Monday, March 9th, 2015

Twelve Hours Before Not What He Seems Premieres

God, did Jocelyn Swanson hate stat.

AP Statistics was by far her least favorite class. She had only taken the class to have an AP math her senior year, and because she'd thought she was going to have Mr. Perkins, who she'd heard was an incredible stat teacher. But Mr. Perkins had gotten a job as a big time statistician, so Jocelyn and the rest of the sorry saps who'd taken the damn class got stuck with Mr. "Creepy Kenneth" Hunt. Who, by the way, was a horrible stat teacher.

With first semester over, the senioritis had sunk in, and Jocelyn was absentmindedly doodling a picture of Bill Cipher's wheel in her notebook.

"C'mon, guys!" Mr. Hunt was saying, waiting for the class to shout out an answer.

Figuring she had to at least participate, Jocelyn called out, "The equation you're looking for is x-bar minus mew over s sub x over the square root of n, which comes out to be…" She moved to her calculator and punched in some numbers. "Three point oh four. The z-score is 3.04."

Stat was usually the blind leading the blind. For this particular topic, Jocelyn happened to fall into the former category.

As Mr. Hunt explained the answer to the rest of the class, Jocelyn rolled her eyes at her best friend Hazelle Krimms, who, across the room, was furiously taking notes and punching in equations. Between the two of them, Hazelle was definitely the more avid student, studying every night and taking detailed pages of notes for every class. Meanwhile, Jocelyn never studied and really only went crazy for her history and music classes (a.k.a. the only classes she liked). She had a kind of natural intelligence that she wasn't crazy about applying too seriously to school, but Hazelle was dedicated to her grades in the same way Jocelyn was dedicated to having fun. But somehow, Jocelyn always came out on top GPA-wise. And it drove Hazelle nuts.

She continued shading in the wheel, mindlessly remembering her trip to Gravity Falls, Oregon, a year and a half ago. So many things had changed since that trip: her sleep schedule, her perception of reality, her goals for her future. Losing her and Hazelle's friend Lucy Glint to who knew what dimension had shaken Jocelyn to her core, which was exactly why she and Hazelle had spent every night since then searching for Lucy through Jocelyn's portal jumping powers and Hazelle's map of the universe.

In that moment, Jocelyn appreciated the utter normalcy of the situation: she wasn't Jocelyn Marie Swanson, portal jumper; she was Jocelyn Marie Swanson, high school senior, a girl wasting away in stat class, doodling an image from her favorite cartoon into her notebook. Her day would consist of finishing up school, going home, doing her homework, eating dinner, and then fighting with her siblings for control of the TV remote during the premiere of what could be the most important episode of Gravity Falls yet. Everything was normal. Everything was fine.

Or at least, everything would have been fine, had the wheel in her notebook had not started glowing blue and spinning.

To her utter dismay, the wheel levitated off the pages and flashed an awful electric blue like a strike of lightning. Frantically looking up, Jocelyn realized that the room had frozen, everything except herself and Hazelle turning black and white.

The wheel shuddered, spinning so fast the separate symbols around the edges blurred together. Shrieking, Jocelyn scrambled backwards, tossing her notebook away from her as a hurricane overtook the room.

"Joss, what's happening?" Hazelle yelled, pushing her hair out of her face and struggling to be heard over the roar of the wind. A swirling vortex opened above them, and familiar laughter began to echo through the small classroom.

As the wind reached its climax, a figure appeared from the vortex.

"Hey, Music Note, Caduceus, didja miss me?"

Jocelyn threw her hands in the air. "Oh, for fuck's sake!"

"Bill?" Hazelle exclaimed. Already frazzled from stat, her outburst quickly took on a hysterical quality. "I don't—how are you—you were gone!"

Bill chuckled, twirling his cane in a circle. "Well ya see, Caduceus, Pen's little stunt only set me back a little ways. Did you really think some puny mortal could get rid of me?" He laughed again, as if they were discussing an inside joke.

Jocelyn felt an uneasy feeling beginning to form in the pit of her stomach. Bill's nonchalant mentioning of Lucy, their Lucy, sent shivers down her spine. Bill being there couldn't have been good.

Jocelyn narrowed her eyes. "So why are you here?"

Bill looked up from examining his tiny black fingers. "Well, I've been watching you two for a while, and I must say, I'm impressed. Especially with you, Music Note. You've really pulled it together." He hummed, glancing about the classroom. "No more explosions, I see."

As Jocelyn bristled, curling her hands into fists, Bill added, "Hey, there, I wouldn't lose my temper if I were you." He gestured with his cane to the frozen students and Mr. Hunt. "Let's keep the civilian casualties to a minimum, hmm?"

Scowling, Jocelyn stepped down.

Hazelle stood up from her seat. "You still haven't told us why you're here. Or how, for that matter. Why did it take you two years to find us again?"

"Losing your touch?" Jocelyn quipped.

Bill's voice took on an annoyed quality. "I'll admit, Pen's move took some guts, and did set me back a bit. A bit. But she won't be causing me or anybody else any trouble soon."

Jocelyn winced. What had Bill done to Lucy?

"As for how I'm here," Bill continued cheerfully, "I owe that to Music Note over there."

Hazelle's gaze flickered to Jocelyn, and then back to Bill. Her eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"

"That drawing in her notebook, dummy!"

Quickly, Hazelle approached it, and, picking up the book, scrutinized Jocelyn's poor attempt at drawing the wheel.

"Every time someone draws me, I can see what's happening in their dimension! Of course, that's no doorway...but you two know Music Note's bad track record with accidentally opening portals in my windows. Searchfortheblindeye ring any bells?" Bill laughed. "So thanks for the help, Music Note! Thanks for not learning your lesson!"

"Jocelyn..." Hazelle began, stricken. "What did you do?"

Jocelyn felt the blood drain from her face.

"I...I don't—I didn't mean—I was just doodling! I thought it was harmless! I didn't know I would create some—some doorway!"

Bill shrugged. "Well, I guess lightning does strike twice—for me, anyway! Some people never learn when it comes to unthinkable supernatural forces beyond their control."

Jocelyn didn't know what to do. She had let a freaking demon loose in the real world! They—Lucy—had risked it all to banish Bill, and Jocelyn had just let him back in with a stupid little doodle.

Sensing Hazelle and Jocelyn's panic, Bill laughed again, the sound harsh and cold. "It's okay, you're my favorite troublemakers, so I'm gonna cut you some slack. I'll bring the party to you! And then things will get super duper fun. We've had a nice chat, but Ol' Bill here's got some work to do! Till we meet again, have fun in calculus or whatever boring class this is."

Hazelle and Jocelyn exchanged a frantic glance. "Till we meet again? What the hell does that mean?"

"And one more thing," Bill added, ignoring Jocelyn's question. "Keep an eye out; things aren't always what they seem, ya know?"

With one last cackle, Bill Cipher vanished in a flash of blue. The world around them brightened with color and movement, Mr. Hunt continuing the lesson as if nothing had ever happened.

With wide eyes, Jocelyn stared down at the wheel in her notebook. The lights must have flickered, or she must have blinked. Because there was no way she saw the tiny Bill she had sketched wave at her, joyous as an old friend.