The Preserve; Sunday Evening

[ihuntkillers]

Skulking about in the preserve might not really be the best idea Jasper's ever had but it'd been something he'd wanted to do for awhile now. Most of this island was a mess of wide open spaces, water and small, dark alleys that were one cigarette smoking guy in a trench coat away from a film noir.

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[rhymeswithtable]

It was an excellent evening for - what? For exploring! Mabel had knitted about fifteen thousand sweaters by now, and Waddles was napping back in her room, so she'd decided to put her adventuring skills to good use tonight by going for a walk in the preserve to check out the little green deer she'd heard about.

So, here she was, armed with a camera and a backpack that was mostly just holding her grappling hook, wearing a sweater with a funny-looking owl on it, and... mostly just wandering around lost. It was dark. Did deer even do things in the dark?

Well, too late for that now. Maybe she could find some other elusive Fandom species of the nocturnal persuasion, like a--

"Hi!"

-- Like an elusive 'guy against a tree.' Those were pretty rare this time of year.

[ihuntkillers]

If he'd been anyone else, he might have jumped in surprise but it'd been pretty easy to tell he wasn't alone when she'd gotten closer. With his mood the way it was, he wasn't sure whether a visitor was a good idea or a bad one.

But, civility.

"Hey," he said, tilting his head. "Didn't think anyone else would be out here."

[rhymeswithtable]

"Well, you know," Mabel chirped, gesturing broadly with one hand up toward the night sky. "It's a great night for this, and a little exploring never hurt anybody, right?"

Unless you ran into a creepy guy in the woods, maybe. But how likely was that to happen?

"I was looking for the deer, but I guess I lost track of the time. It is too late for deer now, isn't it?" A beat. "Prooobably."

[ihuntkillers]

So unlikely! Guess Mabel just had some good luck tonight. The one night a creepy guy hangs out in the woods, right?

"Probably," he agreed, nodding and not moving from his spot against a tree. "You out here hunting this late?"

Was there anything but hunting and watching that you could do with deer? He didn't see a weapon though.

[rhymeswithtable]

Mabel was, alas, pretty darn unarmed. Unless you counted the grappling hook in her bag, along with about half her body weight in puffy stickers.

She had her priorities straight, here.

"Hunting, me? Naah. I just heard that they were teal and I wanted to see for myself. My brother would go crazy if I managed to get footage of a teal deer more easily than he took care of the office moose."

[ihuntkillers]

Wait.

"There's a moose in the office?" Really? "It doesn't even have opposable thumbs."

[rhymeswithtable]

"There is totally a moose in the office," Mabel enthused, pulling out her camera and turning it on so that she could find the video footage of Dipper in his moose costume, being aggressively nuzzled by said moose.

It was hilarious. Mabel was very proud.

"Dipper and I found out about it when we went to try to find out how the school knew we were going to be here, even if we didn't technically sign up or anything," she explained. "Oh, yeah- Hi! I'm Mabel! Who I guess henceforth shall be known as that girl whose brother was hit on by a moose."

Good job, Dipper.

"My theory is that he has very dexterous lips."

The moose. Not Dipper.

[ihuntkillers]

"Jasper," he said absently since his attention was pretty taken by that video footage. He even snickered once, lightly. "Why'd he dress up as a moose? Doesn't look like the guy in the office was really going anywhere."

He snickered again.

"Unless he wanted the moose to hit on him?"

[rhymeswithtable]

"Well, the moose didn't want us to go inside," Mabel explained, "to go poking through the filing cabinets or whatever else is in there. So I figured a disguise would help him fit in better."

A beat.

"It worked a little too well."

Oops!

[ihuntkillers]

"Uh huh." That was...that was definitely a thing, wasn't it? "I think the next question is why did he have a moose outfit handy?"

[rhymeswithtable]

"It's amazing what you can find in town," Mabel replied, practically beaming. "There were furry antlers in a surplus Christmas sale bin, and then I spruced them up a bit!"

With a bedazzler. Naturally.

"He doesn't usually have a moose costume. But he used to have this really great lamb costume..."

If Mabel continued talking in this vein, Dipper would probably never forgive her.

[ihuntkillers]

Yeah, Jasper stared for a second before his brow furrowed and he shook his head.

"Is he a fan of Halloween or something?" he asked, unable to stop himself. The conversation was ridiculous enough to stop his dark thoughts in their tracks. "Or a fan of farm yard animals?"

[rhymeswithtable]

Conversations with Mabel had a funny way of doing that.

"Well, he wants to think he grew out of Halloween," Mabel shared, "but there was this one summer where we were almost eaten by a guy made out of loser candy, so we don't risk it anymore. The livestock thing is mostly just because our mom and dad used to dress him up in this lamb costume and make him do this cute little song and dance? He loved it."

And it had totally saved them from murderous ghosts that one time.

[ihuntkillers]

"Are you serious right now?" Jasper asked, wondering if he was being pranked or punked or whatever it was called these days. "You sound like an acid trip right now."

[rhymeswithtable]

"I'm told you never get used to that," Mabel offered, grinning broadly at Jasper. "I try to avoid the weird brain-altering substances after that one time I overdosed on Smile Dip and hallucinated the flying six-headed laser dolphin, though. If it helps, you can choose to believe I have a very active imagination. That's what most people do, anyway."

It had kept her mostly out of too much trouble once she and Dipper had returned to Piedmont after that one crazy summer.

[ihuntkillers]

Jasper blinked. And then again. "You're serious, aren't you?" He was pretty good at telling when people were lying to his face. Very good, in fact. "This is all crap that's happened to you?"