PART 1:
Mabel slowly wakes up with a headache, quickly realizing she is tied up in a chair at the head of a table in the ballroom, Edward Gracey sitting at the other end and Constance Hatchetaway right next to her, the other ghosts present applauding. Edward calms everyone down and apologizes for making everyone wait as long as they did to have the curse he caused be broken, but they all cheer up when he says Mabel will help the curse stop.
He and Constance tell an increasingly panicked Mabel that Constance needs to possess her so her wedding ceremony can be official, the 'death do us part' bit requiring at least one party be alive. Mabel freaks out and refuses possession, saying that it won't help anyone move on anyway, although her denial means Constance can't possess her. Edward glares and her and snaps his fingers, three ghosts pulling a chained-up Wendy through the crowd, Wendy telling Mabel the boys escaped and to ignore whatever the ghosts do to her.
The ghosts float Wendy up to one of the chandeliers and begin making her chains part of the one that is holding it up. Once this is complete, the chain holding the weight of the chandelier starts weakening, threatening to pull Wendy apart. Mabel, knowing Wendy would most likely survive but also knowing she can still feel pain, agrees to let Constance possess her if they don't hurt Wendy, who is insisting Mabel not agree to the possession. Wendy can only watch as Constance turns into a blue-green mist and starts surrounding Mabel, causing her to twitch until the ropes fall off. Her eyes now the color of the mist, Constance in Mabel's body stand up, announcing that she is ready for her wedding.
Back in the mausoleum, Soos has just shut the door, allowing himself and Dipper to interrogate Stanford, not that it is going very well. The young Stanford reacts with shock and confusion when Dipper and Soos mention the Portal and what happened three years ago, then becomes excited when he realizes he and Dipper are related through Shermie. Dipper realizes something is different about this version of Ford compared to the old one they met three years ago, and he gets Ford to agree to tell them everything he knows.
The first thing that is different is that the twins were apparently told Ford called Stan thirty-plus years ago and asked him for help, but this Ford says Stan had been the one to call him. He says Stan was broke when he called and, after taking the chance to brag a bit, Ford had offered Stan the chance to come live with him in what would eventually become the Manor. He says things were rough at first, but having Stan around to help with his research was a benefit until he hit a roadblock with his formula for why Gravity Falls attracted so many weird things.
Soos and Dipper exchange a look, silently agreeing to tell Ford about the Stone and what happened to the town later as Ford mentions meeting Bill Cipher and the construction of the Portal with the help of McGucket. He says that, despite the progress the three of them made with Bill's help, Stan knew something was off, and after McGucket got sucked in and quit, Stan was eventually able to convince Ford to realize Bill couldn't be trusted. Ford says he started changing the Portal without Bill's knowledge, but Stan found out and the two of them got into the fight that caused Ford to be sucked into the Portal...
And come out in the middle of the forest. He mentions the Ranger station Dipper had gone into with Wendy, Dipper mentioning the town having disappeared from the internet and people's memories. Ford declares the Portal as a failure and starts demanding answers of his own, but the zombies start trying to open the doors. As much as Dipper doesn't trust Ford, he agrees to let him stay around until they figure out how to defeat the zombies and ghosts, making sure he knows who is in charge as the three of them prepare to fight their way back into the mansion.
Ford is impressed and slightly scared by Dipper's Paths moves, Dipper telling him he's lucky he didn't know that Ford was the one looking for them. Ford asks what happened three years ago, but is shut up when the three of them get inside the Mansion and Dipper mentions his sister being captured by the ghosts. The three of them start heading towards the ballroom, Dipper showing Ford Edward Gracey's journal and catching him up on the situation on the way. Through the talk of fortune tellers and dead husbands, they agree that the best course of action is to exorcise Edward Gracey, thus removing the thing that they believe is tying all the other ghosts to the mansion. Dipper offers to give Ford the answers he wants if he helps them with the exorcism, Ford agreeing and offering to hold up a barrier between Dipper and the ghosts while Dipper performs the exorcism.
The three of them head for the ballroom but run into Mabel before they make it there, something on a chain around her neck. Dipper is slightly suspicious of Mabel when he sees her eyes, but Ford reminds him about their exorcism plan, and the four of them run into the ballroom. Ford immediately activates the barrier, warning Dipper that he won't be able to hold it for very long. Dipper begins the exorcism, but stops when he sees Wendy yelling at him from a chandelier, telling him to get away from her. Mabel attacks the boys, her eyes flashing blue, Dipper realizing she is Constance as Ford's barrier falls.
The ghosts don't move in, instead watching as the boys try to attack and get Constance to leave Mabel's body. Unfortunately, Constance has access to all of Mabel's memories, from her Paths moves to the times Mabel has gotten her heart broken, and Constance's desperation to find true love plus Mabel's skills and Dipper's unwillingness to hurt his sister allows her to retain control and beat down the boys. Constance waves Mabel's hand and makes the floor under the boys warp into a hole and send Ford and Soos down into it. Dipper grabs at the chain around her neck in an effort to save himself, but the chain snaps, leaving him with a key with a familiar pink color as he falls into the darkness.
Constance repairs the hole in the floor and the party begins again, her dancing while Wendy contemplates what she can do now that she is alone. Constance is enjoying herself immensely until the doors burst open, bringing the celebration to a standstill. Constance asks her father who the late arrival is, Edward admitting that he doesn't know as a man in a silver mask enters the room and makes his way to her. Constance and Mabel both react when Zander takes off the Guardsman mask and reveals his face, apologizing for being late.
PART 2:
Constance is instantly infatuated with Zander, who tells them his name is Maxwell Orvas, Edward recognizing the name as related to a shipping company from Baltimore. Constance starts flirting with Maxwell, Zander responding in kind while Wendy yells warnings at him from the chandelier. Constance and Maxwell start dancing before Zander asks to talk to Mabel, Constance releasing her hold just enough for a dazed Mabel to some out. She is able to kind-of tell Zander what happened to Dipper and mention Constance feels incredibly sad about not having true love before Constance regains full control.
Zander tries to say he's going to leave and change out of his Guardsman clothes, Edward eyeing him suspiciously while Constance insists he's fine how he is. Wendy yells down about the floor eating Dipper, three ghosts moving to gag her at Edward's request. Zander intervenes and asks to speak to Wendy, the chain on the chandelier extending to have her close to the ground. Zander puts on a show of demanding respect from her, but he secretly tells her that he has a plan to find Dipper and rescue, but he needs her in one piece so he can have un-possessable players on the field. Zander leaves the room as the chandelier chain shortens again and brings Wendy back to the ceiling, three ghosts beginning to tie string to her body as Constance tells her father that she has found her husband, staring out the door Zander just walked out of.
Soos, Ford and Dipper crash through several boxes and land on the floor of the basement, Dipper turning his phone's flashlight on after he recovers, the chain and key still in hand. Dipper tells Ford about Constance possessing Mabel and the three of them start trying to figure out a new plan. Dipper looks around the room to see the rusted bars of a cell, the door unable to close properly. Soos mentions the servants magically cleaning everything upstairs, so evidently the basement hasn't been touched in a long time.
Ford suggests Constance is the real thing tying all the ghosts together as the three of them enter the hallway and pass several more cells, a headless decayed body in each. Dipper realizes the bodies were once Constance's husbands, Soos wondering why their ghosts aren't haunting the island. A weird green light starts coming from behind a hidden door in response, the three of them entering the room to see a crystal ball that appears to have gray mist in it. The mist turns into a face as the ball begins floating, the being inside introducing herself as Madam Leota and giving strange rhyming warnings.
Soos simply asks how to get out of the basement, Leota giving them basic, non-rhyming instructions. Dipper then mentions the curse, Leota agreeing to help them understand, and hopefully break, it, although she does grumble about being asked to not rhyme while she explains. She says Constance's mother got sick after she gave birth and died when Constance was ten. This caused Edward to work to increase the family's wealth, making Constance a desirable wife for other elites. But after she married her first husband, taking and keeping his surname, and he was killed, it became harder and harder for her to get remarried, as every person who married her 'disappeared.' Leota says there was a party to regain some of the support the family lost, but Edward and Constance got into a shouting match during it, so Constance ran to find her and ask for help.
Leota says she told Constance the quick marriages would never be the true love she wants, then began to scry at Constance's request. She says that when she woke up, she was already dead, an axe nearby her decapitated body. She explains that scrying doesn't allow her to hear herself until it's complete, but she blames herself for warning Constance to not expect true love from thin air. She says Constance wanting true love was spawned from the loss of her mother, and after her warnings, Constance poisoned the entire party and herself, and Edward hung himself after his daughter died.
Leota leaves as the boys realize they can now talk to Constance and get her to move on instead of performing exorcisms. Then they hear something coming from behind the door, Ford casting a spell on his hands before the three of them try to attack. Ford is thrown around like a ragdoll by Zander, who pulls his scarf off and turns it into a spear as he pins Ford to the wall. Dipper is able to convince Zander to not kill Ford, although Zander isn't happy about letting a magic-user live, although he does forgive Dipper for using the sending spell, with several warning about gateway magic thrown in.
Dipper introduces Zander and Ford to each other as the four of them start heading back upstairs, planning as much as they can. Zander and Ford confirm that the whole thing is just a haunting, not a curse, and Zander updates Dipper on how Mabel is doing- not too good. He says that Constance is powerful enough to do serious mental damage to Mabel, and unless there's another undead around with even more power than Constance, they need to convince her that true love isn't all it's cracked up to be.
They all stop short when the see a blue-eyed Mabel staring down at them, especially Zander, angrily, a wedding dress having replaced her normal clothes. She does something to make the stairs start warping and tells Zander to find her in the ballroom if he really is sorry about tricking her. Constance leaves the four of them to navigate the stairs on their own, Zander taking the lead and kind-of getting Dipper to maybe trust him a bit more. They make it to the hallway to see the pictures coming to life, Soos and Ford leading the animals from the pictures away as Zander and Dipper continue towards the ballroom.
Then Wendy begins attacking them, three ghosts controlling her actions like a marionette puppet. Dipper tells Zander to run ahead to the ballroom, Zander complying as Dipper debates how to free Wendy from the ghosts' strings. Dipper tries to convince the ghosts to stop listening to Constance, but they just make Wendy throw him into a wall, the keychain necklace and Constance's Journal falling out of his vests. Dipper realizes they are the same color and opens the lock on the book as the three ghosts move in for the kill. He reads what Constance wrote about her engagement to Jon Hatchetaway, then flips to six months later when Constance describes wanting the man dead. The ghosts realize the Constance is insane and opt to leave, no-longer controlled Wendy collapsing to the ground.
Wendy insists she can handle herself and that he needs to get to the ballroom, Dipper flipping through Constance's journal on his way. Realizing blaming other people is what caused the haunting in the first place, Dipper realizes what his plan is as he walk onto the overlook in the ballroom, the wedding already in progress. Dipper gets more and more furious about the situation as Zander and Constance say I do, his anger driving him to leap from the balcony and grab a chandelier just before the ceremony is finished.
Constance snaps her fingers and causes one of the links holding the chandelier up to snap, both it and Dipper plummeting to the ground. Then something crashes into Dipper and he hits the ground some ten feet away from where the chandelier has now crushed Zander. Zander assures everyone he's okay as Constance confronts Dipper for ruining her wedding. Dipper tells her it isn't about the wedding and, with the help of Edward's Journal in which he describes how hard he worked after his wife died to provide for his daughter, Dipper convinces Constance that The Power of Love is nothing compared to The Power Of Family. Constance leaves Mabel body, Dipper catching her as she starts to fall. They agree to a missing-your-sibling-hug, their pat-patting causing all the ghosts present to vanish.
The twins reunite with Soos, Wendy, Zander and Ford, each group catching each other up on what happened while they were separated. Zander and Ford return from a private conversation, Zander telling everyone to keep an eye on each other and after Ford helps them with the Starkissed, they can help put him back in the proper time. Ford admits that he knows a lot about Starkissed and comments on Zander wearing it before Zander says he's going to leave. Wendy confronts him and accuses him of knowing more about wraiths than he lets on, Zander agreeing to give her the info she wants at a later time. Zander flies away and the now five head back to the shoreline, Mermando bringing a boat around so they can continue on their mission to save the world.
In the highest level of a tower, Graupner angrily punches the glass shielding him from the wind blowing around the now-complete military base below him. Graupner grumbles and Kelly not helping them anymore, but Alvis assures him that they can survive without her. He says that he's contacted a few bounty hunters and that soon they will be able to use their fully-trained soldiers. This helps a bit, but what helps even more is when Alvis mentions Kelly wasn't their only option for demonic help. Graupner watches Alvis allow Bill Cipher in, Alvis' eyes now yellow and black and Bill's voice coming from him. Graupner says he wants a deal, offering Bill a replacement when he mentions his terms. Bill is doubtful until Graupner mentions her name- Wendy Corduroy.
Cryptograms:
1-12-12 25-15-21 14-5-5-4 9-19 12-15-22-5. All you need is love.
Tvxv xgsv- op Xmzrlnc Pkrl Repgeotqyr Xhqwr Yyoy! Pmbv: dqiq ok pcwq zyrqyen khg zcoc oh hcgkh? Eel efu jye g xhqwr zf tji ylketpglv? Wjer'y khg tpkwetvcj tonsetv oh xfk soa-kfujt? Eel efu tiyrcy oeik fuv mlyzdg e tgtuwq arvapip cztj e enfsv? Xfkje crqcvru elj doti! Keyword
Next time- on Totally Real Paranormal Ghost Show! Love: does it pass through the veil of death? Can you hug a ghost to the afterlife? What's the preferred cologne of the boy-ghost? Can you really make out inside a vacuum cleaner with a ghost? These answers and more!
8-1-16-16-25 2-9-18-20-8-4-1-25 1-12-5-24 8-9-19-18-3-8. Happy birthday Alex Hirsch.
Shr Mslqnrb eydaq oircs qrae caen tczcrv. Av zrr epvrsrg xf ae jlxy ervhrur aag jrliyb me shrvi uzrx wmdds, oxx jsiyo av laefl rgeng. Av baa eekslr ryi cezrrj, ve pdr vwoefmjd ohu kynsgv, fls cnq av ceshek nuevicuef? Keyword
The Journey ahead leads down dark places. We are blessed to be with friends and family in these dark times, but still we march ahead. We can battle our demons, we can exorcise our ghosts, but can we defeat ourselves?
