Fool's Gold

Stan Pines was sitting in his usual position at the till of the Mystery Shack gift shop, going through inventory and ordering extra 'one of a kind' merchandise, when he heard it.

The sound of money.

Others wouldn't have recognized it- and not just because the telltale noise was muffled as it drifted through the walls of the shack. They would have misinterpreted it. But Stan viewed things in a way that others didn't, and he knew that in this business, a squabbling family equalled money. You just had to know how to play 'em.

Quick as could be, he pulled on his eye patch, grabbed his cane, and headed out the door, ready to pacify the latest family of tourists with the promise of excitement and mystery.

"This is ridiculous," one was complaining as the group made its way in his direction. She was an odd sort- tall, long nosed, dressed real fancy, hair dyed pink. Or maybe orange; one of the two. (Stan didn't hold with all these fancy new colours like 'salmon' or 'peach'.) "A source of power this strong isn't just going to be sitting out in the open! Investigating this tiny human town is just a waste of time!"

"Beach City is a tiny human town," pointed out the young boy accompanying her. He seemed to be the most normal of the bunch. Short, chubby, curly black hair. Looked to be about Dipper and Mabel's age.

"That's completely different!" the woman protested.

"It doesn't matter," said a second lady. She towered over the rest of the group, an effect enhanced by her strange suit and huge reflective sunglasses. She had somehow managed to shape her hair into a near-perfect cube. "It's here. I can feel it."

At that moment, a third woman broke in (although, maybe she wasn't a woman at all, but just a teenager). She had purple skin, which was weird, but Stan had seen weirder. "Yeah, P. Besides, I think this place looks kinda cool."

That was Stan's queue.

"Oh, it is cool, I assure you," he said with a voice like snake-oil, slipping into the conversation. He twirled his cane to add a bit of flourish. "If it's power you're looking for, then you've come to the right place! The Mystery Shack is a collection of both horrors and wonders, housing magical artifacts far beyond human comprehension." He paused. "Entry is ten dollars each."

The boy gestured at him, looking towards his family(?) with a satisfied expression. "See?"

The pink/orange-haired one looked from the boy, to Stan, to the shack behind him. "No," she said.

As far as Stan was concerned, anybody with some sort of shiny jewel embedded in their forehead had no right to look as skeptical as she did. But then, she didn't matter. She clearly wasn't the one he'd have to work on.

"Don't worry," he instead told the boy with an award-winning smile. "She will. And that's a Mystery Shack guarantee!"

The boy smiled back at him, then at his family. All of them then looked towards the tall, square-headed one. After a moment, she shrugged. Without a word, she began walking towards the tourist trap. The rest followed her with varying levels of enthusiasm.

Stan beamed. "Excellent choice! And you know what? Since I like you folks, I'll even make it a private tour, just for you!"

(Silently, Stan added another six bucks to the tour's cost. Per person. It was the perfect way to turn a slow day around. Now he just wished he hadn't let all the kids have the day off. He could use their help.)

He shepherded the group in- or at least, 'shepherded' was the term he usually used. There wasn't anything particularly sheep like about thesepeople. They moved quickly and efficiently, striding right into the building without a second look in his direction. Stan began with his usual spiel, but he could tell that it was being ignored. Stan prided himself on his improvisational skills, able to adapt easily to any lemmings' interests, but in this case, it didn't seem seem to be working. The square one had been staring at the cast of some "monster's footprint" that he'd had Soos whip up five years back, but when Stan shared his usual tales about the mysterious creatures living in the woods, she was completely unfazed- but then, who could tell with her wearing those giant sunglasses? He caught the one with the nose inspecting a set of old arrow heads, but at his well-worn story about a haunted Indian burial ground, she just scoffed. The purple one listened with rapt interest as he explained about the 'brave hunter' who managed to catch and mount an alien (said alien made through a creative stitching together of taxidermy duck, a couple discount Summerween costumes and the generous application of glitter), but then she just laughed and said, "This guy's a riot!"

The only one who seems the least bit interested in him was the kid. About five attractions into the Shack he held a hand out to Stan and said, "My name's Steven Universe, by the way. What's yours?"

Stan regarded the out-stretched hand for a moment, then took it. "Stan Pines."

The boy nodded, grinned. "How'd you lose your eye?"

"Yeti attack," Stan lied, without hesitation. The boy nodded again. He didn't seem particularly surprised or amazed by this statement, just accepted it as fact.

Honestly, there was something odd about the kid. Stan wasn't sure what to make of him. Sure, he seemed like the usual gullible child who ended up dragging their whole family to every roadside attraction they passed, but Stan's gut said there was more to him than that. There had to be, for somebody so apparently-normal to be hanging out with weirdos like these. He seemed to have the same unfaltering cheerfulness of Mabel, albeit more subdued. The kind of person who, underneath the smiles and sequins, had an iron will.

If there was one thing Stan had learned in the past few months, it was not to underestimate Mabel Pines, and he suspected the same thing held true of Steven Universe.

But San still did his best to entertain him, feed him the usual stories, keep him happy. It seemed to work, too.

At least, until the pink-haired one came over.

"Pearl, Pearl!" the boy said, almost buzzing with excitement. "Is it true that mammoths breathed fire?"

"No. They did not," she said, frankly. She put an arm on Steven's shoulder, and subtly but firmly pulled him away from Stan. She was looking at the man as though he was something strange and disgusting she'd found on the bottom of her shoe. Stan would have been offended, but honestly, he was used to it. "Listen," this Pearl lady said. "Do you have anything here that is actually magical?"

Part of Stan recognized that what he was about to say was probably a bad idea, but old habits die hard, and he couldn't help it. "I guarantee, madame, that everything here is a 100% genuine magical artifact!"

Big Nose looked like she might explode. Or, at the very least, walk-out without saying another word. But before either of those things could happen, Purple popped up and said, "Look, have you got any rocks?"

That, Stan did have.

"TADA!" he said, several minutes later, with a flourish of jazz hands. "The rock that looks like a face rock!"

The assembled visitors stared at the relevant rock.

"...So it's a rock," began the Square One, speaking slowly, as though to unravel some hidden truths, "that looks like a face."

"Exactly," said Stan. When there was no further reaction, he added, "Pretty cool, right?"

"So it's...merely a rock which, due to random chance, superficially resembles a human face?" asked Pearl, who appeared to have reached a stage of pure confused resignation.

"Er. Yes."

"Well," Steven said. "I think it's pretty cool."

"Yeah," Purple said. "But it's not a gem, soooo..."

"Oh, you're looking for gems?" asked Stan. "We've got those!"

Well, in a sense. He definitely had some genuine gemstones. He also had some very gemstone looking things . False stones made of plastic. Pieces of glass found by the lake. Marbles. Ring pops. Stan displayed them all at the same exhibit, tucked away in the back of the Mystery Shack, where few tourists managed to reach.

The four visitors were not particularly impressed.

"They're very...uh, sparkly," Steven said loyally.

"Is that one candy?" snickered Purple. Stan ignored her.

Big Nose's face was buried in her hands. Peeking through, she turned the the tallest one and said, "Can we please leave now?"

It seemed as tough Square Head was going to agree, but before she could open her mouth, one of the stones began to glow.

"See?" said Stan. "Magic!"

He wasn't a total liar, after all. Like the rest of the Gravity Falls, there was something genuine among the junk. Some of the gems in his collectionwere real- though, admittedly, not particularly valuable, being too small and low quality to really be worth anything. And among those, there was something truly special; a stone of brilliant orange with deep veins of black running through it, embedded in a piece of elegantly carved oak, beautiful to behold.

Stan didn't particularly care for it. He'd gotten it at a bargain from a wandering magician. The reasons for the low price quickly became apparent, and Stan had been forced to put the gemstone on display somewhere that couldn't disrupt anything else. It would be fine if the gem just occasionally lit up; a light show never hurt anyone, would have even added a bit of pizzazz. What wasn't fine was that whenever it did so, random objects would begin to levitate and get thrown around the room, as if the stone was a child having a monstrous tantrum.

This is what it began doing then. It grabbed Stan's fez, which shimmered in a pale orange light, before tossing it violently at the ceiling. At the same time, it also grabbed a broom Soos had left propped in a corner, and a few creepy china dolls that the Shack had lying around.

The four visitors immediately tensed up, ready to fight. Random parts of their body began to glow- forehead, chest, hands. "Relax," Stan assured them. "Just a bit of your classic telekinesis. Harmless stuff."

As if to smite him, the gemstone decided to pick up the Purple one, who had somehow managed pull a whip out of her chest, and flung her into a wall. She hit with a sickening crash, sending down a shower of dust from the rafters.

"Amethyst!" Steven cried.

"Oh, you wanna play?" the girl growled, picking herself off the ground and charging at the display, whip in hand. The magical force began to throw the china dolls at her; she dodged the first two, but the last one hit her on the head, shattering, but apparently leaving her unharmed. Stan couldn't say that he was particularly upset about the dolls' destruction. They had been pretty creepy.

Predictably, the girl's attack was not successful, since the angry gemstone merely picked her up once more- while also grabbing two of her friends, who'd at some point summoned a spear and pair of giant gauntlets. This time, it didn't just fling them at the nearest wall, but kept them suspended in the air, where they struggled uselessly.

"You've upset it!" the boy cried, staring up at his companions.

"Yo, it attacked first!" Amethyst responded, as the gemstone grabbed the broom, a bucket, pieces of broken china, and started tearing up the floorboards. Stan winced. That would be expensive to repair.

They were both right, really. The gem had a hair-trigger temper, and there was no way to avoid these outbursts in the first place. However, Mystery Shack employees had learned from experience that any attempts to engage it just made that anger worst; the best method of dealing with the sentient stone was retreating, and coming back once it had calmed down. With three of his visitors suspended in the air, however, that wasn't going to be an option (however tempting it may be).

The gem threw the inanimate objects it was holding in every direction. A shower of doll shrapnel went heading right for the boy; a sudden pink shield appeared on his arm, deflecting them. Stan had so such tricks. Using an agility surprising for his age, he dodged a couple of pieces of the ex-dolls, and side-stepped the broom coming right at him, then plucked it right out of the air by the handle.

"Are you okay, Steven?" Pearl wailed.

"I'm fine!" he shouted back, over the roar of floorboards being torn out of the very ground.

Keep talking, keep talking, Stan thought, as he 'nonchalantly' made his way towards the gemstone display, broom hidden behind his back. The boy saw him; they shared a look, and understanding passed between them. Steven looked away, and somehow continued to find something to talk about, leaving his friends- and more importantly, the sentient stone- distracted. This gave Stan the opportunity to quickly whip out the broom, and use it's handle to knock the orange gem off it's perch. It fell; and as it did, it lost it's telepathic grip, and everything it had been holding fell too. At that moment Steven leapt forward and slid across the floor, managing to catch the stone right before it hit the ground and shattered.

"Woah. Shhh. Shhhh," the boy crooned to the orange stone in his open palms. "Just relax, now, okay? Everything's going to be alright.

"This kind of thing wouldn't happen as often if you guys tried being a little nicer," he gently admonished his friends, as he began to pry the gemstone out of the wood.

"Maybe you're right, Steven," the tall one said, but the other two looked dubious. Stan shared their concern. Maybe sometimes the nice approach worked, but more often than not it would just get you killed, especially if you didn't have any fancy shield powers.

The ability to create magical shields apparently wasn't the only power this kid had. The moment he'd worked the gemstone free of the wood, a small, pink sphere blossomed in his hand, surrounding the now floating jewel.

"Hey, wait, you can't just-" Stan began.

The bubble vanished, the gem with it.

The man sighed. Clearly, they could. And maybe it was for the best. One less thing for him to worry about, anyway.

"You're gonna have to pay for that," he still told them gruffly. "And for the tour. A hundred bucks."

Big Nose and Purple looked like they might just argue about that, but then Steven pointed out that 'it's wrong to steal things', and Square just nodded at Stan and said, "Very well."

Amethyst huffed, crossing her arms. "What's with humans and their money obsession, anyway...?"

"I don't even have any money on me!" muttered Pearl. Neither did the others, though the boy did have seventy-five cents in one of his pockets. Eventually, Big Nose just sighed; the shiny oval at her forehead began to glow with a bright, pure light, and from it materialized a pile of gold.

"Here. Take this. We're going." Pearl handed the summoned payment straight into the hands of the unresisting, but sceptical, Stan. The gold came in many forms- old coins, rings, chains, even a crown. As the four guests left the way they came in, he bit into one of the coins. It felt soft but solid against his teeth.

Bah. That was the problem with supernatural beings. They never knew how to use credit cards.

Oh well- at least they'd still paid. In gold. And the real stuff, too, not any of that Leprechaun fakery. Despite the disaster, there would still be enough here to make a decent profit.

Yeah. All in all, it had been a good day.

oOoOo

Author's Note: Ever since we found out that we're getting new SU and GF episodes on the same day, I figured I needed to do something to help celebrate...and I figured that it was the perfect excuse to get out the crossover fic stewing at the back of my head. Or fics, rather, since I was imagining a bunch of random scenes, but no way to link them into a coherent signal plot. Hopefully, they're still enjoyable.