Pacifica Pleasure walked softly through the halls of the Tent of Telepathy. It was late, and she had to admit that she was tired; but the prospect of what she was about to do energized her just enough to keep her moving. She stayed as silent as possible: She wasn't concerned about getting caught in her own territory, but she did want to avoid annoying questions from unimportant people.

The halls were dark, but that did nothing to deter Pacifica. She walked confidently through the building until she stopped in front of the correct door. It opened silently, and she slipped inside. With a flick of a semi-concealed switch, the room's electric lanterns sputtered to life in a yellow ambiance that imitated firelight.

As Pacifica's eyes adjusted to the light, she smiled at the object in the center of the room. On a low table sat a crystal ball, which shone with a reflection of the light. It wasn't a real crystal ball: It had no inherent magic, and it was made of cheap glass. Pacifica had a real crystal ball (complete with magical properties), but that was back in her trailer. The ball in front of her, though entirely ordinary, was still the object needed for her task.

She ran a finger over the smooth glass of her purple amulet, which sat in its usual place on her chest. This would be tricky. Generally, séances required multiple people, sitting in a circle around the table. Pacifica had conducted a few séances by herself in the past (mostly just to see if she could), and they'd been noticeably trickier. People could create circles — and the more circles involved in a séance, the better. By herself, she'd have to rely on the round room, the round table, and the spherical crystal (or, glass) ball.

And, of course, she had her amulet and its powers. That was what really made the séance possible.

Pacifica sat cross-legged beside the table, which put her at eye level to the crystal ball. The ball was a centering object, to which she could call ghosts and temporarily trap them inside. Calling ghosts was a skill with which she had experience, though usually she had more information about the spirit. Usually, she called dead relatives for clients so that they could hear one last message from them. On those nights, she had a name, a few memorable traits, and her clients to pull up a face in their minds. Not tonight. Tonight, she wanted to summon a ghost that she wasn't even sure existed.

She always did like a challenge.

A yawn escaped her: a desperate plea from her body to go home and get some sleep. She ignored it, though she did wish that she could do this at a different time. When no other opportunities for privacy had presented themselves, Pacifica had been forced to encroach on her own sleep and use that time for this experiment. She had no idea how long it would take. . . so she'd better get started, before she fell asleep at the séance table.

Her amulet glowed purple; the room went into greyscale, save a few purple wisps that bobbed around the room. These were the spirits. Most of them didn't have form, although some had discernible features, like a vague face or a stream of hair. To themselves, they looked similar to how they had when they were alive (with the small change of being intangible and translucent); but until she summoned one into the crystal ball, they would look like wispy blobs to her.

She kept the spirits in her periphery and brought an image to her mind's eye. It had taken some time to decide on an image to express her abstract situation, but she'd eventually found one that she hoped would work. In her mind, Pacifica imagined two nondescript heads: one surrounded by purple smoke, and the other blank. It was a tricky image to visualize steadily, but she managed. Moving her gaze to look directly at the spirits, Pacifica projected her image out to them.

Hopefully it would work. She had no idea if there was any spirit who knew the answer to her question. Perhaps she could find the last person to own her amulet, or even the creator of the amulets. Maybe she could find someone who knew why she couldn't read the minds of Dipper or Mabel Pines.

Gideon Northwest said that she didn't need to worry about them, but he was clearly mistaken. Not only had Mabel almost smashed Pacifica's amulet, but she'd created maniacal clones and sent them after Pacifica. And, to top it all off, she kept her twin brother Dipper oblivious to it all. Looking for answers among the ghosts was the next step, in Pacifica's mind, to putting a stop to Mabel's trickery.

After a few minutes, a larger spirit began to form, swirling in the purple mist. Its shape was very vague; it was resisting being summoned. Pacifica locked her eyes onto it and showed her image to it. The spirit started squirming, trying to escape, but Pacifica was too strong. She drew the struggling spirit into her crystal ball, where it filled up the space. She had it trapped. Resigned, the spirit formed into the shape of a human face, taking on a man's strong jaw. He stared at Pacifica with an unamused expression.

Well, my apologies, Pacifica thought sarcastically, but I need to speak with you.

The spirit raised an eyebrow, wondering if Pacifica really did need to speak with him, or if she was just a brat with powers.

Rude! Pacifica pursed her lips and told the spirit that she just wanted information. Did he recognize the image? Had he used the amulet before?

Instead of answering, the spirit regarded her with a curious expression. He wondered. . . was she a Symbol?

A what? Usually, spirits communicated with feelings and wordless thoughts, but this thought was so strong that Pacifica actually caught a word: Symbol. Confused, she told the spirit that she thought she was symbolic for the townspeople, in a famous sort of way; but that didn't seem to be what he meant.

If you don't know, the spirit realized, then maybe I shouldn't tell you.

What? Pacifica demanded. Why not?

It was a tricky situation, the spirit told her. Maybe she didn't need to know. . . although Cipher certainly knew. . . .

Cipher? Pacifica was getting more confused by the moment, which feeling she did not like. Who's Cipher? It was another thought that yielded an actual word.

Now the spirit seemed nervous. Cipher was not for him to explain, he told Pacifica, not to anyone. He wanted her to let him go.

No. Not until you tell me about Cipher.

Now the spirit got angry as well as scared — never a good combination. The séance table started to shake, and an unnatural wind gusted through the room. Pacifica had the technology to create these effects for her clients (and she used them often), but these specific phenomena were caused directly by the ghost. Trapping the spirits like this gave them power over the real world that they didn't usually have.

This ghost was using that power to his full advantage. The rocking and blowing became overwhelming, and Pacifica could tell that the ghost would cause real damage soon. This spirit was strong.

Pacifica didn't want to let go — but she was too tired, and the ghost was too strong. She finally relented, and the ghost flew from the crystal ball with a final bang of noise. The wind and the shaking ceased, leaving Pacifica alone in the séance room.

Well, that was useless.

She patted down her windblown hair, in case anybody saw her on the way home. Perhaps it wasn't so useless, now that she thought past her original annoyance. She was extremely confused, yes, but the ghost had given her new leads — and not just concepts, but words. That was relatively rare in séances.

The words ran through her mind as she turned off the light and left the séance room. (A janitor could clean up the small mess left by the ghost.) She hurried through the cold night, looking forward to her warm trailer, and thought about what she'd learned. Symbol. Cipher. Both words seemed to refer to people rather than objects, which was strange. Who had a name like Cipher?

She knew who she could ask. He probably knew more about all of this.

But, not tonight. Tonight, she was exhausted, as much as she wanted to stay awake pondering her experience in the séance. Once inside her trailer, she took off her makeup, brushed out her hair, changed into pajamas, brushed her teeth, and climbed into her bed.

As she fell asleep, she couldn't shake the feeling that she was on the cusp of something big.