The change doesn't fade.
If anything, it settles in.
My memory is no longer something I use—it's something I inhabit. Every book I've read, every conversation I've had, every fleeting observation now exists in perfect clarity, layered and indexed without effort. I don't recall things; I access them.
My past life feels closer now.
Not emotionally—those feelings are still distant—but cognitively. Memories I once struggled to articulate are suddenly crisp. Dates. Names. Patterns I never realized I noticed. It's like someone wiped condensation off a mirror I didn't know was fogged.
I don't forget.
Not anymore.
Stan notices before I tell him.
It's subtle at first. I finish his equations before he does. I reference obscure entries from the journals without checking. I catch inconsistencies in our notes that neither of us remembers writing incorrectly.
He doesn't accuse me of anything.
He just watches.
By the time we're well into Journal Three, Gravity Falls has become less of a mystery and more of a system—still chaotic, still dangerous, but no longer incomprehensible. We've been here over a year now, and the town has yielded more secrets than most places do in a lifetime.
And still… it isn't enough for me.
Stan studies Gravity Falls like a scientist cataloguing a newly discovered ecosystem.
I study it like someone preparing for war.
We work together constantly—sharing discoveries, theorizing late into the night—but I also begin keeping my own journals. Not copies. Not supplements.
Independent records.
My journals don't just describe what happens in Gravity Falls—they explore why, how, and what could be done differently. Countermeasures. Safeguards. Failsafes. Theoretical applications of anomaly energy far beyond observation.
Eventually, I build my own lab.
Far enough from Stan's house to avoid accidents. Shielded. Reinforced. Designed not just to contain phenomena, but to fail safely. If something goes wrong—and something always does—it won't take the forest with it.
The lab becomes my sanctuary.
Here, I test ideas I won't voice aloud. Hybrid theories blending physics with proto-glyph logic. Devices that respond to intent as much as input. Early attempts at translating magical principles into repeatable frameworks.
Not spells.
Systems.
At night, alone among humming instruments and chalk-covered boards, I think about the future.
Bill Cipher is still out there.
The Collector will come.
The Boiling Isles waits.
I prefer magic. I always have. There's something honest about it—raw, symbolic, alive. But magic without understanding is fragile, and understanding without restraint is catastrophic.
So I choose both.
Science to anchor me.Magic to elevate me.
I glance at my reflection in the polished metal of a workbench—Elaine's face staring back, eyes sharper now, steadier.
"I'm ready," I say quietly.
Not for everything.
But for what comes next.