The God and the Thief

The Story's Beginning(44)

((I guess I didn't make myself clear enough at the end of the last chapter, Dipper wasn't the one who got slapped, they heard the sound from the other side of the door. Sorry. But now that we are all on the same page let's move on.))

Dipper POV

The voices from the other room stopped. I barely registered Bill taking my hand, "Maybe this isn't a good time..." he whispered.

But all I could think of was Ford, slapping me when I told him he couldn't keep me under house arrest, and boy was I wrong. I shock my head pushing past the initial shock taking the last few steps to the door. Bill's hand is still in mine.

The room beyond the door was deadly silent when we walked in, from here I could barely see the crowd of people in the kitchen all standing completely still. My Gunkles had their back to us, and from here I could see Mabel... Mabel, she's ok, but- she held her hand to her cheek and it looked like she had been crying. Wendy stood over protectively besides her, with a hand on her shoulder. They both turned their gaze from my grunkles to us at the sound of the old door creaking open.

Wendy was the first one to fully react, her eyes had gone wide and her mouth fell open. Mabel's face, which had previously been sickly pale, flushed and fresh tears well up in her eyes.

My grunkles took a slow turn, almost instinct with one another, following the girls gaze to me. It was like none of them saw Bill come in behind me, all four had their eyes locked on me.

The girls recovered first, Mabel burst into tears and came bolting through the kitchen and living room to me, she threw herself onto me and it took all my strength and balance to keep us both from falling over, Wendy was close on her heels and wrapped us both into a tight hug. While Mabel simply cried tears of joy into my shoulder Wendy whispered, "You're ok, you're ok, I'm so relieved you're ok." Mabel's voice was caught in her throat but she nodded along in agreement with Wendy. I wrapped my arms around both of them, feeling like a weight had been lifted, I leaned in whispering back reassurances as they held tighter.

The moment was broken however by Ford's recovery from the shock, "Dipper- Dipper!" I felt the weight fall back into place, and both girls in my arms tensed. I looked over both their heads pulling back a little from the reunion. Bill took a step forward to stand next to me, he stood so close that his hand brushed my side. This must have been when they all actually noticed Bill, the only one who really didn't over react was Wendy. Mabel pulled completely away from me practically falling into Wendy. And the blank surprise on my Grunkles faces had turned to rage.

"Wait! Wait, wait, wait!" I shouted, throwing my hands up at all the faces in the room, stepping back into Bill. "Please before we all over react and start fighting, can we talk?!? Like adults, Please!" I said as quickly as I could so that neither Ford or Stan could get a word in. It was clear from what we heard that emotions are already high in the room and I'm almost positive that Ford had slapped Mabel, and as much as I want to gut him for it the only way this can possibly be resolved is not through fighting.

Mabel was the first to react, though I could see Ford gearing up. Her eyes flickered between us and Ford, "Let's all sit, the kitchen table had room." She slowly walked between us and Wendy followed at a similar pace to the kitchen, they both sat down.

"Please Ford?" I pushed, taking hold of Bill's hand I walked us into the kitchen keeping an eye on my grunkles. Bill followed without hesitation, squeezing my hand in his reassuringly.

We sat down at the table leaving the last two seats across the table empty, Wendy and Mabel sat between us with their backs to the wall. The four of us breathlessly watched our grunkles, neither of them made a move for a long awkward moment, but before any of us felt the side effects of oxygen deprivation, Stan moved towards the table elbowing his brother in the side as he passed him. Taking the seat across from Bill.