Four Painful Years

Find a happy place! Find a hiding place!

>Resist urge to touch anything. Fingerprints, dna and such y'know. Looks like you need another pharmacy. And somewhere safe to hide. He might not be the last.

Now seems like a good time to get some help. The warehouse is within walking/sprinting for your life distance right? You should go there and remember to stuff the gun in one of your pockets. You know it's evidence but if you leave it behind someone might think you were the cause of the pharmacist's death.
You mean, chances are you're going to get blamed for the majority of this instead of anyone believing in your accounts of supernaturally resilient old people.

Do not take the meds, the medic was apparently trying to kill you. Also, remember the cops are coming.

>Take meds.

It wouldn't hurt to salvage some pills from the chaos. The place looks like a war zone. No one's going to notice if a bottle of obscure experimental medicine goes walkabout, much less experimental medicine that has to be flown in from another state. You happen to find a bottle on the ground near the shelves. That'll save you a hundred bucks or so.

No harm done. It's not like anyone else was buying these things. These pills were ordered specifically for you.

>Do not take the meds, the medic was apparently trying to kill you.

...These pills were ordered specifically for you.

A wave of unease comes over you. A little nausea, too. You put the bottle down and take a few nearby Tylenol 3 capsules instead. Better than nothing, if only slightly. Who knows what kind of weird crap that guy was putting in your prescription. For all you know, it could've been making your situation worse. If your crazy neighbor was telling the truth about him, anyway.

Speaking of whom...

>Find a hiding place.

Before you make tracks, you scan the room for that bastard's pipe. Nowhere to be found. You see the machete hanging there, but for one, you're too short to reach it, for two, it's probably really heavy, and for three... do you really want to be seen running around town with a huge, bloody machete? Especially with the police on their way?

You don't see much point in taking the gun. You have no idea where you'd find more ammo, and even if there's some lying around, you don't exactly have time to look for it. As if bullets worked the first time. Whatever. You stick the gun in your back pocket and climb over the counter. You can hear your monstrous neighbor groaning as you rush out the door of the pharmacy. Home is too far, and if he tries to find you that's exactly where he'll look. Your best bet is the warehouse.

This is hands down the worst day of your life. Teetering on an impending migraine, covered in the blood of someone you spoke to only a few days ago, no longer sure of who to trust or what's even real anymore, you step out into the familiar light of the sun...

JULIE: "I guess that wasn't Tylenol..."

>Take a second to gawk at the stuff you can now perceive and ponder what the medicine you were taking made you miss before.

This might as well happen. Try not to stare at the sky island for too long, you don't want to attract the attention.

Actually? Go to a bar, let's drink.

>Ignore. You're hallucinating. Pretend you didn't see that.

Congratulations, you aren’t colourblind anymore! :D

>Ignore. You're hallucinating. Pretend you didn't see that.

Try not to stare at the sky island for too long.

You don't have to try very hard. As soon as you rub your eyes and blink a couple times, it's gone. It was probably just a little light blindness, that's all. Yeah! Nevermind the fact that the pharmacy was actually pretty well-lit. These things just kind of happen, right? You guess?

Sort of...?

Either way, this is exactly the kind of stuff you've come to expect from your tendency to see things that aren't really there. Well, maybe not floating islands, but things like that. The increased severity could have something to do with how close your painkillers are to wearing off and the amount of stress you are currently under. Or maybe all that rapid movement finally caused something to break up there. Welcome to Bonkersville!

Whatever. Hallucinating or not, there's a maniac trying to kill you.

Actually? Go to a bar, let's drink.

... There is a maniac... trying to kill you.

As much as you could go for an entire bottle of spiced rum all to yourself, you think the literal actual murderer will have to take priority for now. Something really did break up there!

Stupid god damn wrinkly bag of wet neurons!

>Take a second to gawk at the stuff you can now perceive and ponder what the medicine you were taking made you miss before.

There's nothing. Nothing at all. Hallucinating, remember? You round the corner of the intersection.

A three-headed cocker spaniel rears up on its hind legs and barks at you in tri-toned stereo. You understandably flip the fuck out and do a sort of one-legged bunny hop away from the offending party of pooches. Its owner, the jogger from before, apologizes and assures you that he's friendly, like all dog owners do, but something's different. Fizzing in and out like a colourful static on either side of her head are these fin-like ears. You stumble back and blink extra hard.

Nothing. No fins, no extra dog heads... nothing. Just a regular dog and a concerned lady in a tracksuit.

You turn around to flee and run straight into a bush. You scream as hundreds of glowing eyes flick open to stare at you from the gaps between the leaves. A swarm of winged creatures explodes from the foliage, buffeting you backwards before they fly away and disappear. At this point you're sprinting towards the warehouse. Can't get there soon enough.

There's that weird bird again, but this time its weirdness is leagues more apparent. It keeps fizzing out like that lady's ears, flipping back and forth between the form of a crane and that of a big red thing with long feathers, gleaming in the sun and smoldering like it's on fire. You'd almost think it was beautiful were not a completely unnatural monstrosity that you will avoid at any cost.

After running for what seems like hours through what feels like a particularly cruel nightmare, you reach the back entrance of Grosvenor Storage &...

... Grosvenor Storage, Warehouse & OffWorld Freight!?

Not only has the sign changed, but the warehouse looks different, too. There's an extra bay door up there next to the sign, possibly connected to the second level. There's no ramp or anything. The only way a vehicle could receive anything through that door is if it could fly. A wave of blunt pain washes over your brain. You feel a migraine coming on...

Go home. You can’t embarrass yourself there.

Go home. You can’t embarrass yourself there.

Home is precisely where you don't wanna go right now. Remember, terrifically stubborn murderer?

Come on now, admit to yourself that you're not hallucinating. These things are way too specific.

>Ok, INTERACT with the extra bay door
>hallucinations sucks

Disregarding all the strangeness a psychopath is still on your tail. You need to get in there, find Max, and then come up with a more complete plan on how to survive. Maybe you can get Luca to run them over, they're good at that.

((Oh my god! You're living in a Gravity Falls. There must be some kind of masquerade trying to hide all this weirdness. Gasp! What if you're not hallucinating, but rather, seeing past the facade, the dividers they used to obfuscate the true nature, the true appearance of the town?))

Enough rambling, go in.

>Ok, INTERACT with the extra bay door

It's too high up for you to touch, so you pick up a small rock and throw it. You expect to hear the light tap of a stone against a concrete wall. Instead you hear the startling clang of steel. That door is no hallucination. It's actually there... on the second story of a building with no way to get it.

Come on now, admit to yourself that you're not hallucinating. These things are way too specific.

You sigh. Okay, fine. You fold. Some seriously freaky business is going down. Either the entire town is a portal to Hell that just opened, or the mass in your head has grown large enough to put you in a coma and this is all just an extremely vivid dream. Or, worse yet, it's all been like this from the very beginning and you've somehow been unable to see that. But before you jump to any conclusions about what is or isn't real and throw yourself into a huge panic, you've got to touch base with the guys. They don't need to know that you're seeing firebirds and fish people. For now, they need only know about the invulnerable man who's out for a mug of Julie juice.

You burst into the warehouse and everybody turns to look at you. They seem to be in the middle of a meeting and thank GOD, they all look normal.

What do you say?

"hey friendos theres this indestructible maniac out to get me so uh if you hear someone trying to suplex the door with a bayonet dont answer it"

"Some sort of paid killer is after me. He was shot but did not stop. He may be invulnerable."

"hey friendos theres this indestructible maniac out to get me so uh if you hear someone trying to suplex the door with a bayonet dont answer it"

Seconding.

"fuck guys, I think the pharmacist tried to poison me and now I'm with no meds :((("

"Please tell me none of you want to kill me. We're all friends here, yeah? Almost running me over everyday wasn't actually planned attempts on my life, was it Luca?"
"Also, my head is killing me. Anybody got some none poisoned painkillers I could take?"

MAXWELL: “Julie? What’s up?”

TRENT: “Yeah, you look like... ”

JULIE: “I’ve seen a ghost? Worse. More like a zombie, or Jason Voorhees… Or the T-1000.”
JULIE: “And all of his little demon friends...”

MAXWELL: “Breathe, Jules, breathe. You’re not making sense.”

JULIE: “I’m fine… I’m fine. There’s just this indestructible maniac out to get me so, uh, if you hear someone trying to suplex the door with a bayonet, don’t answer it.”

TRENT: “... Say what now?”

JULIE: “Look, you're just gonna have to deal with my shit right now because I don’t know what happened and I never got my meds ‘cause my pharmacist might’ve been trying to poison me but my creepy neighbor killed him with a machete and then he came after me and I tried to shoot him with this gun I found - ”

You brandish the gun. Everyone flinches.

“ - but he wouldn’t go down and I ran out of bullets and then I had no choice so I punched him and my ring like EXPLODED and he went WOOSH and the wall fell down and then I went outside and there was this huge floating island and a fin lady and a three headed dog and a bunch of weird bird things and now the name of the company’s different and there’s a weird door outside and I have no idea what’s going on anymore…!”

You double over and cry, like anyone would. Your fingers curl up against your temples as the pain worsens, becoming almost unbearable. Mustafa and Trent look at each other with worried expressions. Luca’s eyebrows have raised a whole inch.

MAXWELL: “How’s your head, Julie...?”

JULIE: “It hurts…”

MAXWELL: “Okay, I’m going to go get the back up pills you gave me, the rest of you keep an eye on…”

JULIE: “Max?”

MAXWELL: “... Yes?”

JULIE: “Please tell me you guys aren’t weird monster things that are trying to kill me, too…”

There’s a moment of silence. Suddenly, a hand is on your shoulder and you look up. It belongs to Luca, of all people. She kneels down and gingerly answers your question.

LUCA: “Rest assured, Mitchells… If I thought you were worth killing, you would have been dead months ago. And I would have done it immediately, without hesitation, because everything about you pisses me off.”

Silence.

JULIE: “God, Luca, why are you such a b-WAGH!”

Luca takes you down with both arms and rolls forward. Only a moment later the warehouse door flies off its hinges with a resounding BANG, and scrapes the ground where you were standing. It carries on and almost clips Maxwell before smashing into the office area.

It’s him.

NEIGHBOR: "... A Ring o’ Defiance, eh?"
NEIGHBOR: "They didn’t tell me you’d gone and crossed over already… Oh well."

A serrated blade taller than a normal person appears in his hand. The light level in the warehouse increases slightly.

NEIGHBOR: "Last chance, little girl… Come take a walk with me now, and I’ll only kill you… Keep strugglin’, and I'll make you scream for death."

>RUN TO THE FORKLIFTERS.
>IF THE MAN ISN'T GOING FOR GOOD. HE'S GOING FOR BAD.
>Run over him!