kid. Now I'm bringing my kids." She nodded at the girls examining a pamphlet of the most haunted truck stops in the Pacific Northwest.

"Aw, how sweet." Bill slapped on a toothy grin. "I was gonna ask what you think about the changes this year, but I guess almost everything is different from what you remembered!"

"Oh, yes, it is. I remember a plastic skeleton in a Hawaiian shirt and funny sunglasses. Mr. Mystery said he was a tourist who was cursed for not tipping."

"Haha right, Mr. Cheapbones, they took him out five or six years ago." Bill gestured at himself and Mabel, "We come back every summer, it's fun to see the changes! Like the 'baby dragons,' those are new! What'd you think of those?"

"Oh, they were so cute, I wonder how they keep the fake wings glued to the back?"

"Who knows! Maybe some kind of alien superglue." Bill glanced at Mabel.

The woman rolled her eyes and laughed. "Oh, sure. It's probably whatever glue they use to stick horns and elf ears on actors."

Bill smirked slightly, then turned back to the tourist. "You know, that's probably it. Have you seen the pig yet?"

"No, I wasn't sure about that. It seems a bit pricy." She frowned doubtfully at the $50 door. "What is it, taxidermy?"


"No, it's a real, live pig!"

"Really!"

"Yeah, guess it must be trained! Dunno how they made the egg, but it looks real, too. Tell me if you figure out the trick." Bill winked. "Spending money doesn't count if it's on vacation, anyway."

The woman laughed. "You know what? You're right! Why not!"

"Have fun!" Bill waited until the woman had gone off to collect her children before he turned to Mabel. "See? Even when I told her the truth, she didn't believe me!"

"Okay," Mabel said. "Maybe you kind of have a point."

"And you wanna know something fun about the plastic skeleton?" he asked. "It wasn't plastic. Stanley found it when he took over the shack and decorated it. But the tourist remembers it as plastic—because that's what she expects to find here." Bill assessed Mabel's expression. "You look more bothered by this than I thought, kid, what's on your mind? I can't read it anymore."

With a troubled look, Mabel asked, "Did Grunkle Ford murder somebody?"

Bill's jaw hung open an embarrassingly long time while he tried to think of a lie he could get away with. "I know if I say yes, you'll just go ask him for the details and I'll get in trouble." (And he'd gotten in enough trouble with Ford again. He couldn't stand the thought of being glared at again. Especially when they were finally sorta getting along sometimes.) "You can't set me up like that, kid, it's too tempting!" He sighed. "But no, he didn't murder anybody. He just robbed a grave."

He slung an arm around Mabel's shoulder and turned her back to the living room door. "Anyway, do you get what I was saying about playing make-believe? And I know you're a pro at that! So just have fun with it! Everyone in the Mystery Shack is just begging you to lie to them!"

####

"That sure is something," a tourist said. "Where'd this egg come from?"

Before Stan had a chance to answer, Bill piped up, "You oughta ask the owner!" Bill had put on his top hat, which made him look at least as authoritative as Stan, so the tourists dutifully looked at Mabel.

Stan shot Bill a dirty look; but Bill whispered back, "Trust me."

"Is this your pig?" one tourist asked.

"Yep!" She beamed. "And I'm his human!"

The tour group went awww. Mabel was a pro at adorable. Another tourist asked, "So, you can tell us where this egg is from?"

"Nope!" Mabel said. (Stan's glower intensified. Bill hissed, "Kid, what are you doing!") She went on, "Because nobody knows where it's originally from! It fell out of the sky in a meteor! And it landed right in the shack's driveway! Which is why there's that big pothole on the way in."

The tourists laughed appreciatively.

"Anytime anybody got close to the meteor, it pushed us back with an invisible magic forcefield! Waddles was the only one it let get close! And the moment he touched it with his cute little piggy snout," Mabel poked his nose, prompting him to oink, "it fell apart! And there was an egg. So, it chose him! For mysteeerious alien purposes. And we've got no idea what's inside."

The tourists were duly impressed by this. Bill shot Stan a triumphant smirk—see?—but Stan was too busy beaming with pride at Mabel.

One tourist asked, "What happened to the rest of the meteor?"

"Um..." Mabel reached into a pocket hopefully. "It dissolved into sparkly space dust!" She held up a handful of glitter. Pocket glitter never failed.

One tourist said enthusiastically, "I'll pay you for that space dust!" Several others loudly agreed.

Stan's face lit up. "That's right, folks, own a little piece of history! Buy your own handful of dust for—"

"Grunkle Stan," Mabel hissed, "I don't want to give it away! Glitter is expensive! This is a dollar thirty an ounce!"

Stan whispered back, "And if you sell it for thirteen bucks an ounce, you can buy ten times as much glitter."

Mabel considered that. "One hundred bucks for the sparkly space dust! We have limited quantities, and it's going fast!"

As the tourists fought to throw their money at Mabel, Bill pantomimed silent applause. Stan muttered, "Whatever you said to her? Good job."

Bill smirked. "We'll make a proper con artist outta her yet."

####

At a break between customers, Mabel counted the cut of the profits Stan had shoved at her before he'd run off to give the rest to Soos. "With this, I'll be able to replenish my glitter stock and set up a great nursery for Waddles's baby space chicken." She patted Waddles's head proudly, and then his egg. "And maybe replace all the gold and yellow paint you used up at the start of summer."

Bill graciously bore the jab. So what if he'd used up the paint. Beauty took work. "You deserve it. You did good work with the tourists, kid."

"Thanks!" She beamed. "You were right, it's just like playing make believe. One of the tourists said I should be writing short stories! Which sounds crazy boring, but I appreciate the sentiment."

"Funny how people would rather hear the right lie than the truth, isn't it?" Bill asked. "Wanna know something even funnier? Some people will refuse to believe you're telling the truth until you abandon the truth and tell a lie they like better. Everyone everywhere is crazy!" He laughed.

Mabel's smile wilted. "Oh. Yeah."

Uh oh. He'd stepped in something nasty. He could feel it squishing under his metaphorical foot. "Hey, what's wrong, kid?"

She grimaced. "Remember when I told you about that teacher who didn't believe I did my own book report?"

"Oh. Right." They'd been talking about something similar the last time it had come up, hadn't they? If people think the truth is a lie, why bother telling the truth at all or something like that?

Did he wanna know more than he already did? Usually when one of his friends was getting sulky over a past trauma, he didn't dig for the details (unless he thought it might be something he could use against them later). Because he was a caring friend who didn't pry into his friends' private business (but mainly because he didn't care about their lives outside of him). And he didn't think this would be useful.

But something made him ask, "Just—I've been wondering. How did your teacher decide you'd copied Dipper's report? You two really don't have the same taste in books."

As if she'd been just waiting to be asked, Mabel blurted out all in a rush, "Okay so—it was The Princess and the Dolphin, and I wrote about it because I'd read it the year before. I didn't care that it was 'advanced for my grade,' it had a princess! And dolphins! Plus a parrot that was actually a fairy in disguise! Dipper only read it because it was on the list of books we could choose from for our report and I'd been begging him to read it for a year." She gave Bill a plaintive look. "We had English at different times, we didn't even know we'd picked the same book."

"He should've guessed," Bill said.

"He really should've. But we didn't check, we didn't think it mattered!" Mabel sighed heavily. "Both our book reports talked about how the evil prince was only mean to the dolphin when the princess wasn't watching him, and mentioned the fairy tale the book came from, so our teacher was sure I'd copied—but Dipper only wrote that stuff because I'd talked to him about it when I read it! He copied me by accident!" Her voice got thicker. "And I—I really worked on it. It was the best book report I wrote ever."

Oh, she'd better not be about to start crying on him. Trying to hit the right balance of "sympathetic" and "not too heavy," Bill said wryly, "A little too good, huh?"

She grimaced. "Yeah."

(And she'd been too humiliated to tell Dipper about it—too humiliated that she was apparently such a bad student that the teacher didn't think she could possibly do a good job without Dipper doing it for her—so Dipper hadn't intervened to defend Mabel's honor. The teacher said she wouldn't tell Mabel's parents as long as she didn't do it again, and Mabel didn't tell them either. She'd swallowed her undeserved zero and donated the dumb book to some dumb charity.)

(Her brother didn't know, her parents didn't know, her friends didn't know—she wasn't sure she'd ever told anybody before Bill.)

"But hey," Bill said, "here's a silver lining for your storm cloud—if she didn't believe you, do you know what that means?"

Mabel shrugged. "I dunno—that I don't write that good?"

"But you did write that good," Bill said firmly. "Here's what it means, kid: you are literally unbelievably smart."

That got a smile back on her face. Good job, Bill.

He added Mabel's fifth grade teacher to his mental list of all the people he'd murder on her behalf once he had his body back. But before he had a chance to indirectly ask how she'd most prefer to have her enemies killed, the door swung open again, and in came—

"Lazy Susan!" Mabel exclaimed.

"Daryl! Edwin! Hey!" Bill tipped his top hat to Blubs and Durland. "What are you doing here!" It took all his self-control not to make a joke about the three pigs in the room.

"Some tourists at the diner were talking about the new attraction at the Mystery Shack!" Susan said. "I brought a baby shower gift for the proud papa!" She set a quarter of a pie in front of Waddles, who eagerly dug in.

"We wanted to come see it for ourselves," Blubs said. "And, uh..." He waggled his brows conspiratorially. "Hear all about its miraculous arrival from space." (It was clear from the look of wonder in Durland's eyes that he completely bought into the egg's alien origins.)

Mabel perked up. "Sure! I've been working on the story!" She stood on a chair so the crowd could see her, and began, "Long, long ago, in a parallel universe, an alien family was loading its egg into a flying saucer, to save it before the whole planet got blown up by exploding volcanoes! The flying saucer escaped just in time—but then it ran into a meteor shower...!"

####

"This is going great!" Stan said. "The tourists are loving this egg, even the locals are coming to see it, and we're making money hand over fist!" He patted Waddles, who endured it. "You laid the golden egg, pig."

Waddles snorted.

"We could start an advertising campaign," Stan went on. "We'll take out ads as far as San Francisco! There's a month and half left in the tourist season, if we get the word out we could make—"

Waddles let out a startled squeal as the egg shook beside him.

"Or it could hatch today," Bill said.

"What?! Darnit!" Stan rushed into the gift shop. "Soos! We've got a problem! Our moneymaker's hatching!"

"Really?" Mabel said. "Already?!" She laid an ear on the egg shell, listening. "Waddles! You're about to be a dad!" She hugged him around the neck.

Stan returned with Soos in tow. "Okay, think. Either we've gotta slow this thing down before it hatches, or make as much money off of it as we can before then."

"Sorry, there's no slowing it down now," said Bill, who knew full well they could refrigerate it but who was more invested in Mabel's delight than he was in helping the shack make money he wasn't getting a cut of.

"Maybe we could make tourists pay to watch it hatch?" Soos said. "But we can only fit like, eight people in here."

"And I don't want Waddles and his egg to be crowded," Mabel said.

"We can't just do it in the parking lot," Stan said. "Anybody could wander up and watch for free!"

"Maybe the floor room?" Soos said. "But we haven't used it for anything all summer. We'd have to sweep it, and I dunno if we've got enough chairs for everyone..."

"Let me handle this," Bill said, "I have government connections." He held out his hand, palm up. "Phone me."

Mabel's phone landed in his hand. He dialed and waited for the other end to pick up, pretending he didn't even notice the humans watching his every move with baited breath as they waited to see whether he would save the day for them. (He did notice, though. And he was so smug.) "Hiya, Ty! It's Goldie! Sorry for the short notice, but do you have any evening plans? Would you like some?" He waited for Tyler to confirm no and yes. "That's what I thought! Listen, I remember you mentioned wishing more people would use the big auditorium space in town hall, and have I got an opportunity for you! What's your policy on pigs?"

After a couple minutes, he hung up and announced, "Okay! We've got the go ahead to use town hall this evening! I bet this thing'll hatch a little after seven, so we'll schedule the party to start then."

"How do you know it'll be seven?" Soos asked. "Is it part of your magic super future-seeing powers?"

"No," Bill said. "It's part of my magic super x-ray vision. I can see how far along it is."

"Oh, right."

"Seriously, how would I see what's happening in town hall when I'm standing in the living room? I've got future vision and x-ray vision, not telescope vision." Bill sighed wistfully. "My eye isn't what it used to be."

"Yeah yeah," Stan snapped, "we can yap about our aging eyesight later. First we've gotta figure out how to get out the word before seven."

"Uno momento!" Bill dialed another number. "Hiya, Shandra Jimenez? This is Goldie from town hall," he said, as if he expected her to recognize the name and know all about what he allegedly did in town hall. "I'm calling on behalf of Mayor Tyler! He wants the station's help getting the word out about a fun little show tonight to raise funds for the local tourism industry."

When Bill hung up a couple minutes later, he was met with a round of applause and cheers. He basked in it for all of five seconds before the reality of his situation hit him. He'd just used his "connections" in town hall so a bunch of backwoods hicks and budget tourists could stare at a pig and watch an egg hatch. And it would probably be the most fun any of those losers had this week. It would be the most fun Bill had this week. What had become of his life? It was a Saturday night. He should be at the club.

Then Mabel flung her arms around him. "Thank you, Bill! This'll be sooo much fuuun." She abruptly let him go with a gasp. "Waddles and I need costumes! Bill, help us make costumes!"

Apparently he was on costume fabrication duty now. Better than contemplating what his life had become. "You dweebs hold down the fort," he told Soos and Stan, as Mabel dragged him through the curtains and off to his new afternoon distraction.

#####

(I SAID I WOULD GET IT OUT TODAY AND I GOT IT OUT TODAY.

The term "unusualogist" comes from one of the post-TBOB charity streams. if you haven't seen it, here's the first full clip of that part I could find. If that link ever breaks, search for "stanford pines thirst comments."

Bill's life is slowly turning into one of those hallmark movies where the big powerful business lady from the city moves to a small town and falls in love with the community and settles down and there's nothing he can do to stop it. like knowing you've been bitten by a werewolf as the full moon approaches. except usually those movies end with the powerful business lady hooking up with a strong friendly small-town christmas tree farmer, not a reclusive nerdy researcher who barely remembers to shower. and also none of those movies have mabel, so, they're worse.

Anyway looking forward to y'all's thoughts!!)

[silmarienthequeen]

Just finished rereading Project Hail Mary again and it’s really interesting that Stratt is not a scientist. She’s an administrator, a politician, a leader. Not a scientist. She’s surrounded by some of the smartest people in the world, and they’re speaking in very science-y terms, and she has no idea what is going on. So what does she do? She turns to Grace and asks him to explain it to her. And he does, he explains the very complicated stuff in a way she, a non-scientist, can understand, because he’s a teacher. That’s what he does. It works very well from a narrative perspective because you, the reader, also don’t know what all this stuff means, so Grace explaining it to Stratt also explains it to you. But I also think maybe this is part of the reason Grace became so important to Project Hail Mary, why Stratt dragged him around everywhere- and she really does take him everywhere with her- not in spite of the fact that he’s a junior high school teacher, but because of it.