"Flicker" Fanfiction Display.
Synopsis:
Deciding they need a change in routine, the twins stay in the falls for a year after graduation.
Meanwhile, a strange man remembers his past and reaches out to old friends. The citizens of Gravity Falls are slowly taken over by a mysterious amnesia, and the twins seem to be the only ones willing to get to the bottom of it. And a rich valley-girl. That totally won't develop into everything.
Memories quickly become unreliable. It soon becomes a race against time to stop their mysterious malefactors. When things get personal, and alliances are revealed, is it even worth fighting when you can't remember who you are?
Rating: Teen and Up
Category: Longfic, Romance, Slowburn, Action/Adventure/Mystery.
Relationships: Pacifica Northwest/Dipper Pines.
Prologue:
Memories had a way of eluding him.
The Amnesiac stumbled through familiar borders under the watchful eye of the spring sun. A still, earthy scent filled the air and danced around his nose, tickling the back of his mind. He had been here before. Sometime. Somewhere.
He knew himself only as a performer. A ragged nametag on his chest mocked him with his childish title, “Toot-Toot McBumbersnazzle.” Like a scarlet letter on his breast, The Amnesiac could only hope that the world had forgotten it just as he had forgotten them. Was it some sort of punishment? Forced to roam the world as a dull performer, not knowing where he had come from or where he was going?
“I knew I recognized you,” The Amnesiac said, leading his guide into the only place on Earth that seemed familiar, “Well, maybe not you, but your father.”
The Guide shrugged, “Beats me. You probably know more about him than I do.”
A man of thirty with a face of fifty, The Guide smelled of lumber and game. There was a verdant ranger’s shirt that tried to cover the marks of fishing lines and sunburn. A protruding gut was helplessly held back by a worn belt. The Amnesiac would not know the color of the man’s eyes, as a musty cap obscured them from view, only allowing a rear view of a rapidly receding hairline. The same narrowed, almost bird-like head shape connected The Guide with his father.
Oddly, it was the beard that had given his father away. The Amnesiac did not remember how he knew the man’s name, only that his face triggered the word “Founder.”
Founder.
Founder of what? The Amnesiac had driven himself mad over the years trying to remember where he had come from. Smells, dreams, sensations, would send him spiraling into week-long fits of deja vu. All while performing in that damned circus through a ceaseless choir of color and drones of static.
“You don’t say,” The Amnesiac remarked, “He seemed like a secretive man. Were you able to find anything about me?”
“Yes, I was,” The Guide replied, reaching behind him for a tattered box, “This might interest you.”
Inside of the box was a maroon robe and a large, neon blue cylinder. The Amnesiac recognized the drawing of a head with grid-like tattoos on its head, much like his own, with the marking of an eye and an X beneath it. Like the other stimuli, the image evoked familiarity, flickers of remembrance skimming his psyche.
“What is this?” The Amnesiac asked, closing his eyes.
“I don’t know,” the man replied, “I found it in my father’s basement. I saw your tattoos and they matched.”
“Did you ask him about it?”
“No. Every time I’ve brought it up, he shuts down.”
“It?”
The Guide pointed to the eye drawn on the side of the box, “This.”
A phantom tightness gripped The Amnesiac’s chest as he studied the drawing. The familiarity was strong, far stronger than anything he had felt since arriving back in The Founder’s town. He closed his eyes again and tried to use all of his other senses. Smell, hearing, touch, even tasting if he had to. It had developed into a pseudomeditative practice over the years, trying to gain whatever insight that he could. Usually the memories would fade. But the eye was different.
Images of red robes and bright lights flickered through The Amnesiac’s mind. None of them made sense, yet he knew that they were memories. Memories from a time long forgotten to him. It could have been last week, or it could have been years ago. The Amnesiac closed his eyes tightly and held on for all he was worth. It had been years since his last breakthrough, and he wasn’t going to let that one go.
Bright blue flashes. A gun. A hit to the face. A red-tinted image of the bearded Founder and his bastard son.
Suddenly, The Amnesiac’s fists were clenched.
“Are you okay?” The Guide asked.
A throbbing against his head reminded The Amnesiac of his ferocious heartbeat.
The Amnesiac knew not why his newfound fury had chosen its target. Nor did he have any control when he reached into the box and wielded the neon blue cylinder. The Founder had wronged him, in one way or another. The Amnesiac had learned to let his muscle memory take over, the fibers wielding more strength than his neurons ever could.
“The Founder is a traitor!” The Amnesiac yelled, holding the hardened cylinder in the air and lumbering towards the traitorous guide, “Bring him here!”
Somewhere, he and The Founder had parted ways. The Amnesiac had no way of remembering why, only knowing that his blood boiled at the mention of The Founder’s name.
“Hey!” The Guide shouted, “Watch it! I didn’t do anything!”
Of course, he had chosen to fight in his newfound abode. It was nothing more than an abandoned scrapyard, on the outskirts of the city that had almost certainly ruined his life. The Amnesiac cared not about the threat of blood on his carpet. If knowledge and closure required a sacrifice, pleasantries be damned, The Amnesiac was more than willing.
The back of The Amnesiac’s brain stopped him before he could march forward. Was it worth it to kill the only man that might have the answers?
“The Founder,” The Amnesiac spat, “What do you know?”
“I don’t know anything!” The Guide said, reaching for the door, shuffling junk as he did so, “He won’t tell me anything! You know that! You’re on your own!”
The Guide had the chance to run. The Amnesiac was not sure what kept him inside of the rusty shack, pinned against the open door like a dog in a kennel. There was something humbling about seeing The Guide hunkered against the back wall as the yellowing sun cast volumetric rays of dust across his face, beads of sweat glimmering like diamonds on their way to the ground.
One second of hesitation was all The Amnesiac needed to get the upper hand.
With a swipe of his hand, he grabbed The Guide by his collar and held him close, the blue cylinder in the other. He wondered if broken glass would be enough to get the message through. The rational part of The Amnesiac’s mind had been shut down. All he needed was the blood of a sacrificial lamb. No longer was the brain in control, but the muscles, burning with the rage of a mental nomad.
The Amnesiac raised the cylinder and prepared to send it crashing down on The Guide’s face.
The Guide, however, was quicker.
He raised a fist and shattered the cylinder before it could hit, sending blue sparks and shards of glass flying into The Amnesiac’s face.
“Augh!” The Amnesiac yelled.
Crashing to the floor, he covered his face as the sparks enveloped his scalp. He felt his body convulsing as The Guide watched in horror, thrashing violently back and forth while bright flashes filled his vision. Blue, white, red, pink, purple, a cacophony of color. His ears began to ring with the angry hissing of a thousand mental bees, stinging the sides of his head and crawling up his ear canal and into his brain.
The Amnesiac reached out to The Guide’s foot. Not out of malice, but out of desperation.
“Help me!” The Amnesiac yelled.
The man’s feet did not move, and all The Amnesiac could do was brace. He yelled until his throat was raw as image after image flew in front of his eyes, faster than he could process. Every possible wavelength of energy was wrapping around his body and smothering it.
He did not know how long he had been on the floor when the noises finally stopped, only that he opened his eyes and the sun had set and the noise was gone.
And standing in the doorway was none other than The Guide.
Something was different when The Amnesiac stood up. He had a sense of person, a history that had been unveiled to him. The outside was no longer unfamiliar, but a welcome vessel for his purpose.
The thoughts in his head had a narrator, no longer wandering endlessly in a senseless blur.
Rising to his knees, The Amnesiac could not help but weep. Not out of pain, but out of gratitude. His years of suffering were over.
The walls were familiar. The smells, the feeling of the robe in his hands, welcoming like a parent’s embrace. Gone were the walls of deja vu. Sure, one could climb the sides and occasionally peek over to the other side, but that day they had collapsed. The fog lifted. The images were no longer images, but memories. In their wake was a man ready to continue what had been started decades ago. A man who had fallen victim to his own creation.
“Don’t run!” The Amnesiac yelled, “Stay. Please. I didn’t mean to do that.”
The Guide hesitated, but The Amnesiac had a feeling he would stick around. He had been kind enough to watch his fit of convulsing on the floor. The least the man could do was stick around for what was next.
“What was that?” The Guide asked.
The Amnesiac shook his head, “I have no idea. But I must thank you. You have put my suffering to an end.”
“I did…?”
“Yes. Yes you did.”
The words were like sugar rolling off of his tongue, still heaving with elation.
“You could be of use to me,” The Amnesiac said, reaching into the box and donning the maroon robe, “Tell you what. I’ll keep your little secret, and keep my hands away from your father. But you have to help me.”
Played like a fiddle, The Guide grimaced at the mention of his father, “You stay away from him.”
“I will. But I need you. I never got your name, by the way.”
Still processing the years’ worth of information that had been thrown back into his head, The Amnesiac stood up, still smiling from ear to ear, and tried to remember the man’s name, only to come up empty. Perhaps they truly had never known each other.
“Tate,” Tate said, sighing reluctantly and shaking his head, “Tate McGucket. And yours?”
The Amnesiac smiled and said the name he hadn’t said in years.
“Ivan Wexler. Second founder of the Society of the Blind Eye.”
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