"Your parents aren't dead."

It was a shocking, bold statement, traveling through the eyes and ears of everyone in the Paranormal Club, uttered by Gideon Gleeful, which was perhaps the worst place it could have come from.

No one knew what to do or how to respond.

Pearl reacted first on impulse. Her hands reached over and grabbed the small boy by the neck, cutting off his air circulation in anger.

"Listen here, you little shit," Pearl profanely choked out, struggling to form words, "you'd better have a pretty good explanation for what you just said, or I will kill you. Literally. Kill. You. And I will nasally laugh while I do so."

"I - I do!" Gideon tried to scream, as his voice became hoarse from the force being placed on his throat. "Let me speak!"

Pearl reluctantly let go of the boy's throat as he let out a deep breath, happy to be free.

Dipper, Candy, and the others were still completely silent, trapped in their own thoughts, not sure what to say or how to respond to what they had just discovered - if it was even true. Gideon had messed with them in the past.

"My father holds the answer to all of your problems." Gideon said, still trying to catch his breath. "He hired people to...take care of all your parents."

"Explain." Pearl demanded fiercely.

Gideon paused for a second.

"Now."

"Okay, okay." Gideon repeated in a quiet tone, trying to calm the mood a bit. "I promise I'm not trying to mess with you guys. Bud Gleeful, my father, is a very deceitful man. I have his journal in my bag."

"Pull it out."

"Give me a second, would ya?" Gideon replied to Pearl in an annoyed tone, only to find hands wrapped around his throat again.

"Don't tell me what to do." Pearl ordered, releasing her hands after a couple seconds. Gideon took more deep breaths and didn't look in Pearl's direction once after that, not wanting to mess with her in any way.

Gideon pulled his father's dusty, grey journal out of his bag, with a clear message written in bold, red ink, all capital letters on the front: KEEP OUT.

As Gideon placed the book on the desk, every member of the club moved in closer to take a peek.

June 3rd

The plans are in plan to get the last two necessary assets for my plan here. The Pines twins will put everything in place perfectly - I've spent 14 years on this, and I'm not going to let anything get in my way.

They'll see. They'll all see.

That was the only noteworthy entry in the whole journal - there were lots of blank pages, some pages which only had labeled dates on them, and some pages with very strange drawings on them - as to rather the drawings told any kind of story or not, they couldn't tell.

"How do you know that your father's hired people to take our parents?" Tommy asked.

"That's another thing. I've had a wiretap on him for a while." Gideon said, pulling a tape recorder and a tape out of his bag. "I've only been able to get it to hear his end, but it gives a pretty good idea of what's going on."

Gideon cranked up the volume on the cassette player, placed the tape in and pushed the PLAY button.

Yeah, uh huh...you've got everything arranged? How much is this costing me?

Oh, come on, that's not fair. You said 500 even on the phone yesterday.

Taxes? I don't want to play these types of games...I've been working with you and your buddy for a long time to get rid of these nuisances, and I don't need you getting stingy on me.

You will? Alright, that'd be great. I'd be willing to pay 550 if you make this as smooth as possible.

*static*

"And there's no other information you're hiding from us?" Candy questioned as the tape ended.

"Yeah, how do we know we can trust you?" Dipper asked.

Gideon let out a deep sigh. "This is always my problem. I try to change, but no one believes me or trusts me, so I just have no choice but to say 'forget it' and go back to my old ways."

"It doesn't have to be like that, Gideon." Pearl stated, placing her hand on the shorter boy's shoulder. "If you help us with this, and if you manage to get our parents back, it'll show that you actually have a kind heart. You'll be a hero of sorts, and people will gain trust and respect for you."

"No matter your mistakes in the past, you can change everyone's opinion of you for the better." Candy said with a smile.

"You - you really think so?" Gideon asked.

"Know so." Pearl said. "And look, I'm sorry I, er, choked you earlier. Repeatedly. The news of that just came to a big shock for me..."

"It's fine, really." Gideon replied. "I'd probably do the same thing in your shoes. I think I'd best be getting home, my dad's expecting me..."

With that, Gideon put his things away, zipped his bag back up and exited through the door, leaving the Paranormal Club with the biggest news they'd had in a long time.

The disappearance of their parents wasn't paranormal at all. It was kidnap.

But who had them?

A/N: Oh my gosh, guys, sorry it's been so long. Just thinking about how long it's been since I last updated I'm reminding of that Tumblr GIF with the old woman and the caption "It's been 87 years..."

I've just been going through a fair amount of stuff. Got out of the hospital, had to get all my schoolwork straightened out, then started suffering from Writer's Block for a while...I think I'm back and better then ever though now.

I hope those of you who are still out there liked this chapter. To be honest, if anyone were to R&R this chapter, even if it's to yell at me for taking so long to update, it'd still make my day. See you all next time!