Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Character Cheat Sheet:

Gravity Falls:                       Relativity Falls:

Dipper Pines-                       Stanford Filbrick “Ford” Pines

Mabel Pines-                        Stanley “Lee” Pines

Stanley Pines-                      Mabel “Grantie Mae” Pines

Stanford Pines-                    The Author

Jesus “Soos” Ramirez-          Maria “Ria” Alzamirano

Maria “Abulita” Alzamirano- Jesus “Abuelo” Ramirez

Gideon Gleeful-                   Buddy Gleeful

Bud “Buddy” Gleeful-           Gideon Gleeful

Wendy Corduroy-                Danny Corduroy

“Manly Dan” Corduroy-        Wendy “Tough Girl Dee” Corduroy

Robert “Robbie” Valentino-  Stacy Valentino

Tambry-                              Shandra Jimenez

Mr. Valentino-                     Robert Valentino (Funeral director)

Shandra Jimenez-                Tambry Valentino (News reporter)

“Lazy” Susan Wentworth-     “Growling” Grenda

Grenda-                              Susan Wentworth

Toby Determined-               Thompson Determined

Thompson-                         Toby

Tyler Cutebiker-                  Gorney

Gorney-                              Tyler

Candy Chiu-                       Fiddleford “Fidds” McGucket

“Old Man” McGucket-          Candy “Crazy” Chiu

Tate McGucket-                  Fiddleford’s dad

Sheriff Daryl Blubbs-           Sheriff Nathan Holt

Deputy Edwin Durland-      Deputy Roy

Lee Roy-                             Edwin “Ed”

Nate Holt-                          Daryl

Gompers the goat-             Waddles the pig

Waddles the pig-                Gompers the goat

Pacifica Northwest-            Preston Northwest

Mr. Northwest-                   Mrs. Pacifica Northwest

Mermando the merman-    Darlene the spider girl

Norman/gnomes-              Norma/pixies

Relativity Falls Characters:

Pines Family: Ford, Lee, Grantie Mae, Waddles, and Gompers

Workers: Maria “Ria” Alzamirano, Fiddleford “Fidds” McGucket, and Danny Corduroy

Teenagers: Danny, Toby, Daryl, Edwin “Ed”, Shandra, and Stacy Valentino

Kids: Ford, Lee, Fidds, Buddy Gleeful, Preston Northwest, Susan Wentworth, and Tyler

Towns Folk: Gideon Gleeful, Wendy “Tough Girl Dee” Corduroy, Thompson Determined, Gorney, Robert Valentino, Tambre Valentino, Candy “Crazy” Chiu, “Growling” Grenda, Jesus “Abuelo” Ramirez, Mr. “Tate” McGucket, Mrs. Pacifica Northwest

Law Enforcement: Sheriff Nathan Holt, Deputy Lee, Blenden Blandon*, Time Baby*, Time Police*

Other: Darlene the spider girl, Norma/pixies, President Sir Lord Quentin Trembley III, Esq.*

*- No change between aus

Symbols:

The Author: Pine Tree

Fiddleford McGucket: Question Mark

Danny Corduroy: Ax

Mabel Pines: Shooting Star

Stanford Pines: Six Fingers “Sixer”

Buddy Gleeful: “Psychic” Star

Candy Chiu: The Big dipper “Saucepan”

Preston Northwest: Llama

Stanley Pines: Crescent Shaped Symbol

Stacy Valentino: Stitched Heart

 Foreword:

In honor for the Gravity Falls series finale, which will be coming sometime early next year, I'm starting my own AU for Relativity Falls. In case the character sheet confuses you, I will be open for questions about any of the characters. Here's the brief overview:

• In order for the plot to work, a lot of these characters won't be straight. Some might come as a surprise, others I will make painfully obvious.
• Soos' grandmother won't replace him all the time. Half the time, it'll be her, for the other half, he'll be replaced with Fiddleford McGucket.
• Maria's last name will be Soos' middle name, Alzamirano, since she is his mother's mother, so they most likely won't have the same last name.
• Fidds will also be added into scenes that Soos isn't in, purely for the sake of the Mystery Trio and adorable Fidd/Ford moments <3.
• The police officers are Lee and Nate Holt. I wasn't too sure of Lee's last name, so I made one up. Please let me know if you know what Lee's real last name is.
• Stanford and Stanley's nicknames are Ford and Lee instead of Ford and Stan, mainly to avoid confusion. If either twin is called "Stan", it'll only be because the other twin isn't present or they're talking to each other.
• Robbie has been switched with Stacy Valentino. Since his middle name is "Stacy", I'm guessing that is what Robbie's mom's name is. In this au, Robert (Robbie) and Tambry are married, and Stacy is their daughter.
• Some characters in this au will not be switched, either because it didn't make sense to switch them with anyone, or because I couldn't find anyone to switch them with.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask. Read the first comment to know when the first chapter will come. 

(THIS CHAPTER HAS BEEN UPDATED FOR CORRECTIONS)

Chapter Text

Somewhere hidden deep within a dimension of demons, one particular demon stood out from the rest. In the shadows, his geometric figure looked through various symbols in thought. He laughed maliciously, “The symbols are coming together! My time will come soon!”

He continued to laughed.The figure then looked through the symbols one-by-one. “The pine tree, the question mark, the ax, the shooting star! The hand with six fingers, the star of the all-seeing eye, the constellation of the big dipper, the llama, the crescent, and the stitched heart!”

The symbols began flashing faster again. “Be prepared, Earth. I’m going to change your world, and NO ONE CAN STOP ME!”

The demon laughed even louder and wilder. The symbols in front of him stopped once again, but this time, on the six-fingered hand.

A boy with the same, strange abnormality sat on a bus. He also wore glasses, a white shirt, and a brown jacket and jeans. Next to him was another boy that looked near identical to him. The other boy didn't wear glasses, but his smile revealed his metal braces, and he wore a pair of blue shorts and a red and white striped shirt.

The second boy smiled at the first, “Are you excited, Stanford? We get to see our Great Aunt Mabel!”

“But we’ve never met her before,” Stanford reminded him. “And could you keep it down? I don’t like it when people look at us.”

The other boy sighed, “Alright. Your hands aren’t that strange, though. I keep telling you there’s no reason to be ashamed of them.”

Stanford scoffed, “Yeah, right. Keep telling that to those kids that bully me for it. They keep calling me a freak,” he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jacket to hide them.

“We’re not in Glass Shard Beach anymore,” his brother reminded him. “This summer will be a new start for us! You’ll be glad Ma and Pop forced us on this summer trip,” he dug through his bag. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t like showing people your hands, so I packed you these,” he gave Stanford a pair of brown, protective gloves.

He gasped in happiness and pulled them on. Stanford squeezed his pinky fingers and his sixth fingers in the same finger sleeve of the gloves, “Thank you, Stanley! They’re perfect!”

Stanley looked back out the window and gasped, “Look, Ford! We’re here!”

They just passed a sign that said ‘Gravity Falls’ on it. They passed through the town, taking in the small buildings and towns folk. Soon enough, they stopped at their destination: The Mystery Shack.

When they got off, they were greeted by an older woman in a business suit. She wore a pink fez on her head with a shooting star on it.

“HEY, BOYS!” She greeted. “I’m your Great Aunt Mabel, but you can call me Grantie Mae.”

“Why ‘grantie’?” Ford asked.

“Because it’s shorter, so it saves time saying it,” Mae explained. “And time is money after all! So, let’s see… which one of you is Stanford, and which one is Stanley?”

“I’m Stanford,” he replied. Ford pointed to his brother, “he’s Stanley.”

“You can call us Lee and Ford!” Stanley smiled.

Grantie Mae nodded, “Thanks, kiddo! Easier for me to remember. And you,” she pointed at Stanford and lowered her voice. “Your parents told me about your hands, but since you covered them up, I’ll assume you don’t want to show me.”

Ford blushed in embarrassment and folded his gloved hands behind his back.

Mae smiled softly and got on one knee in front of the shy boy, “Hey, it’s okay. I won’t talk about it anymore unless you want me to. Hey, why don’t I give you the tour!” She suggested to try cheering him up.

“Okay,” Ford nodded.

The three of them walked inside the Mystery Shack, “This front room here is the gift shop,” Mae explained. All around her were shirts, knickknacks, and an assortment of other items for sale at borderline outrageous prices.

Ford noticed a red-headed teenage boy at the register. Despite his strong build and forming stubble on his chin, he didn't look any older than fifteen. He wore a plaid button-up shirt and shabby jeans and boots. The boy was reading a magazine, but he put it away right as they entered, “Oh, h-hey, Ms. Pines!” He greeted. “Are these your grand nephews you’ve been talking about?”

“Yes they are,” Grantie Mae smiled. “Kids, this is my employee, Daniel Corduroy. Danny, this is Stanford and Stanley,” she introduced.

When Danny waved at Ford, he couldn’t help but blush a little.

“Okay, let’s keep going, shall we?” Grantie Mae showed them through the tourist attractions, where she explained all the exhibits.

“Grantie Mae?” Stanley asked, looking at a fake duck with a second head sewed on it. “Are these things really real?”

“That’s what we tell the tourists, sweetie,” she brushed off. She walked up to an exhibit covered with a white blanket. “Here’s the Mystery Shack’s latest attraction!” She pulled off the blanket. “A CENTAUR-TAUR!” It was a strange centaur that had the body of a horse and a head of a horse’s body. It fell over after the blanket was removed, but Grantie Mae pretended not to notice.

Ford looked very confused, “Um… Grantie Mae? Do you have any REAL exhibits? Like of Bigfoot? Or the chupacabra?”

“Ford, sweetie, I really love your suggestions, but you gotta learn that tourists are bored of seeing the same-old, same-old,” she explained, “which is why I come up with original tourist attractions.”

“Oh!” Lee nodded. “That makes sense!”

“Now let’s show you the rest of the house, where you’ll be staying at,” Mae lead them to the ‘Employees Only’ door. On the other side was a living room with furniture and a small television set. She showed them the bathroom, the kitchen, the hallway, and the rooms they aren’t supposed to go in.

“And stay out of the attic,” Grantie Mae warned. “This building is old, and it went through a lot of wear-and-tear over the years. I would have liked for your bedroom to be up there, but I don’t want you to risk falling through the floor in your sleep. So, Maria prepared another room for you instead.”

Before the twins could ask who Maria was, a Latina woman in her early twenties came out of one of the rooms in the hallway, “Hi there, chicos,” she greeted. “My name is Maria Alzamirano. You can call me Ria if you want.”

“She’s my other employee,” Mae explained. “She’s our cleaning lady, and I make sure she’s paid well. Ria is like a daughter to me, so be respectful to her. Ria, these are Stanley and Stanford.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. I have your room all set up here,” she smiled, opening the door she just came out of. “Make yourselves at home and unpack.”

“Thank you, Ria!” Stanley smiled. He carried his bag in the room.

“Thanks,” Stanford followed. The room had completely wooden walls and floor. The opposite wall had a large, stained-glass window, and another wall had a blank, cork bulletin board with several different colored pins stuck on it. In a corner of the room were two wooden dressers, and a bunk bed stood in the opposite corner. “It’s just like the bunk bed back at home!” Ford exclaimed.

“Rock, paper, scissors for the top bunk?” Lee offered. His hand was already out.

“You are on!” After three rounds, Ford won with rock, “YES! Top bunk!” He called. Ford jumped on the upper mattress, and both laughed while Lee threw his bag on the bottom one.

“This is gonna be so cool!” Lee smiled. “I bet this will be the best summer ever!”

Ford chuckled, “Yeah, this is okay, I guess. At least we’re away from those bullies.”

“Don’t you worry ‘bout a thing,” Lee assured him. “Like I said, with those gloves, no one will have to know! Then we can get as many friends we want. Maybe I’ll get a girlfriend... and you might even get a boyfriend,” he added, teasingly.

Ford blushed, “We’re only here for the summer, Lee. Don’t forget that.”

“Yeah, but who knows what’ll happen?” Lee began unpacking, starting off by putting up his boxing posters on one side of the room. “This summer will change our lives forever, Ford. I know it!”

Stanford was really glad for his brother’s enthusiasm for this summer stay, but Ford didn't share the same confidence. While he and his twin unpacked, something kept nagging at the back of his mind that something wasn’t right here. Even that first night, when Ford kept hearing strange noises from the window, Stanley kept shrugging them off as owls, tree branches, or rodents. Ford, however, thought there was something more to this strange, small town than what meets the eye. He just couldn’t figure it out yet….

Chapter Text

In the Mystery Shack, Stanford was watching his brother hide behind the counter. Stanley peeked through the bobble-heads that looked like Grantie Mae and smirked at a pretty girl that was reading a note he gave her.

Stanford sighed as he watched the predictable outcome- the girl crumbling up the note and throwing it away, "Listen, Lee," he spoke up. "I understand you're getting interested in girls and all, but could you tone it down a notch?"

"Not until I get a girlfriend, Ford," Stanley said with determination. "Now that we're out of New Jersey, I want to find the perfect girl to date me."

Ford frowned, "That doesn't mean flirting with every girl you see. Remember when you tried hitting on that lady with the pet turtle? She looked at least ten years older than you!"

"I have a thing for older women, so what?"

Another sigh, "We're twelve, Lee."

"Yeah, but by the end of the summer, we'll be thirteen! Besides, I have a good feeling about your summer romance too, Fordzy. Too bad nobody knows that you're ga-"

Stanford covered Lee's mouth with his hands and blushed a deep red, "Be quiet! I don't want you telling anyone about that!" He pulled his hands back after feeling Stanley blow a raspberry on his gloves, "STANLEY!"

Lee chuckled in amusement. Ford wiped his glove dry with his jacket while Stanley continued. "But trust me, Ford. I got a good feeling about this summer. I wouldn't be surprised if the woman of my dreams walked through that door right now."

Right as Lee said that and pointed at the door, Grantie Mae walked in through there slouching and burping, but her burp got caught in her throat, and she ended up coughing.

"Eww! Why?!" Lee yelled, while Ford laughed.

"Alright, everyone," Grantie Mae smiled, "I need someone to go hammer these signs in the spooky part of the forest," she held up several signs and a hammer.

"Not it!" Ford yelled quickly.

"Also not it!" Followed Stanley.

Mae's cleaning lady, Ria, ignored the conversation while vacuuming to look busy.

Grantie Mae sighed and turned to her other, and last employee, Danny Corduroy, "Daniel, I need you to put up these signs for me please!"

Danny was leaning back in his seat behind the register while reading a magazine. Without interest, he pretended to reach out for the signs, "I would, but I, ugh, I can't… reach!"

Mae groaned, "Fine. If you're going to be that way, then I guess I'll choose. Eenie, meenie, miney, you," she pointed at Stanford.

"Aw!" Ford groaned. "But Grantie Mae! I always feel weird whenever I'm in those woods- like I'm being watched."

Grantie Mae shook her head, "I've been in those woods hundreds of times, kiddo. How many times do I have to tell you that nothing scary is in there?"

"Except maybe bears," Stanley teased.

"But look at my mosquito bites!" Ford pulled off his jacket to show the bites. "It says, 'BEWARE'!"

Mae squinted at it, "That says, "BEWARB", Stanford. The local legends you hear about in those woods are just that. Legends. You'll be just fine, and I'll be making cookies by the time you're done."

"YES!" Stanley cheered.

Ford sighed in defeat and took the signs and the hammer, "Fine, but don't come crying to me if I end up getting eaten by a two-headed duck or something," he mumbled before leaving.

Once he was gone, Stanley smiled at Mae, "What kind of cookies are you gonna make, Grantie Mae?"

"It's my secret glitter cookie recipe! And the secret ingredient… is glitter!"

Stanley suddenly lost interest in the cookies…

Later, Ford was putting up his last sign, and he was deep inside the forest by now. It was getting foggy, and if it weren't for the other signs he had placed, he would have lost his way for sure. He took out a nail to hammer it into a tree trunk, but when he hit it with a hammer, he heard a metal clanging.

"What is this?" he wondered. The tree stump, he discovered, wasn't a tree stump at all. It was made of metal, so he opened a secret window to find two switches. Stanford tested the first switch, but nothing happened, so he tried the second one. He heard a creaking sound and turned around to see what is was. A hole had opened up a distance behind him that scared away Mae's pig, Waddles.

Stanford slowly looked inside the hole. Inside it was a dusty, old book. It was a dark blue with three silver pine trees connected to each other side by side on the front. Curiosity took over him as Stanford opened the book, his eyes filled with wonder. He found an eye-glass within it, and on the first page, it said, "Property of", but the rest of the sentence was ripped out from the book. He closed the book to look at the back cover, where it showed a golden constellation of the big dipper.

Ford looked up from the book for a moment to see if anyone was watching him, but when he saw nothing, he moved to a different part of the forest to continue reading it on an old log, "It's hard to believe it's been years since I began learning about the weird and amazing secrets of Gravity Falls, Oregon," he read out loud. He flipped through the pages, read the content, and looked through the illustrations. It all baffled him. There were codes, inscriptions, and illustrations that showed creatures that were known to be mythological or from fantasy. Monsters were mentioned in the book too, and some pages Ford had no idea what to make of them.

"What is all this?" He stops at a page, where in all capitals, it read "TRUST NO ONE!". Ford read the rest out loud, "Unfortunately, my suspicions are correct. I'm being watched. I must hide this book before he finds it. Remember: In Gravity Falls, there is no one you can trust," he closed the journal and took it all in. "No one you can trust…"

"HELLO!" Stanley jumped out from behind the log.

"AH!" Ford screamed. "LEE!"

"What'cha got there, Poindexter? One of your nerd books?"

Ford instinctively hid the book behind his back, "It's- it's nothing."

"Liar, liar, pants on fire," Stanley laughed. "Come on, broford. Just show me!"

Waddles had already started nibbling on the book, so Ford pulled it away from him, "Let's go somewhere private."

Back at the Mystery Shack, Ford and Lee went to their shared bedroom on the first floor near the living room, "It's amazing," Ford said, flipping through the pages. "Grantie Mabel said there wasn't anything going on in Gravity Falls, but this book proves otherwise! It says here that this town has a secret dark side!"

"Whoa! That's pretty awesome," Stanley admitted. Usually he isn't into this kind of stuff, but something about the journal got his interest as well.

"And you won't believe this!" Ford continued. "After a certain point, the pages just stop. It was as if the person writing it mysteriously vanished," from their room, Ford could hear the doorbell ringing. "Who's that?" He asked.

"Well," Stanley smirked, looking much too proud of himself, "this guy has a date!"

"What? You mean you were able to find a girlfriend in the thirty minutes I was gone?!"

"What can I say, Stanford? The ladies must find me irresistible."

Ford scoffed, "The only thing irresistible here is the urge to roll my eyes," he mumbled.

Stanley ignored him. The doorbell rang again, and he ran out to open the door. Ford followed, just to see who his brother's new girlfriend was.

Grantie Mae was in the living room when Stanley opened the door. On the other side was a tall girl with pale skin and brown hair that covered up part of her face. She was wearing a dark, old, heavy sweatshirt despite the warm weather. The most unusual part about her was that she had a large twig sticking out of her hoodie, but Stanford decided against mentioning it out of politeness.

"This is my new girlfriend," Stanley smiled. "Her name is Norma."

"Aww!" Grantie Mae cooed. "My little man's first date! And she's so pretty!"

"Hey," Norma nodded at them. Stanford frowned. There were some immediate bad signs about her that he couldn't ignore- especially right after discovering the journal that said 'TRUST NO ONE'.

Stanley leaned against the wall, "Yeah, she's pretty awesome. We met in the woods. She's into poetry, video games, and wrestling. So, I guess you can say that I found the jackpot."

There was something red dripping from her cheek, "Are you bleeding, Norma?" Ford asked.

"That's just jam," she shrugged off.

Stanley laughed, "Yep. You know who else likes jam? This guy!" He pointed at himself.

"So, you wanna hold hands or… something?"

Lee gasped, "Yes!" He turned to Ford and Mae. "I'll see you guys later!"

Stanley ran out the door, and Norma followed him, after bumping into the wall twice.

"Aren't they adorable together, Stanford?" Grantie Mae asked sweetly. She didn't wait for a response. "Well, better get those glitter cookies out of the oven. I wonder if Norma would like a batch to take home?"

Ford narrowed his eyes as he watched his brother leave with his new girlfriend. There's something about her that's not right, he thought. Before Mae could return with the cookies, he rushed back in his room to consult the journal.

After looking through the book, Ford found a page with an illustration of a creature of the undead, "Known for their pale skin and bad attitudes, these creatures are often mistaken for… teenagers? Beware Gravity Falls' nefarious…" Ford gasped, noticing the connection between Norma and the picture.

"ZOMBIE!"

From the kitchen, Grantie Mae paused for a moment, confused by the sudden noise, "Did somebody say 'crombie'? What's a crombie? Is… is that even a word? Huh… I'm getting old…"

Stanford shut the book and held it to his chest while he regained his breath. He peeked out the window, where he could barely see his brother with Norma. She didn't look like she was about to eat Stanley's brains, but after reading what was written in the journal, Ford couldn't help but feel paranoid, "Is my brother really dating a zombie, or am I just overreacting?" He asked himself.

A vacuum suddenly turned on, and Ford gasped in shock. He turned to see that it was just Ria cleaning the room, "Let me tell you, niño," she began, "there are no such thing as zombies or creatures that go bump in the night. You're hermano is fine."

Frustration swept through Ford as he glared at her, "But, Ria, you've seen Lee's girlfriend, right? She's gotta be a zombie!"

She turned off the vacuum and looked over at him, "How many brains did you see her eat?"

Ford sighed and looked down, "Zero."

"My point exactly. Stanley's girlfriend is not a zombie, and there is no way to prove otherwise. Keep saying things like that around town, and everybody will think you're loco."

Before Stanford could retaliate, Ria unplugged the vacuum to clean the next room, "I have work to do. Stay out of trouble, Pines."

Stanford wanted to believe Ria. He wanted to think that this journal just sparked up his imagination and gave him the crazy notion that Norma was somehow a zombie. He wanted to believe that Norma is just a strange girl that happened to like his brother, but he couldn't. Something about her made him feel uneasy. He knew that something was up. My brother could be in trouble, he thought. It's time to get some evidence…

It was difficult, but Ford was able to use a camera to get footage of Stanley and Norma without getting caught. He spied on them all day, and when he was done, he felt he had all the evidence he needed.

Lee was in their shared bedroom practicing his boxing moves when Ford entered, "Lee, we have to talk about Norma."

Stanley stopped what he was doing to take a sip of water, "Isn't she great? Dude, she punched a window today!"

"No, listen, Stanley! Your girlfriend isn't what she seems," Ford warned him. "Look!"

He opened the journal to show the page to Stanley, who only looked at it in confusion before chuckling, "You really believe that she's a pixie?"

"What?" Ford looked to see that he showed him the wrong page. "Oh, sorry," he flipped to the proper page. "Look!"

Stanley still looked unconvinced, "A zombie? Really, Ford?"

"I'm serious," he said. Ford paced in front of his brother. "It all adds up. The bleeding, the limp, breaking through the window! Why would she do that?"

Lee narrowed his eyes, "Maybe because she's awesome and doesn't listen to the rules!"

"But the journal! It says, 'Trust no one'!" Ford reminded him.

"Yeah," Lee scoffed, "well, I'm your brother, aren't I? Aren't you going to trust me?"

"Of course I trust you, Stanley! It's Norma I don't trust!"

"Then trust me when I say that that dumb book of yours has gotten to your head," Stanley stomped in front of Ford. "Norma and I are going on a date at five o'clock, and I'm not going to let you ruin it with one of your crazy CONSPIRACIES!" Stanley pushed Ford, causing him to fall hard on the ground, before he left the room and slammed the door behind him.

It took a while for the shock to go away, but when it did, Ford could already hear Stanley leaving for his date. He sighed and sat up, "What am I going to do?" he asked. He noticed the camera left on the floor near him, and he looked through the footage again. "Ria and Stanley are right. I guess I can be kind of paranoid sometimes and-" Ford paused when he looked closer at the footage. On the camera, Norma's hand fell off without Stanley noticing, and she glanced around before reattaching it. "OH MY GOSH!" He gasped. "I WAS RIGHT!"

Suddenly filled with panic and adrenaline, Ford ran outside, "Grantie Mae! Grantie Mae! Grantie Mae!" He ran outside to where she was on a stage in front of a small crowd of tourists.

"And over here is a face rock. It's a rock that looks like a face."

"Does it look like a rock?" One of them asked.

"No, it looks like a face."

"Is it a face?"

Mae sighed, "It's a rock that looks like a face!"

Ford tried to get her attention, but Grantie Mae was far too busy with the tourists to even hear him.

"I've said it five times! It's not actually a face!"

Stanford groaned and gave up on that plan. He looked around to see Danny driving the golf cart, "Danny! Danny! I need to borrow the golf cart so I can save my brother from a zombie!"

Without protest, Danny gave Ford the key and walked off, "There's a shovel in the back. Try not to hit anyone."

Stanford mentally thanked the teenager, before hopping on the cart and driving off.

Meanwhile, Stanley and Norma are alone in the woods. Norma looked around before she spoke, "Uh, Stanley, now that we've gotten to know each other, there's… there's something I should tell you," she sighed.

Stanley smiled, "You can tell me anything you want, Norma."

She sighed, before she removed her jacket. Underneath was not a teenage girl, but actually a bunch of pixies stacked on top of each other holding a mask and fake hands. Stanley stared up at them in total shock.

"Um… Stanley?" The pixie on top asked. Her voice had risen by three octaves. "Are you okay?"

Stanley didn't respond. He kept staring at them dumbly.

"Well, now you know our secret. We're pixies," she confessed. "My name is Princess Janet," she introduced. "That's Carly, Stephanie, Jane, and… um… I'm sorry," she apologized to the last one. "I keep forgetting your name."

"Shmebula," the last pixie said in a gruff voice.

"Thank you!" Janet smiled. "Shmebula!" she turned back to Stanley. "Listen, Stanley. The thing is, we need a new king, and you fit the bill. So, what do you say? Will you marry us?" she asked politely.

The shock finally wore off when he was asked that question, "N-No, I-I'm sorry, ladies," he apologized, backing away slowly. "I'm not really interested in marrying you, so I'm just gonna pretend that none of this ever happened and leave."

Stanley turned around to run away, but the pixies casted a magical wall in front of him that he couldn't get through.

"I don't think you understand," Princess Janet began. "The thing is, now that you know about us, you don't really have a choice. If you won't marry us, then we'll have to use force," she pointed at him. "Get him, girls."

Stanley's screams and cries for help could be heard from the distance. Luckily, Ford was close, "Hold on, Stanley!" he yelled. "I'll save you from the zombie!" When he got there, he expected to see his brother being attacked by a zombie. Instead, he was tied down, and surrounding him was a bunch of pixies.

"What is going on here?" he asked. In response, one of the pixies hissed at him.

"Ford!" Lee yelled, struggling to break free from the ropes. "Norma turned out to be a bunch of pixies! They want me to marry them!"

"Pixies?! Wow, I was off," Stanford mumbled. He pulled the journal out to find the relevant page and read out loud, "Pixies, otherwise known as 'trickster fairies' have magical abilities used for defense. While their weaknesses are unknown, I theorize that they can be defeated using similar methods as gnomes- by blowing them away using a leaf blower!" When Stanford lowered the book, the pixies were starting to take Stanley away.

"Hey!" he yelled. "Let go of my brother!"

Princess Janet turned around to fly in front of the other boy and laugh, "Oh, don't be ridiculous. We're not planning on hurting your brother. We're just going to have him marry all one thousand of us and make him our king for eternity. Isn't that right, Sugar?" She asked Stanley.

"Don't call me that, you butt-face!" He screamed.

Ford picked up the shovel from the cart and pointed it at the pixie, "Let him go now, or else," he growled.

"You think you can stop me?" she teased. "Do you have any idea who I am? I am Princess Janet of the pixies! Don't you dare trifle with the-"

Ford swung his shovel at her, causing her to fly backwards screaming. Once she was out of sight, he used the shovel to cut his brother free.

"Quick! In the cart!" Ford ordered. Lee didn't object. They ran to the golf cart and drove away as fast as they could. When nothing happened, Ford sighed with relief. "I think we lost them," he smiled.

Stanley looked behind them in horror as he shook his head, "No, we didn't!"

Ford looked in the rear-view mirror and gasped. The pixies were flying after them. There were hundreds of them! Ford hit the gas harder to try to get away. Both were screaming as they drove through the forest.

"FASTER!" Stanley yelled.

"I'm going as fast as I can!"

"WATCH OUT!"

A magical wall formed in front of them, and Ford had to slow down to turn. By doing so, the pixies caught up to them and started attacking them. Ford and Lee kicked and swung at them while Ford continued to drive. Ford ran the golf cart into a fallen tree, and the twins screamed as the cart overturned. They landed right next to the Mystery Shack.

"Stanley, quick! Find the leaf blower!" Ford yelled.

Stanley did as he was told and ran past Grantie Mae, who didn't bother to look at him because she was showing the tourists the world's most distracting object.

Ford was left cornered by the pixies. The princess approached him, "Well," she sighed. "If we can't marry your brother, then it looks like we'll just have to marry you instead," she insisted.

An idea formed, and Ford nodded, "Yeah, I'll marry you," he agreed. "Just as long as you leave Stanley alone."

The pixies squealed with joy, "Fantastic!" Princess Janet smiled. "Now come over here and give me a kiss, sweetie."

Just in time, Stanley came back with the leaf blower, and he used it to suck the pixie into the nozzle before she could kiss Ford. The pixie screamed, before getting sucking halfway into the leaf blower.

"Wanna do the honors?" Lee asked.

"On three," Ford replied.

"One, two, three!" They aimed the leaf blower at the other pixies and switch it to 'blow'. The princess pixie went flying back at the swarm.

"RETREAT!" She cried. "RETREAT!" She looked back at the twins, "I'LL GET YOU BACK FOR THIS!"

After all the pixies fled back into the forest, Stanley frowned at the ground, "Um, Stanford? I um… I'm sorry for ignoring you earlier," he apologized. "You really were just looking out for me."

"You don't have to apologize," Ford said. "Besides, you did save me back there."

Lee sighed, "Too bad my first girlfriend turned out to be a bunch of pixies..."

"Don't worry, Lee. We still have plenty of summer left for your next summer romance," Ford assured.

"Thanks, Ford," Lee smiled.

Ford lifted up his hand, "High six?"

Stanley high-fived him, "High six."

When they made it back to the Mystery Shack, their grantie noticed their injuries, "What on Earth happened to you two?" she asked.

"Uh, we were playing pirates," Ford lied.

Grantie Mae chuckled, "Alright. Since you two had such an exciting day playing, and since Ford put up those signs," she added, "how about I let you each have one item from the gift shop? On the house."

"Cool!" They cheered. The twins looked through the items. Stanley found his gift quickly. It was a t-shirt with a crescent-shaped symbol on it, and he put the shirt on over the striped one.

"I'm keeping this!" He confirmed.

Stanford kept looking through the gift shop until he found a crossbow in one of the boxes.

"This'll do the trick," he smiled. "Grantie Mae? Can I have this crossbow?".

She shrugged, "None of the customers will buy it, so why not?"

"YES!" Ford cheered. He tested it out, and shot an arrow at the ceiling. "CROSSBOW!"

That night, Ford and Lee were in their room. Ford was busy writing away in the journal. This journal told me there was no one in Gravity Falls I could trust, he wrote. Ford glanced at Lee. But when you battle a hundred pixies side-by-side with someone, you realize that they've probably always got your back.

"Hey, Ford? Could you get the lights?" Lee asked.

Stanford set the book aside to shoot the crossbow at the lantern. The lantern shattered, but the light went out, "It works!" he laughed. Lee laughed with him.

Our aunt told us there was nothing strange about this town, but who knows what other secrets are waiting to be unlocked.

Meanwhile, Mae held onto a lantern in her nightgown, and she walked into the gift shop. She stopped in front of a vending machine that read "OUT OF ORDER" and punched in a code. The vending machine opened, revealing a secret passageway. Mae looked around to make sure she wasn't being watched, and walked in, closing the vending machine behind her.

Chapter Text

Ford and Lee were at the table for breakfast eating pancakes. There were two bottles of maple syrup on the table, and both twins knew what that meant. “I challenge you to a syrup race,” Lee declared.

“You are on!”

They both turned their own syrup bottles over their mouths and let the syrup flow freely. “Go! Go! Go! Go!” They chanted. The syrup made it to Lee’s mouth first.

“Yes! Akk. I won!” He said, coughing on his syrup.

Ford laughed, before glancing over at the newspaper. He gasped when he read it, “No way! Hey, Stanley, check this out!”

He handed the newspaper to his twin, but Stanley read the wrong column, “Nice! Gold watches! Those would make me look like a mob boss!” he said excitedly.

“No, not that! This,” Ford pointed to a different ad. “They’re having a monster photo contest, and the winner gets a thousand dollars! We should enter! If we see something like those pixies again, then we’ll win for sure!”

Stanley gasped, “If we win the cash prize, we could get a boat!” He wrapped his arm around his brother’s shoulder. “Just imagine it, Ford. You and me together, sailing on a boat, having cool adventures all the time! We'll even find treasure!”

“That’s a great idea,” Ford agreed. A thought came to him. “We didn’t get any pictures of those pixies, did we?”

“Nope,” Lee smiled. “Just the memories,” he held up a small, sparkling sack. “And some of this magical pixie dust.”

Ford pointed at the bag, “How did you get that?”

Stanley shrugged and put the bag away, just before Grantie Mae came in with more pancakes. As she walked by the the twins, she ruffled their hair affectionately. “Good morning, munchkins,” she smiled. “Do you know what day it is?”

“Uh… Tuesday?” Ford guessed.

“Is today your birthday?” Lee asked.

Grantie Mae took the paper to show the kids, “Nope. Today is Family Fun Day!” She cheered. “We’ll be skipping work today so you’ll get to spend the whole day with me. Won’t that be great?”

“Grantie Mae?” Ford spoke up while eating his pancakes. “This won’t be like last time, will it?”

“Oh, yeah,” Stanley added, remembering. “This isn’t like the time you tried to show me a rainbow, is it?” Lee asked. “I’ve still been having problems seeing.”

As if to prove his point, Stanley tried to grab the maple syrup bottle, but missed. It dropped on the floor, but Waddles walked over to the mess to lick it up.

“Okay, I’ll agree that wasn’t my best idea,” Mae admitted, “but don’t you worry. Today, we’re going to have some real family fun. Now who wants to put on some blindfolds and get in my car for no reason in particular?”

“YAY!” They both cheered.

Ford stopped to think about what she just said,“Wait, what?”.

Stanford couldn’t see a thing because of the blindfold, but he knew he and Stanley were currently strapped in the backseat of Grantie Mae’s red convertible. The fact that she had one was pretty cool. The only problem is that she drove like this is the first time using one.

The twins held on to the seats for dear life, “Grantie Mae!” Ford yelled over the car’s engine, which sounded strangely like a race car's engine. “Please tell me you aren’t wearing a blindfold too!”

“Nope,” Mae laughed. “But with these cataracts, I might as well be. What is that, a hamster?” She crashed through something that made the twins scream. Ford honestly thought he was going to die. Miraculously, they made it to their destination in one piece and got out of the car.

“Okay, boys. Take off your blindfolds!” Ford and Lee took their blindfolds off to see they were at a lake. There seemed to be a lot of people from town here as well. “Ta-da! It’s fishing season!” Mae smiled. “Isn’t this great?”

The twins glanced at each other, “Fishing?” Stanley asked.

“I never thought of you as a fisher,” Stanford commented.

“I’m not,” Grantie Mae admitted. “But how hard can it be? Besides, the whole town is here. You’ll get a chance to meet some new people here.”

The twins looked around, seeing that there were some familiar faces from the few times they visited the town. An older woman with a terrifyingly low-pitched voice held out a pan, calling out for a fish to jump inside it. In another part of the lake, a buff, red-haired woman had caught a fish with her bare hands and started punching it, while three red-haired men were cheering her on. The four of them looked related. On a boat next to red-headed family was a chubby-faced man that was also cheering for her.

“Now that is some quality family bonding,” Mae smiled.

“Grantie Mae? Why do you want to go fishing all of a sudden?” Ford asked.

Mae frowned, “Oh, come on. Can your grantie just spend some time with her favorite adorable nephews? Here!” She threw matching red sweaters at the boys. “Pow! Pines family sweaters!” She slipped on her own sweater, which read ‘World’s Best Grantie’ on it. “Try them on! I made them myself.”

The twins looked at their sweaters. Ford’s said ‘Forddy’ and Lee’s said ‘Stanny’.

“Why would we wear sweaters?” Lee asked. “It’s summer.”

Mae ignored Stanley’s question, “It’s just going to be you, me, and these sweaters on a smelly boat for ten hours!”

“Ten hours?” Ford repeated.

The twins exchanged uneasy looks, “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind when I said I wanted to go on a boat,” Stanley muttered. Stanford could only nod in agreement. Just when they thought they were doomed for ten hours of fishing with their grantie, a loud screaming was heard nearby.

“I’VE SEEN IT! I’VE SEEN IT AGAIN!” An old woman with a Korean accent ran up to the docks. She was barefoot and dressed in rags. Her white hair was mangled, as if it hadn’t been brushed for years. “THE GRAVITY FALLS LAKENESS WONKER! COME QUICK BEFORE IT GOES AWAY!” She warned, before doing a little dance.

“Aw, look!” Stanley smiled and pointed at the crazy old lady. “She’s doing a happy jig!”

“This isn’t a jig!” she yelled in Lee’s face. “It’s a sign of DANGER!”

Before she could say anything else, the crazy, old lady was sprayed in the face with water. The man holding the spray bottle shooed her away, “Stop scaring my customers, you old hag!”

“I HAVE PROOF! I have it this time! Look!” She pointed to a half-destroyed boat. “It’s the Lakeness Wonkity monster that did this! It had wrinkly skin and a long neck! I saw the beast swim over to Scuttlebutt Island! YOU GOTTA BELIEVE ME!”

The sheriff stood nearby and spoke into his walkie-talkie, “Attention all units! We got ourselves a crazy, old woman!” Everyone except for the Pines family laughed at her.

“Nice one, Sheriff Holt,” his partner chuckled.

The old woman walked off, “Aww, donkey spittle! Aw, fork fingers!”

Grantie Mae paused, “Well, that happened. Lesson learned, kids. Stay in school, and, um… don’t go crazy. Welp, I’m going to get the boat ready. You boys wait here,” she said before leaving.

“Lee,” Stanford turned to his twin excitedly, “did you hear what that old lady said?”

Stanley mimicked her the best he could, “Aw, fork fingers!”

“No, the other thing! About the monster in the lake! This is our chance, Stanley. If we can get a photo of it, we can split the prize money fifty-fifty! Imagine what we can do with five hundred dollars!”

Stanley gasped, “I can imagine it now!” Lee became entranced in thought, muttering quietly about something having to do with a new watch. After a moment, Stanford waved his hand in front of him in concern.

“Stanley?” Ford asked.

“Stanford, I am one hundred percent on board with this!” Ford smiled.

They were about to tell their grantie about their change of plans when a boy their age approached them, “H-Hi, my name is Fiddleford,” he introduced himself. “Fiddleford McGucket. My dad, Tate McGucket, owns this lake. Listen,” he added shyly, “I’ve been overhearin’ what you were saying, and I was wonderin’ if I could join ya'll.”

“You really want to help us?” Ford asked.

“Well, yeah, I mean, I believe what Crazy Chiu is saying. About the monster, that is. Whenever I’m over at that island, I hear the monster. It’s scary, but maybe with your help, we could catch it. My dad has a cool fishing boat we could use if you want,” Fiddleford offered.

The twins glanced at each other, silently deciding on whether to let him join. Ford turned back to Fiddleford and nodded, “Sure, you can come with us,” he agreed, holding out his hand. Ford was thankful he remembered his gloves today, or else their new friend would have seen his extra fingers. “My name’s Stanford, and that’s my twin brother, Stanley. You can call us Ford and Lee, though.”

Fiddleford blushed while they shook hands, and then he shook hands with Stanley, “You can call me Fidds if you want. It’s shorter.”

Grantie Mae returned, “Okay, boys! The boat's all ready!" She stopped when she saw Fiddleford. "Oh, look what we have here! A third one!” Mae turned to the twins. “Is this your new friend?”

“Grantie Mae, this is Fiddleford,” Stanley introduced. “He wants to go monster hunting with us!”

The other boys chanted, “Monster hunt! Monster hunt! Monster hunt!”

“We’re going to catch the Lakeness Wonker on Scuttlebutt Island! Can we go?” Ford asked.

Grantie Mae frowned, “But I thought you kids wanted to go fishing. Come on, your new friend can come with us,” she suggested. “Would you rather go on some boring monster hunt, or would you rather tie knots and skewer worms all day with your Great Aunt Mabel?”

The twins looked between Grantie Mae and Fiddleford, who pointed at an awesome looking boat behind him. They looked back at Mae’s leaky old boat that didn’t look like it could hold the four of them. Ford looked back at Scuttlebutt Island, which held secrets just waiting to be uncovered. The twins grinned at each other as they made their decision.

“So, what do you say?” Mae asked, confident on what she believed the boys would choose. 

When she looked back at them, the boys were already running over to Fidds' boat, leaving her behind. “We made the right choice!” Stanley yelled in the distance.

Grantie Mae frowned, “Fine, you ungrateful children! I’ll do this myself then!” She sighed. “Who needs them anyway. I have this box of creepy fishing wires to keep me company,” after a moment of looking at the box, she cringes in disgust and closes the lid. “I gotta find new fishing buddies.”

The kids boarded on the boat with the help of Fiddleford’s dad, “You aren’t gonna try to find the Lakeness Wonker are you?” Mr. McGucket asked.

“No, Dad,” Fidds lied. “I just want to show them the beavers over at the island.”

“Alright, son. Ya’ll better be careful,” he warned. “Oh, and Fiddleford. Don’t forget your sunscreen.”

Fidds sighed, “Okay, Dad.”

The twins continued packing supplies for their trip. After Mr. McGucket left, Stanford went up to Fidds, “Hey, Fidds? Is it really okay for us to drive this boat ourselves? Aren’t we supposed to have a boating license?”

“Not in this town,” he replied. “The police here are pretty lazy, and our mayor hasn’t been adding any rules to Gravity Falls for decades. Heck, you could marry an animal here if you wanted to,” he added.

Stanley stood on the boat, wearing a fake eye patch under his glasses, “AHOY MATEYS!” He yelled. “Check out my new eye patch!”

“Where did you get that?” Ford asked.

“Found it!” Lee smiled. “So, are we ready to go, or what?”

Stanford turned to Fidds, “I think we are. You ready?”

“Yeah!” Fidds answered.

The boys hopped on the boat, while Stanley started giving orders, “HOIST THE ANCHOR!” Fiddleford pulled up the cinder block anchor. “RAISE THE FLAG!” Stanford lifted a beach towel up on the pole. “WE’RE GONNA FIND THAT LAKENESS WONKER!” Lee exclaimed.

“WE’RE GONNA WIN THAT PHOTO CONTEST!” Declared Ford.

They had already started sailing towards the island when Fidds spoke up, “Did either of you pack the sunscreen?”

“We’re gonna… go get sunscreen!” Ford added.

“YAY!” They cheered. They made a u-turn back to the mainland.

Five minutes later, they were back on track. Ford paced across the boat in front of Fidds and Lee with his hands behind his back, “Alright,” he began. “If we want to win this monster photo contest, we have to do this right. Now think. What is the number one problem with most monster hunts?”

“Um… the side character dies in the first five minutes of the movie?” Fiddleford guessed. “Wait. I’m a side character, aren’t I? Do ya’ll ever think about that kind of stuff?”

“No, you’re not a side character,” Lee said to calm him down. “You and me and Ford, we’re a trio now!” he declared, grabbing his shoulder. “The Mystery Trio!”

Ford glared at his brother, “Please never call us that ever again. And no. Camera trouble is the number one problem! For example, say Bigfoot shows up. Fidds, can you be Bigfoot?”

“Um, okay?” he struck a Bigfoot pose and faced Stanford.

In a mock acting voice, Ford gasped, “There he is! Bigfoot!” he pat himself. “Uh-oh, no camera!” He pulls a camera out of his jacket. “Oh, wait, here’s one! Aw, no film!” He put his camera back and looked back at Lee and Fidds. “Do you get my point here?”

“Oh, yeah,” Fiddleford nodded. “You do have a good point.”

Stanford agreed, “That is exactly why I took the precautions of bringing seventeen disposable cameras! Two on my ankle, three in my jacket, four for each of you, three extras in this bag,” he held up a bag, “and one… under my glove,” he grinned. “There is no mathematically feasible way to lose all the cameras or use up all the film. Now, let’s test these babies out!”

“Lee, take a selfie with me!” Fidds held up a camera. When he tried to take a picture, the flash startled him, “HOLY MACKEREL!” He threw the camera overboard by accident.

“You see? This is exactly why I brought backup cameras. We still have sixteen!”

A bird flew over Stanley’s head, “AH! BIRD!” He threw another camera at it.

“Fifteen,” Ford sighed and pinched the bridge of his glasses. “Alright. The point is to NOT lose the cameras. I repeat, do not lose the cameras!”

Fiddleford chuckled quietly, “Um, Stanford?”

“What?” he sighed.

“You said don’t lose them? Funny thing… um…” he scratched the back of his neck and laughed awkwardly. “I just accidentally dropped two more in the lake…”

He took another deep breath, “Thirteen! We still have-” Ford heard a crunch under his feet. His emotion didn’t change. “Twelve. We have twelve cameras.”

Stanley held another camera over the edge of the boat, “So, what’s the plan, Broford? Throw more cameras overboard?”

“NO! No. Here’s what we’re going to do. Stanley, you’ll be lookout. Fiddleford, you can work the steering wheel, and I’ll be the captain.”

“What?! Come on, Ford! Let me be captain!” Stanley pleaded. He chanted. “Stan-ley! Stan-ley! Stan-ley!”

“No, you can’t be captain.”

“Then I want to be co-captain!”

“Stanley, there’s no such thing as co-”

A small splash was heard as Lee threw another camera overboard, “Whoops.”

“Fine!” Ford gave up. “You can be co-captain.”

“Can I be associate co-captain?” Fidds asked.

“As co-captain, I authorize this request!” Stanley permitted.

Stanford walked over to the barrels of fish food, “Well, as first captain, our number one order of business is to lure the monster out with fish food.”

Lee grinned, “As co-captain, I hereby DARE the associate co-captain to taste some!”

“Permission to dare co-captain to do the same?” Fidds asked, raising his hand.

Ford nodded, purely for the sake of watching his brother eat fish food, “Permission granted.”

“Permission co-granted!”

“Permission associate co-granted!” Stanley and Fiddleford each took a bite of one before gagging and coughing at the bad taste. The three of them laughed.

Meanwhile, Grantie Mae watched them laughing through a small telescope, “I’ll show them,” she promised. “I’ll find my own fishing buddies,” she looked around until she found a boat with a happy couple sitting in it. “There’re my new pals!”

The couple was on a romantic date. The woman was happily watching the waves in the lake while the man turned away, looking at the engagement ring in a box. He took a deep breath to gather his courage, “Now that we’re alone,” he began, turning to the woman, “Rosanna, there’s a burning question which my heart longs to ask of you.”

Rosanna gasped and began tearing up, “Oh, Reginald!”

Just before he could ask, Mabel pulled her boat up to where the couple were, “Hey! You young lovebirds wanna hear a joke?” She continued when they didn’t respond. “Okay, here it goes. Why did the pelican get kicked out of the restaurant? Because he had a very big bill!”

They didn’t laugh, “He had a big BILL! Get it? Like a pelican’s bill?” Grantie Mabel noticed the ring and gasped, “ARE YOU GETTING MARRIED?! Can I come to your wedding?” Reginald, now frustrated by his ruined proposal, rowed the boat away from her. “Hey, where are you going?”

Back at the boat, Stanford, Stanley, and Fiddleford were approaching Scuttlebutt island. After the fish food incident, things were pretty quiet on the boat, so Stanford decided to start a conversation with Fiddleford while he was at the wheel.

“Hey, Fidds, how’re you doing?” he asked.

Fidds shrugged, “Okay, I guess. It’s getting a bit foggy, though,” he pointed out. “Say, what’s the prize for this monster picture contest anyway?”

“It’s a thousand dollars,” Ford explained, “and Lee and I were planning on splitting it fifty-fifty, but since you’re helping, we can split the prize money in thirds.”

Fiddleford whistled, “Hoo-wee. If I had that kind of money, I’d start my own business.”

“What kind of business?” Ford asked.

“I’m not quite sure yet. Maybe in selling radios or computers. I’m good at fixing them, and I’ve built my own radio before. Maybe I’ll open up a small store here in town.”

“You can build radios? That’s so cool!” He said in awe.

“What about you?” Fidds asked. “What do you wanna spend with your share of the money?”

Ford looked out in the direction of the island, “Probably save it up for college. It’s not really the money I care about, it’s the fame. I want to become a world famous paranormal investigator!” he exclaimed. “You and Stan can be my partners.”

Fiddleford blushed, “You really think so?”

“Yep! That’s why we need this picture.”

The two of them stood quietly next to each other before Stanley yelled, “LOOK OUT!”

He threw a volley ball at Ford, hitting him on the arm, “Ow! Lee, aren’t you supposed to be on look out?”

“I am, dummy!” Stanley retorted. The boat shook, having crashed on the shore of the island, “See? We’re here! I’m a lookout genius!” He bragged. “Shiny new gold watch, here I come!"

Stanley jumped off the boat, and the two other boys followed shortly after. The trio disembarked into the foggy woods, with Ford carrying a lantern. Lee and Fidds stopped in front of the ‘Scuttlebutt Island’ sign. “Hey, dude,” Stanley pulled at Fidd’s shirt sleeve, “check this out!” He used his arms to cover the ‘Scuttle’ part of the sign. “Butt Island.”

Fiddleford laughed, “That’s a good one, Lee!”

Ford rolled his eyes and kept walking. Lee and Fidds caught up with him, “Why aren’t you laughing, Poindexter?” Stanley asked. “Are you scared?”

“No, I am not.”

Stanley poked him on the nose while blowing a raspberry, “Yeah, you are!”

“Hey! Quit it!” Ford dropped the lantern and yelled, but Lee would not stop the onslaught attack of poking and raspberries. “STANLEY!”

A growling noise heard in the distance caused Lee to stop. The three 12-year-olds stopped to listen, “W-What was that?” Fidds asked.

“It’s coming from over there!” Ford whispered, pointing to a rustling bush. Something jumped out of the bush, causing them to scream. They stopped when they saw what it was.

“Oh,” Fidds laughed, and sighed in relief. “False alarm. It’s just a possum.” 

The possum hissed at the boys before grabbing the lantern and ran away. “Our lantern!” Ford reached out in a futile attempt to get it back. It was too late. “Aww! Now I can’t see anything!”

Fidds started getting worried. He huddled closer to the other boys, “G-Guys, I’m starting to think this might not be worth it.”

“Not worth it?” Ford repeated. “Come on, Fidds! Think about what could happen if we win that contest! We could win a THOUSAND dollars!”

Fiddleford still didn’t seemed too confident, but he gave in anyway, “Oh, alright. I’ll do it for the money.”

“YAY!” Stanley cheered. The 12-year-olds kept walking through the foggy island. Eventually, Fidds and Lee got bored, so Fidds started beat boxing. “My name is Stanley!” Lee rapped. “It rhymes with manly! It also rhymes with… ranley! It also rhymes with… chanley!”

Fiddleford laughed and pulled out a small notebook and a pen, “We should write this down.”

Ford gasped and held up his camera, “Guys, hold on! Do you hear something?” Another growling noise could be heard, causing birds to fly over them, away from the sound. “This is it! Stanley, this is it!” he shouted.

Lee and Ford lightly punched each other out of excitement. They cheered while following the noise. Fiddleford was currently feeling like a third wheel in the trio, but he stayed behind the twins anyway. He picked up a nearby stick to defend himself with and followed them into the fog.

The three of them stopped when they saw a silhouette of the monster in the distance. They ducked behind a log, “Everyone, get your cameras ready!” Ford ordered. Once they activated them, Ford took another deep breath. “This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for. Are you ready?” A confirming nod from the two other boys answered his question. “GO!”

They jumped out of the log at the same time, yelling loudly while snapping multiple pictures at random. They came to a stop, however, when they got close enough for the fog to fade away. What they thought was a monster was actually just an old boat with happy beavers living on it.

“What?” Ford asked, confused. “Beavers?! But… but then what was the noise?” To answer his question, the noise sounded again, and the boys turned to the source. It was just a beaver chewing on, and accidentally activating, a rusty old chainsaw.

“Cool. Beaver with a chainsaw!” Fiddleford said. He started taking pictures of it.

Ford sighed and sat on a nearby rock, “Maybe that old lady was crazy after all.”

“She did say ‘fork fingers’,” Stanley agreed.

“Look,” Grantie Mae said to a little boy, “when it comes to fashion, I only have one rule for you: Be yourself. Just put on whatever clothes makes you feel like you! Got it?”

“Uh, I, uh… who are you, exactly?” The boy asked. He looked very uncomfortable around her.

“Just call me your GRANTIE MAE!”

“Ma’am!” The boy's mother called out. “Why are you talking to our son? Leave now, or I’m calling the police!”

Mae groaned, “Fine! Spoil sport,” she began rowing away.

“Go bother your own kids!”

Back at Scuttlebutt island, Stanley and Fiddleford were busy taking pictures of the beavers. Once they were done, they sat down on a log behind Ford, “What are we going to say to Grantie Mae?” He asked. “We ditched her over nothing,” he threw a stone into the lake and sighed. Stanford was just about to suggest going back when he felt the ground shake. “Hey… guys, do you feel that?” The rock sank in the water, nearly taking Ford along with it, but Fidds and Lee pulled him up in time. “What was that?!”

He turned around just in time to see another silhouette of a monster. Only this one was moving.

“This is it!” Ford hurried to grab one of his cameras to take pictures of it. After taking a few, he turned back to the other boys. “Come on! Grab your cameras! The monster’s right there!” Stanley and Fiddleford were looking up and slowly backing away nervously. “What’s wrong with you guys?”

“Dude…?” Stanley whispered.

“S-Stanford…?” Fidds stuttered.

Stanford wasn’t paying attention to their scared expressions, “It’s not that difficult. All you have to do is point and shoot. Watch me,” he instructed. Ford aimed his camera at the Lakeness Wonker. The head was right in front of him and staring at him. The monster roared, causing Ford to drop the camera in fear and run away.

“Run!” Fiddleford yelled. The three of them ran for their lives from the monster. Trees fell down around them from the lake monster crushing them. They were nearly hit by a few trees along the way, but the kids kept running until they saw the boat within sight. “Quick! Get on the boat! HURRY!” Fidds warned.

Ford didn’t pay much attention to his new friend’s warning. Instead he stopped to take out another camera to aim at the Lakeness Wonker. When running backwards, he tripped over a tree root and dropped the camera, “The photograph!”

Fiddleford grabbed the collar of Stanford’s jacket and ran, “Your life is more important than that picture! If we survive this, I’ll let you keep some of those beaver pictures, though!”

“YOU’RE NOT HELPING!” Ford yelled.

They made it to the boat and pushed it back into the lake just before the monster could get them, “Let’s get out of here!” Exclaimed Fiddleford. 

The boat moved in reverse, but Stanford just saw this as another opportunity to take a picture. The last camera in his jacket had a cracked lens. “Fidds!” he yelled. “Get a photo!”

“I can’t! I’m driving this thing!”

Stanley picked up a camera and threw it at the monster.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” Ford shouted.

“Trying to hit the monster!”

Stanford groaned “Not with the camera!”

Fiddleford grabbed the last camera that was on him, “Catch!”

He tried to throw it at Ford, but missed, and the camera shattered against the wall. Ford was too scared at the moment to be frustrated, though. The monster dived under the lake, and he feared they were catching up to them. Now that Fiddleford was able to concentrate, he turned the boat back around and steered forward and away from the monster. “Go, go, go, go, go!” Ford chanted in urgency.

Fiddleford somehow ended up steering the boat into the old, broken boat with the beavers. “Ah!” Fidds screamed. One of the beavers bit him. “Beavers! Oh, no!”

The boys punched and shook the beavers off of them. Since no one was steering, Stanley took over the wheel. Due to Stanley’s inexperience in driving a boat, it went in different directions all over the lake and disrupted the other towns folks from their fishing. The whole time, the monster was right on their tail. Lee screamed when he saw a waterfall straight ahead, “It’s a dead end!”

The boat was too close to the waterfall to stop it in time, but Stanley turned off the engine anyway. “We’re gonna crash!” Fiddleford panicked. The boys screamed when the boat hit the waterfall. They were expecting a collision, but instead, they went straight through it. Inside was a large, secret cavern. The boat ended up crashing against some rocks, sending the boys safely into the dirt.

Stanley stood up and patted himself, “We’re alive. We’re alive!” He cheered.

“NO!” Fiddleford yelled. “The boat!” The twins looked at the boat. Nearly half of it was damaged or missing from the collision. “My dad’s gonna KILL me!”

The Lakeness Wonker finally caught up to them, but when it tried to swim into the cavern, the monster got stuck in the entrance. “It’s stuck!” Stanley pointed.

Ford gasped, “Stuck?!” He looked around for any more cameras, but he couldn’t find anything.

Stanley rolled his eyes, “There’s one under your glove, remember?”

“Oh, yeah!” He smiled, relieved. He grabbed the last camera on him. Ford snapped photos of the monster, laughing the whole time.

“Did you get a good one?” Lee asked.

“THEY’RE ALL GOOD ONES!” Ford cheered happily. The twins high fived, and Stanford put his camera away when he noticed Fiddleford. The taller boy was sitting sadly on one of the rocks. Fidds glanced over at the broken boat before hiding his head in between his knees.

“What’s wrong, Fidds?” Ford asked. “Is this about that boat?”

“It’s my dad’s best boat,” he explained. “I’ll have to sacrifice my share of the money just to fix this.”

Ford felt a little guilty, “You know,” he began, “I don’t really need the prize money. You and Lee can split fifty-fifty if you want.”

Fiddleford lifted his head to look at him in surprise, “You really mean it?”

“Yeah! After all, it’s the least I could do. You did save my life earlier, and if it weren’t for you, we wouldn’t have even gotten here in the first place. Lee and I really appreciate that.”

The other boy smiled and stood up, “Thanks, Ford. You’re the best.”

Stanley was jumping around and cheering for his new watch when a boulder broke off the top of the cave and smashed the monster’s head. The head concaved unnaturally and fell off the neck of the Lakeness Wonker. There are wires, metal bits, and electronic sparks coming out of the head and where it broke off from the neck. “What the…?” Ford approached the beast and felt the fake metal skin. “Huh?”

Stanley and Fiddleford followed him, “What’s wrong?” Stanley asked.

“It’s not a monster,” Fidds gasped in realization. “It’s a robot.”

“But… who built this?” Ford asked. “And why?”

“Only one way to find out. Follow me!” Fiddleford said, taking the lead. He began climbing the robot, and the twins curiously followed him. On the back of the mechanical monster was a handle. Ford grabbed and turned it, causing the door to open and steam to come out. The trio gasped in shock when they looked inside.

“Crazy Chiu?!” Fiddleford gasped. 

The old lady was in there, working on different buttons and levers, trying to get the monster working again. She gasped when she saw she was discovered, “Aww, fork fingers!”

“Wha- Yo- You?!” Stanford stuttered. “You made this? W-Why?!”

Crazy Chiu lowered her head in defeat, “I just wanted attention”

“What?” Stanley asked.

“Well,” Crazy Chiu explained, “I don’t have any family left. No kids, no grand kids, and I've never had a close friend for years! And when you grow old to be an old hag like me, nobody pays any attention to you anymore. So, I decided to build a fifteen ton aquatic robot!” She started laughing like a maniac, but sighed when her laugh died down. “You just don’t know the length us old-timers would go through for a little quality time with loved ones.”

The twins were feeling guilty again, and they took out their sweaters to look at their nicknames hand knitted by their grantie.

“Well,” Fiddleford laughed awkwardly, “I guess that would technically make you two the real lake monsters. Sorry,” he apologized. He backed away, “I’ll be quiet now…”

“Did you ever talk to anyone about how you felt?” Stanley asked.

Crazy Chiu shook her head, “Nope! Got straight to work on the robot!” She smiled. “Well, time to get back to work on my laser gun to bring death to my enemies!” She went back into the robot, and then stuck her hand out. “Any of you kids got a screwdriver?”

Stanford took his camera back out, “Well, so much for the photo contest,” he sighed.

“We still have one roll of film left,” Stanley reminded him.

Fiddleford turned away from the twins, “This is just great! The boat’s destroyed, AND we’re not winning that contest! How am I going to pay my dad back now?” He asked.

Things looked pretty bleak for the boys, but an idea suddenly popped in Ford’s mind, and he smiled, “I know what to do!”

Still alone in the busted-up boat, Grantie Mabel sighed sadly in defeat. She looked behind her when she heard something. “Hey! Over here!” Ford yelled. They stopped the beat-up boat in front of Mae’s, and Lee took a photo of her.

“What…? Boys?” She pretended to not be happy to see them. “I thought you were off playing ‘Spin the Bottle’ with your new friend.”

Fiddleford blushed again, but tried to hide it. “Well,” Ford explained, “all we did was spend all day trying to find some dumb ‘legendary’ dinosaur.”

“But we realized that the only dinosaur we should be hanging out with is right here,” Stanley finished.

“And also, Fiddleford wants a job at the Mystery Shack,” Ford added. He pointed back at Fiddleford, who shyly waved at Grantie Mae. She looked skeptical, but Ford continued, “So… is there room for three more?” He asked. As if to butter up the deal, Stanley and Stanford threw their sweaters on.

Mae gave a genuine smile, “Ah, well. When you put it like that, I guess I could forgive you,” she gave in. The twins climbed in Grantie Mae’s boat and hugged her, while Fiddleford stayed standing on the bigger one.

“Get on! Don’t be shy,” Grantie Mae insisted. Fidds smiled and climbed on the boat. “What happened to your boat, son?”

Fiddleford chuckled, “Long story. So, can I work for you as a repair guy?” He asked.

“Well,” she considered, “Maria isn’t that good in that particular area, and there are a lot of things that break… You’re hired!”

The boys cheered and thanked her. To celebrate, Ford took out the last camera, “All right, everybody get together,” Grantie Mae, Fiddleford, and Stanley grouped together. “Say fishing!”

“Fishing!” The picture shot and came out perfect. They continued taking pictures the rest of the day while they went fishing. At the end of the day, Grantie Mae was sailing the boat back to the mainland. Stanford was relaxing on the boat when he felt it shake.

“What was that?” He asked. Lee shrugged, so Ford just assumed it was nothing.

Unknown to anyone on the boat, the real Lakeness Wonker swam underneath them, barely visible from the surface.

Chapter Text

Stanford and Stanley were in the living room watching their favorite television show, Duck-tective. Both stared at the screen intensely, taking in the episode's drama and mystery element it is loved for so much. Ford was munching on popcorn he made, and Lee took his eyes off the screen for a second to try to steal some of it. Ford slapped his hands away from the bowl before he could take some.

The commercial break came on right after a plot twist, and Stanley gasped, “That duck is a genius!”

Ford shrugged, seemingly uninterested, “Eh, it’s easier to find clues when you’re that close to the ground.”

Lee stood in front of Ford and squinted at him doubtfully, “Are you saying you could be a better detective than Duck-tective?”

“I’m just saying I have very keen abilities in observation. For example, just by smelling your breath, I can tell that you have been eating…” Ford sniffed Lee’s breath and paused, “an entire tube of toothpaste?!”

“I thought it was frosting at first!” Stanley defended himself. There were traces of sparkling toothpaste around his mouth. “It tasted so good, I couldn’t stop.”

Fiddleford ran in the living room looking excited, “Hey, guys!” he smiled cheerfully.

“Hey, Fidds!” The twins welcomed in unison.

“How’s your first day so far?” Ford asked.

“It’s going great!” He answered. “Ria is really awesome! And you won’t believe what just happened!”

“You found buried treasure?!” Stanley asked hopefully.

“No, but follow me!” Fiddleford lead the twins to an old-looking door. “So, Maria was showing me around, and she complained about the break room a lot, but when I felt the wall, I felt a door knob under the wallpaper. When she took the wallpaper down, we found this secret door! You have to see what’s inside!”

They opened the door to reveal a dark, hidden room. When Ford turned on a flashlight from a shelf by the entrance, they saw different dusty wax sculptures placed around the room. “Whoa!” Ford gasped. “It’s a secret wax museum!”

“They’re so life-like!" Stanley whispered in awe, poking one of the figures.

Ford aimed his flashlight at another figure and cringed, “Except for that one.”

The figure waved at them “Hello!” Fidds, Lee, and Ford screamed in surprise. “Relax, boys,” she chuckled. “It’s just me, your Grantie Mabel!”

The boys sighed in relief. When their heartbeats returned to normal, Ford asked, “Grantie Mae, what is all this?”

“This,” Mae began, “used to be the Gravity Falls Wax Museum. It used to be a very popular attraction, but eventually people stopped coming, so I had to shut it down. I forgot all about this, actually,” she walked past some of the wax figures. “I’m glad you and Ria found this room,” Grantie Mae said to Fiddleford. “I have all sorts of wax figures, and I made them all myself! Over here, I have wax replicas of my childhood dream boys, Xyler and Craz. Aren’t they hot?”

“Eww! Grantie!” Ford and Lee groaned in disgust.

“What?” She asked. “It’s true! Anyway, I also created wax figures of Lizzie Borden, Marie Curie, Harriet Tubman, and… um,” she stopped at a wax figure of an angry waffle with large arms and legs, “I was, um… going through some stuff when I made that,” Mae explained, and made a weak attempt at laughing it off before sighing.

Ford looked around him and shuddered, “Is anyone else getting the creeps in here?” He asked.

Grantie Mae ignored him and continued, “And over here is my personal favorite, Cedric Digg- OH, NO!” She exclaimed suddenly. There was a melted glob of wax on the floor where she was looking at. Sunlight beamed through the window above it. “Who opened the blinds? Wax Voldemort, I’m looking in your direction!” She accused angrily, even though Ford couldn't see a wax Voldemort anywhere. Mae sighed and leaned down to dip her finger in the melted wax. “That was my newest wax sculpture…”

Stanley sat down next to where Mae was crouched, “Cheer up, Grantie Mae. Where’s your happy face?”

“Not over here, kiddo,” she sighed. “Keep looking.”

Stanley poked his grantie’s face childishly, “Beep, boop, boop!” His playful attempt to make Mae happy again gave her a small smile. “There it is!” He exclaimed.

“Yep, you found it,” Grantie Mae smiled.

“Don’t worry, Grantie Mae. We can help you make a new wax figure from all this old wax!”

Grantie Mae glanced at the melted wax, looking uncertain, “You think you can help me make one of these?”

“Sure. you’ve seem to have a lot of practice, and you can teach us. We can be your assistants,” Lee suggested.

Mae chuckled and ruffled Stanley’s hair before standing up, “You sure have spunk, kid. Alright,” she addressed to the three boys, “how about you ankle biters help me make a new wax figure?”

The boys cheered in excitement for their new task.

Stanley, Stanford, and Fiddleford sat in a small circle drawing out ideas for their new wax figure. “What do you think of this?” Stanley asked. He held up his picture. “It’s an angry, bearded pirate!”

Fiddleford nodded in approval, “I like it, but check mine out!” He held up a picture of a fantasy princess. “It’s Princess Unatainabelle from Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons!”

“Dude! You play that game?” Ford asked excitedly.

"Yeah, it's pretty cool. The characters are really awesome, and I love how you make up the story as it goes," Fidds added.

Ford gasped, "Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons is my favorite role playing game of all time! We should play sometime!"

"Yeah, we should!"

Lee snapped his fingers, “Hey, nerds! Less nerdy talking and more wax figure planning. What did you come up with, Broford?”.

Ford held his up shyly, “I came up with one of those pixies we were chased after.”

“When did that happen?” Fidds asked.

“No!” Stanley asserted to his brother, ignoring Fiddleford. “Oh, no! We are not making a wax figure of pixies! Not when they tried to force me to marry them!”

Ford rolled his eyes, “It was the best I could think of.”

“...I still like my idea?” Fidds suggested.

Lee shook his head, “Too nerdy. I like mine!”

“We’re not doing a pirate!” Ford yelled.

“Why not?”

“It’s a dumb idea!”

“No, it isn’t!”

“GUYS!” Fiddleford yelled. “This is going no where! Let’s just think of something else.”

The shouting stopped, and after a short silence, Ford sighed “Like what?”

Grantie Mae came in the room without her fez and heels, “Boys, have you seen my hat?”

She unknowingly posed on a briefcase, but that sparked inspiration for Stanley. His eyes grew large when he turned around to the ceiling, “Oh, muse. You work in mysterious ways….”

“Why’s your brother talking to the ceiling?” Mae asked to Ford.

After Stanley shared his idea, the others all agreed to it. Grantie Mae guided the kids on how to create a wax figure. Fiddleford, Stanley, Stanford, and, at one point, Maria helped in the creation of Grantie Mabel’s newest wax figure. When it was done, they moved back to admire their work.

“What do you think, kids?” Mae asked.

“I think…“ Lee began, “it’s missing something. I’m not sure what though.”

Mae snapped her fingers when she figured it out, “Glitter. Maria, you got the glitter?”

“Yep. Right here, Ms. Pines,” Ria said, hoisting a large bucket of glitter to her.

Ford was curious as to why his grantie had so much glitter, but he ignored these thoughts as she tossed the entire bucket of glitter on the statue.

“Wow!” Fiddleford said, amazed. “That looks amazing! What are you going to do with this, Ms. Pines?” He asked.

Grantie Mae smiled, “People, the Wax Museum is going back in business!”

The next day, there is a large grand re-opening event for the Wax Museum. Fiddleford was left in charge of leading people to the entrance, and Stanford and Danny were working in the stand to charge people a hefty amount for entrance.

“I can’t believe this many people showed up,” Ford commented.

“I know right? Your aunt probably bribed them or something,” Dan joked.

Ford held up a dollar, “She bribed me.” Danny held up a dollar too, and they snickered.

Once everyone paid a fee and got in their seats, Danny and Ford joined them in the front row. Grantie Mae came up to the stage, wearing her full work uniform. She cleared her throat over the microphone, “You all know me, folks! Town darling, ‘Ms. Mystery’. Gentlemen, please, control yourselves!” The men she was referring to were staring blankly ahead with flies swarming around them. “As you know, I always enjoy bringing novelties and curiosity to this lovely town, the likes of which the world has never known! But enough about me. Beast before your eyes… for me!”

She uncovered the the white sheet, revealing a sparkly, wax replica of Grantie Mae, which she had dubbed 'Wax Mae'. Not that many people were impressed, though. Ford and Danny clapped out of politeness, but no one else was joining in. Someone in the audience coughed. “And now,” she continued, “a word from the designer and co-creator, Lee‘onardo!”

Stanley walked on the stage, who seemed way too proud by his creation, “It’s Stanley,” he corrected, taking the microphone. “Thank you for coming! This creation wouldn’t be possible without the help of my brother, Stanford, and my friends, Fiddleford McGucket, and Maria Alzamirano,” he gestured. Maria waved from the crowd, “and last, but not least, my grantie!” He threw up his arms to her. “This sculpture is covered in our blood, sweat, tears, and other fluids!”

The audience looked disgusted by that last part. 

“Yeah…” Lee chuckled awkwardly and glanced the other way. “I will now take questions! You there!” He pointed to Crazy Chiu.

“This is Crazy Chiu, local kook,” she introduced herself. “Are those wax figures alive? And follow-up question, can I survive the wax-man uprising?”

“Um… Yes!” He answered, even though he didn’t fully understand the questions. Another hand went up, and Lee pointed to him.

“Thompson Determined, Gravity Falls Gossiper,” he introduced himself. “Do you really think this constitutes a wonder of the world?”

“Your microphone’s a turkey baster, Thompson,” Grantie Mae pointed out.

“I guess it is-”

“Next question,” Grantie Mabel interrupted. She pointed to a formally dressed woman holding a real microphone.

“Tambry Valentino, a real reporter,” she glared at Thompson. She held up a flyer. “Your flyers promised free pizza with admission to this event. Is this true?” Several audience members murmured in agreement.

Grantie Mae gasped, “Oh, no! I knew I forgot something!” She laughed into the microphone. “You see… well, I kind of… forgot the pizza. So before you get too upset, I only have one thing to say… GLITTER BOMB!” She threw some of the leftover glitter on the ground. There must have been something mixed with it, because smoke and glitter surrounded her. When it cleared, she was running away with the money she earned from the admissions.

The audience left in a fury. Some even went as far as violence. A red-headed, built woman punched a pole while yelling in anger. Stanley leaned on a table, “I think that went well,” he smiled. Ford was too shocked by the audience’s anger to say otherwise.

That night in the Mystery Shack, Grantie Mae counted up her money next to the wax figure, “Well look at all this!” She exclaimed. “With this extra cash, I can finally get that spa treatment I’ve been wanting! And I owe it all to one person: this lovely lady!” She pointed to Wax Mabel.

Stanley jokingly pushed Grantie Mae. “I’m just kidding,” Mae smiled, noogying him, “you too, you little rascal. Now you kids wash up,” she said to Lee and Ford. “We got another long day of work tomorrow.”

Ford and Lee did what they were told. They went up to their room, changed into pajamas, and went into the bathroom to brush their teeth. “Ford, you wanna do a toothbrush race?” Stanley asked.

“Okay."

Screaming was heard from the living room, and Ford and Lee stopped what they were doing to run to the noise. Their Grantie Mae looked distraught, “Wax Mae! She’s been… m-murdered!”

The boys looked down to see that the wax figure had been decapitated, and the head was missing. Stanley fainted in Ford's arms.

“W-What do we do, Grantie Mae?” Ford asked.

“I’ll call the police,” she said. “You stay here and try to wake up your brother.”

A while later, Stanley had woken up, and he and Stanford stood in front of the decapitated wax sculpture with Grantie Mae in their pajamas. There was a police car in the yard, and two policemen were talking to Grantie Mae.

“I just left to get ready for bed,” she explained. “But when I came back, she was headless!”

“Grantie Mae’s sculpture… besmirched!” Stanley cried dramatically. “BESMIIIRRRCHED!”

“Who would do something like this?” Stanford asked.

One of the police officers turned to the other, “What’s your opinion, Sheriff Holt?”

Sheriff Holt turned to the Pines family, “Look, we’d love to help you guys, but let’s face the facts: this is an unsolvable case.”

“What?!” They yelled in unison.

“You’re kidding, right?” Ford asked. “There must be evidence, motives, anything that could help us find a culprit. You know, I could help if you want.”

“He’s really good,” Stanley backed him up. “He figured out who was eating all our potatoes!”

“All signs pointed to the pig,” he concluded.

“Yeah,” Grantie Mae nodded. “Let the kid help. He’s a smart boy. He has top grades too, right, spunk?”

“Yep!” Ford nodded proudly. He turned to the officers. “Can I help?”

The sheriff chuckled, “Listen, kid. It's cute that you want to help us."

"Cute?!"

"But you ain't gonna solve a case with any of your fancy computer phones. You city kids are so adorable, though!” Sheriff Holt cooed.

“Adorable?!” Ford repeated. He was getting frustrated. “I’m not cute, and I'm not adorable!”

The officers laughed at him until they calmed down, “Look,” the deputy began, “how about you leave the investigating to the grown-ups, alright?”

Their walkie talkie activated, and a man spoke from the other side, “Attention, all units. Steve is about to fit an entire cantaloupe in his mouth. Repeat, an entire cantaloupe!”

“It’s a 23-16!” The other officer yelled excitedly.

“Let’s move, deputy!” The officers ran back to their cars and drove away, laughing the whole way.

When they were gone, Ford spoke up angrily, “That’s it! Stanley, you and me are going to find the jerk who did this and get back that head. Then we’ll see who’s adorable. Ah-cho!” He sneezed.

“Aww, you sneeze like a kitten!” Lee cooed. Ford glared at him.

The next morning, the twins investigated the crime scene themselves.

“Wax Mabel has lost her head, and it’s up to us to find it,” Ford declared. Earlier, the kids had blocked the entire living room to protect the evidence by covering the walls and doors with police tape. White marker tape outlined where Wax Mae was found, with the wax figure's body being moved elsewhere in the house. Stanley took pictures of the tape on the ground and areas around it while Ford continued. “There were a lot of unhappy customers at that unveiling,” he turned to the bulletin board that was taken out from their room, where there were notes and photographs of audience members on it. “The murderer could have been anyone.”

“Yeah, even us!” Lee gasped.

Ford nodded, “In this town, anything is possible,” he took out the journal. “Ghosts, zombies, you name it. It could be months before we find our first clue.”

“Hey, look!” Lee pointed on the ground. “A clue.”

Ford looked to where he was pointing, and he saw strange shoe prints in the shag carpet. “Footprints!” He exclaimed.

Lee got on the ground to take a closer look at them, “That’s weird,” he observed. “They’ve got a hole in them.”

“And they’re leading to…” The twins followed the footprints until they found an ax on the floor. They both gasped, having found the weapon used to murder Wax Mae.

The twins took the ax to Maria, who was working in the gift shop. She held onto it to examine it.

“So, what do you think?” Stanford asked.

“In my opinion,” she began, “this is a very unusual weapon. In cases like this, the weapon would normally be a knife or a gun, like in my soap opera shows. Someone that owns an ax did this.”

“Wait a minute,” Stanley gasped. “The lumberjack!”

“Of course!” They yelled. They recalled how the red-headed woman got angry at the unveiling.

“She was furious when she didn’t get that free pizza,” Ford remembered.

“Furious enough for MURDER!” Stanley added dramatically.

Maria handed the ax back to Stanley, “You mean Tough Girl Dee,” she corrected. “She spends her time in that biker joint downtown.”

“Then that’s where we’re going!” Lee declared.

“Alright, if it’s okay with your aunt, then you can go,” Ria smiled. “You two are so adorable. At this point, I should start calling you ‘The Mystery Twins’.”

Stanford looked at her, annoyed, “Please don’t call us that.... And we’re not adorable!” He added.

The boys went outside, where Grantie Mae was pulling a coffin out of her convertible, “Hey, kids? Care to give your grantie a hand with this coffin? I’m doing a memorial for Wax Mae. Something small, but classy,” she explained. Grantie Mae heaved the coffin out of the car and set it down on the ground herself. “Oh, would you look at that," she laughed, somewhat surprised of her strength. "Never mind, then.”

“Grantie Mae! We made a huge break in the case!” Ford exclaimed.

“Break in the case!” Lee repeated.

“We’re heading to town right now to interrogate the murderer!”

“We have an ax!” Lee showed her. He began playing with it like a toy. “REE, REE, REE!”

“Hmm, it seems like the kind of thing that a responsible parent wouldn’t want you to do…” she considered. “Good thing I’m an aunt,” Mae posed on top of the coffin. “Avenge me, kids! AVENGE MEEE!!!”

Once Ford and Lee made it to town, they hid behind a trash bin near the bike joint. It was called ‘Skull Fracture’, according to the sign, but the place was guarded by an intimidating, large man covered in tattoos.

“This is the place,” Ford confirmed. He turned to Stanley. “Got the fake IDs?”

Lee nodded and gave him one. Their fake names Lee put on the cards were 'Ford Fiesta' and 'Stan Lexer'. The IDs were as realistic as a 12-year-old boy could make them, but they would have to do.

Ford looked at his ID and took a deep breath, “Here goes nothing.”

The bouncer looked at an ID card, then shook his head, “Sorry, but we don’t serve miners.”

“Daaaaanng’nab it!” The miner cursed. He spat on the road and walked off irritably. Stanley and Stanford walked up to the bouncer.

“We’re here to interrogate Tough Girl Dee the lumberjack for the murder of Wax Mae,” Lee explained. He and Ford showed the bouncer their fake ID cards.

“Works for me,” the bouncer shrugged. He opened the door for the twins, and they ran in.

Inside the Skull Fracture, Ford and Lee could see tough men and women fighting each other and making a racket. Stanley walked over a body lying on the floor.

“He’s sleeping,” Stanley smiled.

“Alright,” Ford said. He motioned for Lee to stay close. “Let’s just try to blend in, okay?”

“You got it, Ford Fiesta!” Lee climbed onto a chair at a booth. “Hey, how’s it hangin’?” He asked the biker next to him.

The biker growled at Stanley.

Ford eventually found Tough Girl Dee. She was at the back of the Skull Fracture playing an arm wrestling game.

“Tough Girl Dee, just the gal I wanted to talk to,” Stanford began. “Could you tell me where you were last night?”

“I was Punchin’ the clock,” she answered, keeping her eyes on the game.

“You were at work?” Ford asked skeptically.

“No, I was punchin’ that clock!” With her free hand, she pointed out the window at a broken clock. The hands of the clock pointed at the ten and the twelve.

“10 o’clock,” he read. “The time of the murder.... So, I guess this doesn’t look familiar to you?” He pulled out the ax from his bag that was left at the scene of the crime.

“Listen, little girl!” Tough Girl Dee began.

“Um, actually, I’m a-”

“-I wouldn’t pick my teeth with that ax. It’s left handed! I’m RIGHT HANDED!” She ripped the machine’s arm off and began beating the machine with it.

A man Ford had learned was named Gorney showed up from nowhere, and he stood behind Tough Girl Dee and started chanting, “Get ‘im! Get ‘im!”

Stanford wasn’t paying attention to that. He was just given important, new evidence, “Left handed…”

Stanley was still talking with the same biker, “I’m sure your wife is going to be beautiful,” he promised.

“You’re the best, Lexer,” the biker smiled affectionately.

Ford ran up to him, “Lee, big break in the case!”

They left without saying goodbye to the biker, “But will she love me?!” He cried.

“It’s a left handed ax,” Ford explained as they were walking down the street. He showed Lee a list with names on it. “These are all our suspects. Tough Girl Dee is right handed, which means that she didn’t commit the murder. All we have to do then is find our left handed suspect. Since about one in ten people are left handed, there’s a large chance that the list will be narrowed down to one or two people. Then, we’ll have our killer.”

“Oh man, we are on fire today!” Stanley cheered.

“Let’s find that murderer,” Ford said. The twins fist bumped, and they began their search.

They went all over town and testing people to see if they were right or left handed. They had them sign things, catch things, or they just had to check for casts. Ford and Lee crossed out every name on the list except for the last one.

Ford gasped when he read the name, “Stanley, there’s only one person left on this list!”

Stanley gasped as well, “Of course! It all adds up!”

That night, the twins had the cops with them in front of a house.

“You kids better be right about this or you’ll never hear the end of it,” Sheriff Holt warned them.

“Don’t worry. The evidence is irrefutable,” Stanford said surely.

“Very irrefutable,” Stanley nodded.

The other police officer looked excited, “I’m finally going to use my match stick!”

“Are you ready, Deputy Roy?” Holt asked.

“Yeah!” Deputy Roy nodded.

“On three! One, two…”

The officers smashed the door open with a loud yell, “Nobody move!” Holt ordered. “This is a raid!”

The inside of the room looked like an older-styled office for a journalist, complete with a typewriter. The person using it fell backwards in shock. Thompson Determined hid under the desk for cover, “Why am I being raided?!”

Deputy Roy smashed a lamp, mostly just for the fun of it. Stanford went up to Thompson, “Thompson Determined, you are under arrest for the murder of the wax body of Mabel Pines!”

“You have the right to remain impressed with our awesome detective work,” Stanley smiled proudly. He and Ford high fived.

“B-But I don’t understand!” Thompson stuttered.

“Then allow me to explain,” Ford started. “You were hoping that our Grantie Mae’s new attraction would be the story that saved your failing newspaper, but when the show was a flop, you decided to go out and make your own headline. You were sloppy, however, and all the clues pointed to a shabby shoed reporter who was caught left handed. Thompson Determined, you’re yesterday’s news,” he finished smugly.

“B-But I had nothing to do with the murder,” Thompson spoke up.

“I knew it!” Stanford yelled, until he recalled what he just said. “Wait, nothing? You said nothing?”

“Huh? What?” Lee asked, confused.

Sheriff Holt stepped in front of the boys, “Then if you aren’t the murderer, then where were you at the night of the break-in?”

Thompson looked uncomfortable to reveal such private information, so the officers took the recorded tape from that night and insert it into a TV. When it started playing, the time at the bottom went past ten PM, and Thompson was shown taking something out of his closet. It was a cardboard cutout of Tambry Valentino. “Finally, we can be alone, cardboard cutout of TV news reporter Tambry Valentino, who isn’t married to that good-for-nothing Robert Valentino!” He added jealously. Thompson then proceeded to make out with it.

“Eeewww! Yuck!” The boys and the officers cringed in disgust.

“The time stated confirms,” Holt said. “Thompson, you’re off the hook. You freak of nature.”

“Hooray!”

“B-But i-it has to be him!” Stanford stuttered. “Check the ax for fingerprints!”

Sheriff Holt used a finger duster on the weapon, only to shake his head, “No prints at all.”

“No prints?” he repeated.

“Hey,” Deputy Roy interrupted, “I got a headline for you: City Kids Waste Everyone’s Time!” The adults laugh, while Ford and Lee looked at each other, ashamed for their false accusation.

“Boy, I’m sure glad I’m not you two right now,” Thompson chuckled. “If I were you, I’d be pretty embarrassed,” behind him, the video of him making out with the cardboard cutout continued to play, but he paid no mind to it.

Once the officers relaxed from laughing so hard, they apologized to Thompson Determined for the misunderstanding, and they escorted the boys back to the Mystery Shack. “Like I said earlier, you boys are never going to hear the end of this,” Holt reminded the boys. Once they were dropped off, the officers drove away.

Stanford and Stanley sighed in disappointment. When they walked inside, they saw their grantie dressed all in black, “I’m glad you’re here, boys,” she smiled tearfully. “Meet me in the wax figure room. The service is about to start.”

Five minutes later, the twins were sitting in the front row at the service. The other seats were occupied by Maria, Fiddleford, and the other wax figures. Grantie Mae was at the front, giving her speech, “Kids, Ria, lifeless wax figures,” she gestured, “thank you all for coming.”

Ria blew her nose with a tissue.

“Some people might say it’s wrong for a woman to love a wax replica of herself.”

“They’re wrong!” Maria stood up and exclaimed.

“Easy, Ria. It's alright,” she turned to the headless wax sculpture of herself. “Wax Mae, I hope you’re staying glittery in wax heaven,” she started breaking down in tears. “I’m sorry,” she cried and ran out of the room in despair.

“Ms. Pines!” Ria ran after her and left, leaving the boys alone with the wax figures.

Stanley and Stanford sighed. Fiddleford looked back at the twins and spoke up, noticing their sadness, “So, I’m guessing you didn’t find the murderer.”

“Not even close,” Lee shook his head.

Ford sighed again, “Those cops were right about me…”

“But you guys came so far,” Fidds reminded them. “You can’t give up now.”

Ford stood up and walked up to the coffin, where Wax Mae was, “We considered everything: the weapon, the motive, the clues…” he looked inside the coffin and sighed. Ford paused when he noticed something. “Wax Mae has a hole in her heels,” he commented.

“All the wax figures have that, don’t they?” Fiddleford asked. He and Stanley left their seats to stand next to Ford to examine the shoe.

“Yeah,” Lee replied. “It’s where the pole thingy attaches to their stand things to keep them balanced.”

Ford looked deep in thought for a moment, before it clicked, “Wait a minute..." he turned to the other boys. "What has a hole on its shoe and has no fingerprints?” He gasped, and his blood ran cold in realization. Ford could feel his heart beating faster in fear. “Guys!” He whispered frantically. “The murderers are-”

“-Standing right behind you.”

The unfamiliar voice caused the boys to freeze where they were, before slowly turning around. Before them, all the wax figures groaned and came to life. The one that spoke was a wax figure of a woman wearing an old-timely dress.

Stanley gasped, “Wax Lizzie Borden!”

“Wax Xyler and Craz!” Fiddleford yelled.

“Wax… giant waffle with big arms?” Ford paused. The wax waffle just grunted.

Wax Lizzie Borden took the ax from Stanley, or, Stanford assumed from what he knew of her, took her ax back, “Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!” Lee panicked.

“Congratulations, dudes,” Wax Xyler nodded. “You figured out our secret.”

“Yeah, bros,” Wax Craz spoke. He turned to the other wax figures. “Let’s give these dudes a hand!” The wax figures applauded loudly and sincerely. “No, I meant sarcastically,” Wax Craz corrected himself. The clapping grew slower and less meaningful. “That’s better,” he gave a thumbs up.

“B-But… how is this possible? You’re made of wax!” Ford exclaimed.

“Are you… magic?” Stanley asked hopefully.

Wax Lizzie Borden laughed, along with the others. “Are we magic?” She repeated tauntingly. “He wants to know if we’re magic!” Her laughing suddenly stopped, and she hit the blade of her ax against the coffin threateningly. “We’re CURSED!”

“Cursed! Cursed!” The wax figures chanted.

“Cursed to come to life whenever the moon is out. Your aunt created us many years ago on nights when the moon was waxing. She considered it ironic, but remained oblivious to the consequences. The wax she made us out of were bought from a garage sale,” she explained. "A haunted garage sale."

Wax Xyler continued, “By day, we were nothing but statues to look at and play with at the Mystery Shack.”

“But after your aunt went to sleep, we would rock the night,” Wax Craz said. He pretended he was holding an electric guitar and made noises as if playing one.

“It was a lovely life for us, despite the fact that we were cursed beings…" Wax Lizzie Borden smiled, drifting off in memory. Her smile quickly became a scowl. "That is, until your aunt closed up the shop.”

Wax Xyler continued, “We’ve been waiting ten years to get our revenge on her for caging us in… but we got the wrong dudette.”

Wax Borden held up the missing head of Wax Mae, and Ford gasped, “So you were trying to murder Grantie Mae for real?!”

“You were right all along, Ford!” Lee admitted, grabbing his brother's arm. “Wax people are creepy!”

“Enough!” Wax Borden ordered. She set the head aside and drew out her ax. “Now that you know our secret, you must… die.” The wax figures growled, and their eyes rolled to the back of their heads. They slowly approached the kids.

“What do we do, what do we do?!” Stanley asked, looking around for a way to escape.

“Why do these kind of things happen whenever I’m around you guys?!” Fidds asked hopelessly.

Stanford looked around quickly and found an opening to the table. He grabbed their hands and made a break for it. Once they were at the table, the boys started throwing things at the wax figures. When Ford threw a hot coffee maker at Wax Marie Curie, she melted, screaming.

“That’s it!” Fiddleford gasped. “We can melt them with heat!”

The boys each grabbed an electric candle with smirks on their faces and pointed them at the wax figures, “Anyone move, and we’ll melt you into candles!” Ford warned.

“Decorative candles!” Lee added.

Wax Borden laughed, “Do you really think you can defeat us?”

“I-I don’t really know…”

“I’m not- I’m not really sure.”

“It’s worth a shot, I guess?”

“So be it,” she pointed her ax at the boys. “Attack!”

The wax figures closed in on the boys. Wax Lizzie Borden swung her ax at Stanley, but he ducked in time for her to accidentally decapitate Wax Marie Antoinette. Fiddleford pulled Stanley out of harm’s way to only have Wax Craz corner them. Thinking quickly, Stanley used the candle to cut off his hands. While Lee finished off with Wax Craz by cutting off his head, the hands continued to move, chasing after Fidds. Fiddleford ran over to the door, and he smashed it on the fingers repeatedly.

Stanford swung his candle at the wax figure of the waffle with big arms, “EAT THIS!” He yelled, cutting off the figure’s arms. The wax waffle grunted in despair. He moved on to fight his next opponent, “Get lost, Amelia Earhart!” He cut her in half using the electronic candle, and Earhart’s torso slid off her lower half. Wax Harriet Tubman ran at Ford with her arms out, ready to grab him, but he dodged just in time. The wax figure fell right into the fireplace. 

“Looks like… um, you found a, uh… I don’t know, a new underground railroad? Heh. Yeah, okay,” Ford stood up to run back into the fight. The three of them continued to fight off the wax figures while watching each others’ backs. After a few moments, there was only one full-bodied wax figure left.

“That does it!” Wax Lizzie Borden declared angrily. “It’s time to finish you off!”

She took her ax back out and aimed it at Ford. Stanford took the wax head of Grantie Mae and stuck it on the horn of a wall piece of a rhino. Wax Borden swung the ax at him, knocking the candle out of his hand. It broke when it hit the floor. Ford gasped, his only weapon being gone.

“CATCH!” Stanley had heated up the tip of a poker using the fireplace and threw it at Stanford.

Ford miraculously caught it in time to block the ax swung at him. Wax Borden fought him, and Stanford was pushed back while blocking her ax. Stanford backed up the stairs and into the upstairs hallway. Ahead of them was a closed window, but the smallest rays of sunlight were starting to shine through the glass. This gave Ford an idea.

Wax Borden cornered Ford by the window, “Once your family is out of the way, we’ll rule the night once more!” She exclaimed.

She lifted her ax with both arms, but Ford ducked and rolled out of the way right as she swung into the floor. Ford opened the window, “Don’t count on it!” He edged her on. Stanford climbed out the window and on the roof before Wax Borden could get the ax out of the wooden floor. Once she did, she followed Ford on the roof in pursuit.

“Come back here, you brat!” She yelled.

Stanford slowly crept across the Mystery Shack sign, and when he reached the edge, he turned to see that Wax Borden had found him, ready to swing her ax. Ford defended himself with the poker, even though the tip of it had already cooled down. Both he and the wax figure struggled to maintain balance on the sign while fighting. Wax Lizzie Borden clashed her ax with his poker, only for it to slip from Ford’s fingers and off the roof.

She swung her ax at Stanford again, and he jumped back to avoid it. When he did, he bumped into the sign, causing the 'S' in 'Shack' to fall off. As a last resort, Ford climbed off the sign to hide behind the chimney. When he caught his breath, the 12-year-old looked behind him to see where the wax figure was. Wax Borden moved in front of him and kicked him down. She raised her ax once more, “Any last words?”

Stanford looked behind her and smirked, seeing the rising sun, “You got any sunscreen?”

“Got any…? What?” She turned to see the sun and gasped. “NO!”

Wax Lizzie Borden began melting before his eyes, “You know,” he mentioned casually, standing up and folding his arms behind his back, “letting me lead you outside? Probably not your best idea.”

The wax figure melted faster until nothing was left but her face, “Outsmarted by a mere child! You wretched brat! No!”

Ford sighed with relief, “Case closed!” He wiped the dust off his hands, which caused him to sneeze, "Ah-cho!"

What was left of the wax figure laughed, “You sneeze like a kitten!” She exclaimed happily. “Those policemen were right, you’re adorable!” The melted glob of wax oozed off the roof. “ADORABLE!” She repeated, falling to the ground. Wax Lizzie Borden hit the ground with a splat.

“E-ew,” Stanford cringed. He made his way back inside and into the room where he left Fiddleford and Stanley. Luckily, both of them were all right, and they were getting rid of the remaining parts of the wax figures by throwing them into the fireplace.

Fiddleford threw the head of Emily Dickinson in the fireplace and gasped when he saw that Stanford was alright, “Ford!”

Stanley turned back to him as well and smiled, “You’re alright!”

A gentle smile and a soft laugh came from Ford, “It looks like I really did solve the mystery after all.”

Fidds retrieved Wax Mae’s head from the wall and handed it back to Ford, “We knew you could do it!”

“Well, I couldn’t have done it without my partners,” he admitted.

The boys smiled. At that moment, Grantie Mae walked in, shocked by all the melted wax everywhere, “Holy Moses! What happened to my wax figures?!”

“Your wax figures turned out to be evil, so we fought them to the death!” Stanley explained.

“I told Amelia Earhart to get lost,” Ford added.

Grantie Mae laughed, “Ah, you kids and your imagination,” she sighed.

“On the bright side, look what we found!” Fidds gestured to the head Ford was holding, and he gave it to Grantie Mae.

“My head! My beautiful head has returned!” She exclaimed. “Thank you, boys! You kids did a good job,” she set the head aside and opened her arms wide. “Alright, now line up for some affectionate hugs from your grantie!”

The boys looked unsure, but she pulled all three of them into a hug anyway. They laughed, but their moment was interrupted when the police officers drove by and parked a short distance from their window.

“Solved the case yet, city boy?” Sheriff Holt asked. “I’m so confident you’re gonna say no, that I’m gonna take a long, slow sip from my cup of coffee.”

Ford smiled and waited until Holt was well into his drink before he showed him Wax Mae’s head, “As a matter of fact, the answer is yes.”

Holt spat out his coffee into Deputy Roy’s face, who then screamed and spat coffee into Holt’s face. The process repeated once more, before the officers drove off screaming in pain from the hot coffee. After they drove out of sight, a crash was heard. Fidds, Ford, Lee, and Grantie Mae laughed at their comical reaction.

Grantie Mae let out a mixture between a laugh and a sigh as she examined the room, “So what are we going to do about this?” She asked.

The boys looked thoughtful, until Fidds gasped, “I know! We can give it to Ria! She’s been saying how she’s been wanting a new break room,” he mentioned.

“Oh, has she, now? Well,” Grantie Mae shrugged, “I do agree with you, and I can’t think of another use for this room. If you help her clean this place up, you both can use it,” she decided.

Fidds gasped, “Thanks, Ms. Pines!”

She ruffled his hair, “No problem, kiddo. Now all of you, get over here!” She pulled the boys back into a hug, and they laughed peacefully.

Once the laughter died down, Ford turned to Lee, “So, did you get all of the wax figures?”

“I am ninety-nine percent sure that I did!” Lee replied.

“I’m also ninety-nine percent sure,” Fiddleford added. “Which would mean that there is a one hundred and ninety-eight percent chance that we got them all.”

“That calculation is good enough for me,” Stanford smiled.

Up in the vents, the decapitated heads of Wax Xyler and Wax Craz were still intact.

“This is just bogus,” Wax Craz complained.

“I know, right, bro?” Wax Xyler asked. Before Wax Craz could reply, a rat came up to them.

“Oh, cool! Look, Craz, we have another bro to hang out with!”

The rat stole Xyler’s ear and scurried off.

“HEY!” The wax figures hopped after the rat. “Not cool, dude!”

Chapter Text

In the Mystery Shack, Grantie Mae was busy practically stealing money from tourists. Meanwhile Fiddleford was on his break, so he decided to spend it watching TV with Stanley and Stanford. They were watching a movie when the commercial break came on.

The screen showed lights, smoke, and music. Fiddleford recognized it and pointed at the TV excitedly, “Hey, look! It’s that commercial I was tellin’ you guys about.”

The twins looked at the screen in sudden interest, “Are you completely miserable?” A voice-over in the commercial asked.

An actor cried, “YES!”

“Then you need to meet… Buddy.”

“Buddy?” Ford repeated.

“What makes him so special?” Asked Stanley.

“He’s a psychic,” the commercial answered. “So don’t waste your time with a so-called ‘woman of mystery’,” it showed a not so photogenic picture of Mae with the word FRAUD stamped over it.

“Okay, first of all, that is very rude and untrue. Second, I am pretty sure that was sexist against old people,” Stanley observed. Fidds shushed him so they could hear the rest of the commercial.

“Learn all about it at Buddy’s Tent of Telepathy,” the disclaimers came on, and unless Ford was mistaken, he thought he had heard the narrator admit he loved someone named ‘Carla’.

Fidds turned the TV off and asked, “So, what do you think about Buddy?”

Grantie Mae walked in, frustrated, “Let me tell you kids something. Buddy is bad news. Ever since his father came into town, he’s been nothing but trouble, and his son is no different,” she grumbled.

“Why’s that?” Lee asked curiously.

“Is it because of how he bashed you in the commercial?” Ford guessed.

Mae sighed and sat down, “Listen kids, it goes a little deeper than that. Buddy’s father, Gideon, is selfish. I learned that a long time ago. He and I dated for a while, back when we were both young. At first it was nice, but then Gideon became… well, possessive,” she explained the best she could.

“You mean he wouldn’t share his stuff with you?” Lee asked.

“Not exactly,” she continued slowly, as if thinking of how to word it to the children. She sighed and started over. “The point is that Gideon is an awful man, and I forbid you to be near him or his son. I’m doing this for your safety,” Grantie Mae left the room before the kids could ask any more questions.

Now by themselves, Fidds turned to the twins, “What was that all about?”

“I don’t know,” Ford shrugged. “but do you guys really think that Buddy is psychic?”

“Do you wanna go check it out?” Lee asked.

“No! You heard what Grantie Mae said,” Ford hissed. “We aren’t allowed.”

Lee stood up, “So, we’ll sneak out! We can go stop by and leave without Grantie Mae ever knowing!” He suggested.

Fiddleford shook his head, “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“It’ll be fine as long as we don’t talk to them. Grantie Mae said we shouldn’t be near them, but she never specified how near,” he pointed out. The other boys were still unsure, but Lee buttered up the deal. “Come on, guys! Aren’t you curious? Plus, if we check that place out, we can come up with ways to make the Mystery Shack better!”

“You do have a good point,” Ford admitted. He sighed. “Alright. I’m in.”

“Me, too,” Fiddleford added reluctantly.

That afternoon, the boys made it to the Tent of Telepathy. It made Ford feel a little guilty, since he was disobeying his grantie, but he did admit he was curious. At the very least, he kept his distance from this ‘Gideon’ guy. He didn’t care about him, though. It was Buddy that got his attention.

There was a large crowd around the tent, and at the entrance was a large man with white hair and chubby cheeks. He held out a sack to the crowd. “Step right up here, folks! Put your money in Buddy’s psychic sack,” he said. The crowd smiled and lined up to do just that.

Fiddleford nudged the twins, “That’s Gideon Gleeful,” he whispered.

“But he doesn’t seem too bad,” Lee commented.

“That’s not the point. How are we going to get in without being near him?” Ford asked.

Stanley looked around, thinking, until he got an idea, “Follow me!”

Ford and Fidds followed Lee to the side of the tent. Once the coast was clear and no one was around, Stanley lifted up the tent flap, and the boys snuck in.

Inside the tent were dozens of chairs that were lined up, and nearly all of them were filled. There was a stage up front, and the interior of the tent contained strange symbols of stars, eyes, and triangles.

“Whoa,” Ford gasped in amazement, “this is like an alternate version of the Mystery Shack! They even have their own Maria and Fidds.”

He pointed at a young cleaning lady that resembled Ria, and an even younger maintenance worker that looked a lot like Fiddleford. A name tag on his shirt read ‘Finnigan’. Fidds glared at him jealously while chewing on snacks he brought.

The lights around them dimmed, and music began playing, “It’s starting! It’s starting!” Lee gasped. The boys took their seats next to each other in the front row.

“Let’s see what this monster looks like,” Ford whispered to himself.

The red curtains in front of them opened, and a chubby child with brown hair appeared on the stage. He looked no older than ten, “Hello, America! My name is Li’l Buddy!” The young psychic smiled cutely. He clapped, and doves flew out from his hands, as if by magic. The crowd cheered in awe.

“That is Mae’s competition?” Ford asked.

“But he’s so wittle!” Stanley cooed.

“Ladies and gentlemen, it is such a gift to have you here tonight! Such a gift! I have a vision,” he exclaimed. “I predict that you will soon all say ‘aww’,” Buddy struck a cute pose, and the crowd awed.

“It came true!” Stanley smiled and threw his hands up.

Ford rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, “I’m not impressed.”

“Liar.”

One the stage, Buddy pointed to Gideon, who was at the piano, “Hit it, Dad!”

Gideon started playing, and Buddy began singing a song for the audience. Ford had to admit it was catchy, but what caught him off guard was when the audience, including himself, Fidds, and Lee, stood up and started to clap along with the beat. The strange part about it was that it was unintentional.

“Wha-? How did he-” Ford saw that no one was listening to him, so he stopped talking to keep listening to Buddy’s song.

“Keep it going!” Buddy cheered. He pointed to an old woman with a cat on her lap and sang, “You wish your son would call you more.”

“I’m leaving everything to my cats!” She yelled, but didn’t deny what he said. The cat in her lap meowed.

“I sense that you’ve been here before,” Buddy sang, pointing to Sheriff Holt, who was wearing and holding various Li’l Buddy merchandises.

The sheriff laughed, “What gave it away?”

Ford sighed, exasperated, “Come on,” he groaned.

Buddy seemed to hear him, because then he turned to the twins and continued singing, “I’ll read your minds if I can. Something tells me you’re both named ‘Stan’.”

Stanford suddenly regretted the decision to wear matching sweaters with Stanley that both read, ‘I’m With Stan’. Stanley didn’t seem to recall this.

“How’d he do that?” Lee asked in wonder. Ford rolled his eyes again.

After the song ended, the crowd cheered wildly. “Oh… oh my goodness,” Buddy panted. “Thank you! You people are the real miracles!”

Fiddleford clapped out of politeness, but Stanford didn’t clap at all. Stanley, on the other hand, was one of the more enthusiastic audience members, “Woo! Yeah!” He cheered.

As they exited the tent, Ford scoffed, “Man, that kid’s an even bigger fraud than Mae! No wonder she doesn’t like him and Gideon.”

“He wasn’t that bad,” Fidds shrugged. “At the very least, he does do a good musical number.”

“Wasn’t that bad?” Lee repeated. “He’s amazing! And his dance moves! And he knew our names!”

“We’re wearing Grantie Mae’s sweaters, Lee,” Ford reminded him irritably.

“Yeah, yeah,” he shrugged off. "I'm actually almost regretting not paying the entrance fee."

Ford rolled his eyes again.

The next day, Stanley went up to Stanford, wearing his boxing outfit and gloves.

“Check it out, Ford! A bruise!” There was a large, ugly purple bruise forming on his cheek. “I got it when I fell on the floor!”

“Ow,” Ford commented. “Does it hurt?”

“Very much,” he smiled. The doorbell rang.

“Somebody answer that door!” Grantie Mae called out from the kitchen.

“I got it!” Stanley smiled. He went to open the door, forgetting that he had boxing gloves on. He struggled to open the door knob, and Ford was about to ask Lee if he needed help when he got it open.

“Hi!” A voice on the other side of the door greeted. Ford looked to see it was, surprisingly, Buddy Gleeful.

“It’s ‘wittle ol’ you!” Lee gasped.

Buddy laughed nervously, “Yeah, my dad actually wrote that song. It’s pretty catchy. I, uh, know that we haven’t really met yet, but after yesterday’s show, I just thought we could hang out or something. You seemed to be such a big fan and all, and it would be great if you would...”

Before Stanley could answer, Grantie Mae called out, “Who’s at the door?”

“No one, Grantie Mae!” Lee yelled.

“Thanks for not telling her,” Buddy added. “So, how about it? I know this place where there’s this busted-up, old car. We could hang out there if you wanted to.”

“Yeah!” Stanley cheered in response. He lightly punched Buddy’s stomach, forgetting, once again, about the gloves.

“Ow,” Buddy laughed. The two of them left the house, leaving Ford alone to read and decode the journal some more.

Stanley came back four hours later, covered in dirt, oil, and sunburns, “Hey, Ford!” He yelled.

Ford yelled in surprise, but he sighed when he saw it was just his brother, “What happened to you?” he asked.

“I was hanging out with my new pal, Buddy. He’s pretty awesome, and I would have never thought he would be into cars and trucks.”

“Be careful around him,” Ford warned. “Remember what Grantie Mae said? He’s supposed to be bad news.”

“So? You never want to do these kind of things with me; you and Fidds get to do nerdy stuff all the time!” Lee pointed out.

“What do you mean?”

Fiddleford ran into the room with a box, “Hey, Ford! I just got the 1991-1992 edition of Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons! It’s the version where Probabilitor the Annoying can use the Impossibeast!”

Stanford gasped excitedly, “No way! With pen and paper,” he stood, recalling the oath.

“-Shield and sword,” Fidds continued.

“Our quest will be our sweet reward!” They finished together. Fidds and Ford laughed, and they ran off to play, leaving Stanley behind.

Stanley and Buddy continued hanging out over the next few days. Grantie Mae didn’t notice until one day, when she read the newspaper.

“What in the name of all that is good is my little Stanley doing in the paper with Buddy Gleeful?” She asked angrily to her employees and Stanford.

“Oh, yeah,” Danny read from his magazine casually, “it’s like a big deal. Everyone’s talking about ‘Buddy’s wittle fwiend’,” he chuckled.

“WHAT?! You mean that son of a maniac is friends with my great nephew?!” She took a deep breath and glared at Ford in accusation.

“I didn’t know!” he lied to defend himself. “I didn’t hear about it, and plus, I told him not to hang out with him.”

“Yeah,” she scoffed, “well it ends tonight. I have no choice but to go to his father’s house and put an end to this once and for all!” Grantie Mae left the room in a fury and slammed the door behind her.

Once it got quiet, Fidds spoke up. “Hey, Ford, wouldn’t it be funny if that was a closet, and she had to come back out again and go out the real door?” Stanford and Dan watched as Fiddleford went to the door and opened it. “Nope. Real door. Hey, check it out!” Ford closed the door behind him and came back in the room. “I came out of the closet!”

“Not a closet, Fidds,” Ford reminded him.

“Darn it.”

Grantie Mae drove her convertible to Gideon’s house, grumbling the whole way. She parked in the driveway and knocked on the door, “Gideon! I know you’re there! Open up!” She read the sign that says, ‘Please Pardon This Garden’, before knocking the sign down. “I will pardon NOTHING! No matter how beautiful this garden is!”

Gideon opened the door, “Why, if it isn’t Mabel Pines! What a delight!”

“Can it, Gleeful, I know you have something to do with this,” she accused.

“You mean with my son and your nephew just happening to be friends? What a beautiful coincidence, isn’t it?”

Mae frowned, “No, it isn’t. You’re planning something, Gideon, and I know it,” she pointed at him. “Don’t think I’ve forgiven you for what you did all those years ago.”

“Don’t fret,” Gideon smiled. He led her inside. “I’ll make you some Colombian coffee if you want some.”

“I’m not here for coffee. I’m here to tell you that I am against those two being friends,” Grantie Mae spat.

“Well,” Gideon chuckled, “I actually see this as a fantastic business opportunity. Yes, the Mystery Shack and the Tent of Telepathy. We’ve been at each other’s throats for far too long, and this is our big chance to set aside our rivalry and pool our collective profit, you see.”

Mae scoffed, “That might work on others, but you can’t fool me, Gideon. We both know what it really is you want.”

Gideon laughed and threw his hands up, “Whoop, caught me red handed! That’s right, Mabel,” he smiled. He stood in front of her and held her hands. “I want us back together.”

She slapped him across the face, “Never again, Gleeful,” she spat bitterly.

He held his red cheek with his hand, “Just as exciting as ever, you are,” he smiled. “Come on, Mabel, you can’t say ‘no’.”

“Yes, I can. NO!” She left and slammed the door shut.

That night, after playing laser tag with Lee, Buddy went back home to his dad.

“How did it go?” Gideon asked.

“It was fun!” Buddy smiled. “Stanley is really fun to hang out with.”

Gideon gestured for Bud to sit down, and they both sat on the couch, “Son, you’re going to have to spend more time with him.”

“Why?”

“Because I still haven’t won his grantie’s heart yet. You want a new mommy, right?”

“Um… yeah,” he replied. “Dad? Do I have to do that stupid musical number again tomorrow?”

Gideon slammed his fist on the table, causing Bud to jump, “IT’S NOT STUPID! You’ll do what I tell you to do, boy!” He frowned angrily.

Bud took a deep breath and nodded, “Yes, sir.”

“Just be grateful I’m not making you date the brat,” he spat. “I’ll be going over to Stanley’s aunt’s house tomorrow, and I want you to make sure she’s alone. Go and invite Stanley, his brother, and whoever else will be in the house out of there for the day, until I say you can bring them back. Got that?”

Bud nodded fearfully, “Y-yes, sir.”

“Good,” Gideon took a deep breath to calm down before walking out of the room. “Now, be a good boy and go clean something or what-not. I’m gonna finish off that ice cream.”

The next day, the boys were playing outside the Mystery Shack using fake wooden swords and shields Stanley made. Fiddleford held up his shield, which was large enough for him to hide most of his body in. "Okay, try to hit me!"

Stanley swung his sword at Fidds, but the shield blocked it. The kids laughed, but stopped when they saw Buddy Gleeful walking up to them.

“Oh, hey, Buddy!” Stanley smiled.

“H-Hey, Stanley,” Buddy waved shyly. “Do you want to hang out with me today?”

Stanley looked back at Fidds and Ford, “I’m already doing something now, but you can join us if you want.”

“Well, I have a better idea. There’s this place at the edge of town…. It’s really cool, and I want you to check it out. They could come too, if you’d like,” he offered.

Ford and Fidds glanced at each other, then at Lee, then nodded, “Okay,” Fidds decided.

“Is there anyone else in the shack you’d like to bring?” Bud asked.

“Well, Grantie Mae’s taking a nap, and the shack isn’t open today, so it’s just us,” Lee said.

Bud nodded, “Okay. Let’s go now, then.”

“YAY!” The other boys cheered.

A while later, Gideon walked up to the front door and knocked. Mae opened the door, dressed in her nightgown. She glared at him, “What do you want now?”

“I only wanted to talk to my peach dumplin’,” he smiled.

Grantie Mae sighed, “How many times do I have to tell you? I’m not your ‘peach dumpling’, and I’m not interested!”

“Just let me inside, sweet peach, and I’ll make your dreams come true.”

“You mean the dream where you leave?”

“Not exactly,” Gideon held out a small box and got on one knee in front of her. “Mabel Sophia Pines…”

“How did you know my middle-”

“Will you take my hand in marriage?”

Gideon opened the small box. In it was a ring, but that wasn’t what made Grantie Mae gasp. She looked at the photograph in anger, “Why, you little-” she tried to grab it, but she wasn't fast enough. Gideon took the picture and hid it in a pocket.

“That’s right,” he smiled. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten. I know your secrets, Mabel, and I will exploit them unless you agree to become my wife!”

Grantie Mae considered her options, before she gave in and sighed, “I do.”

Meanwhile, the boys were at the edge of town, playing in an abandoned warehouse, “I AM THE KING OF PIRATES!” Stanley exclaimed.

The other boys laughed, and they brought their swords to fight each other with, and they also found cardboard boxes and tubes to wear as armor. Fiddleford knocked Stanford over, and he fell in a pile of styrofoam popcorn.

Ford didn’t get back up, and he yawned, “Guys, do you wanna go back home?”

“Yeah,” Fidds agreed, checking the time, “my dad’ll want me back by now.”

“But you can’t leave yet!” Buddy exclaimed. “We still haven’t looked through the whole warehouse yet!”

“Don’t worry, Bud,” Lee smiled, “we can come back tomorrow.”

“It’s not that, I-” Buddy’s phone rang, and he answered it. “Hi, Dad.”

“Buddy, I have great news! How’s everything going for you?”

“They just told me they wanted to leave,” Bud answered.

“Well, put your phone on speaker, son. Stanley’s grantie has something she’d like to tell everyone,” Gideon said on the other side of the line.

Buddy did what he was told, “Guys, I’m putting it on speaker,” he announced.

The other boys nodded, and then they heard a familiar voice from the phone, “Kids? Kids, this is Mae. I… I’m getting married.”

“WHAT?!” Ford, Fidds, and Lee asked at once.

“Gideon found his way back into my heart, and I forgave him,” she explained. “And when he proposed to me, I couldn’t say no!”

“But that makes no sense!” Ford retorted. “You hated him yesterday. Why do you suddenly want to marry him?”

“It’s complicated. You kids’ll understand when you’re older,” she answered.

“We’re getting married tonight!” Gideon added. “Bud, you know what to do.”

The line went dead, “Buddy? What’s he talking about?” Lee asked.

Buddy looked down sadly, “I’m sorry,” he whispered. He pulled out a strange amulet and placed it around his neck. “My dad told me that this town isn’t normal. He said that Gravity Falls has secrets that I couldn’t begin to comprehend,” he used the amulet to levitate Ford, Lee, and Fidds. Several other objects started floating as well. Everything that the amulet was controlling had a blue aura surrounding it.

“Woah! W-What’s happening?!” Fidds asked.

“I thought you were fake!” Ford yelled in shock.

“I am!” Bud exclaimed. “It’s not me that does all this stuff! It’s my dad! And I have to listen to him!” Much to their surprise, he started crying. “I have to do this…”

“No, you don’t!” Stanley spoke up. “Buddy, we’re friends, remember?”

Buddy sobbed, but he put Lee down. He continued holding Ford and Fidds in the air, and he threw them. The boys screamed, but fortunately, they landed in a pile of cardboard boxes and styrofoam popcorn. Before they could fully recover from the fall, they were floating again.

“Stanley, you’re my best friend, but I can’t disobey him,” Buddy closed his eyes, and more tears fell down his cheeks.

“No. Buddy, you can’t always do what your dad tells you to do! Not when he tells you to hurt people. You have to stop this,” Lee pleaded. “Please. Is this really what you want?”

“No,” he shook his head. He looked at Fidds and Ford, and the looks of fear they had on their faces. Bud turned to Lee, the only real friend he ever had. In anger, he ripped off the amulet and threw it across the room. It shattered when it hit the ground. Ford and Fidds fell on the ground, as well as the other objects that were levitated. Buddy hid his head between his knees and sobbed.

The other boys got up to comfort him. Once Bud was feeling better, Ford spoke, “I don’t know about you guys, but I think Gideon is forcing Grantie Mae to marry him.”

“Then we have to stop him now,” Buddy declared. He wiped away his remaining tears and ran out of the warehouse, “Come on!”

The other boys followed him, but Fiddleford spoke up, “But the shack is two miles away! We’ll never make it in time!”

“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Bud smirked. “Follow me!” They ran to the old, abandoned car that Bud and Lee first played at the first day they spent together, and Buddy took out a rusty car key from his pocket, “Get in!” he yelled. Without thinking twice, the boys climbed in the car, with Bud in the driver’s seat.

“But you don’t have a license!” Ford reminded him.

Fiddleford rolled his eyes, “Remember what I told you about our laws?”

“Oh, right,” he chuckled. Buddy twisted the key in the ignition, and the car roared with life. “Step on it!” He ordered.

“Alright! Hang on!” Buddy hit the gas, and the car sped down the country road. The boys yelled in panic.

The police officers were parked in a dark alley in town working on a word find puzzle. They looked up to see four boys driving past them in an old car and screaming.

“Did you just see that?” Deputy Roy asked.

Sheriff Holt checked the speedometer, “They were going the speed limit,” he shrugged.

“Fair enough,” they continued with their puzzle as if nothing happened.

“Where are the kids?!” Grantie Mae demanded. “What did you do to them?”

Gideon chuckled, “Once your precious nephews are out of the way, it’ll just be you and me,” he smiled.

Mae played with the ring that was forced on her finger, wanting nothing more than to take it off and shove it down Gideon’s throat. She glared at him, “You’ll never get away with this. We have laws now since you last tried this, you little mutant!”

“In a town where people can marry woodpeckers? I don’t think so,” he chuckled. “But look at what we have here! Our very own weddin’ officiant! Licensed and everything,” he gestured towards Thompson Determined, who wasn’t looking very happy about this situation at all.

“I’m getting Tambry Valentino’s phone number after this, right?” He asked.

“Of course,” Gideon promised sweetly. He turned back to Mae. “After tonight, we’ll be together forever. Till’ death do us part,” he whispered. “Thompson, we’re ready to begin.”

Thompson began, “Tonight, we are here for the union of Gideon Charles Gleeful and Mabel Sophia Pines.”

“Just skip to the good stuff if you don’t mind,” Gideon interrupted.

“Gideon, will you take Mabel as your wife, to love and to hold for as long as you shall live?” Thompson asked.

“I do,” he smiled.

The temporary officiant turned to Mae, “And do you, Mabel, take Gideon Gleeful as your lawfully wedded husband?”

Mae hesitated to answer, “Come on, Mabel. You know you can’t say no,” Gideon pressured her. “You know what’s at risk.”

She took a deep breath, but before she could answer, Stanley slammed open the door to the gift shop, “I OBJECT THIS UNION!” He yelled.

“Kid,” Mae called out, “we’re in the living room.”

“Oh, okay!” They heard a door close, and Stanley, with the other boys, opened the living room door. “I OBJECT THIS UNION!” He repeated.

Gideon looked at the kids, seeming not at all shocked to see Buddy with them, “Hello Stanford, Stanley,” he smiled. “How long have you boys been livin’ in this town? A week, two? You like it here? Enjoy the scenery?” he asked casually.

Ford ignored him, “You leave our grantie alone!” he demanded.

The older man laughed, “Or else what?” he taunted. “You gonna nibble my ankles? Your aunt will be mine!” Gideon declared. “And there is nothing you can do about it!”

Thompson Determined ran out the door in fear, “Not good. Not good. Not good.”

“Grantie Mae was right about you! You are a monster!” Stanley yelled. He threw himself at Gideon and attacked him, and while he was distracted, Grantie Mae sucker-punched him in the face with the hand wearing the wedding ring. She threw it off and took something from Gideon.

“I believe that’s mine,” she smiled proudly.

“NO! GIVE ME THAT!” He yelled, clutching his nose. Grantie Mae put the item away in a pocket, and pushed him out the door, “I STILL HAVE EVIDENCE! I STILL KNOW YOUR SECRETS, AND I WILL EXPLOIT-”

She slammed the door in his face and locked it, “Kids, call the cops.”

A few minutes later, Grantie Mae and the boys were outside of the Mystery Shack, watching the police officers take Gideon Gleeful away.

“Grantie Mae?” Lee asked. “How long will he be in jail for?”

She sighed, “A few weeks at most, kiddo. It’s unbelievable what rich people can get away with these days… but I really want to thank you kids for saving me back there,” she smiled. “It really means a lot.”

“What was he talking about though?” Stanford asked. “About your secrets?”

“Just some blackmail from when we were younger,” she shrugged off. “Nothing you kids need to worry about,” Mae checked the time. “It’s getting late. I’m gonna drop Fiddleford home and explain everything to his father. You boys should get ready for bed.”

Buddy spoke up, “B-But what’s gonna happen to me, though? With my dad gone, where will I live?”

“I already got everything sorted out,” she explained. “The cleaning lady that works at the Tent of Telepathy said she would take you in until you find a better home. Look, there she is now!”

A car honked with the cleaning lady in the driver seat. Buddy was about to run in the car, but then he stopped to hug Stanley.

“Thank you for believing in me,” Bud smiled.

Stanley hugged him back, “No problem. See ya, Buddy!”

Buddy let go and ran back to the car, “Bye, Stanley! Bye, Stanford! Bye, Fiddleford!”

“BYE!” The other boys waved. The car drove away.

“Grantie Mae, I’m sorry for not listening to you,” Lee said softly. “I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”

“Are you kidding?” Mae laughed. “You made a new friend, and you put Gideon behind bars! To be honest, he has always been bothering me. He never stops sending me creepy letters. At least now he’ll leave me alone for a bit, but thanks for the apology,” she smiled sincerely. She hugged the boys, before leaving with Fidds. “Goodnight, kiddos. Be in bed by the time I get back.”

The twins waved bye, before yawning and heading inside, “Ford? Do you think Gideon will come back for us?”

“I doubt it,” he responded confidently. “I have my journal, don’t I? What could that washed-up old man possibly have that could compete with it?”

“Good point. Goodnight, Sixer.”

“Goodnight, Stan,” the lights turned off, and all seemed well.

In the moving police car, Gideon breathed heavily in anger while holding an open book in his lap, “Stanford and Stanley Pines, you don’t know what you’ve done! You boys made the biggest mistake of your lives! The entire Pines family will pay recompense for your transgressions!”

“Quiet, back there!” Sheriff Holt ordered. “And what’re you reading? A dictionary?”

Gideon laughed quietly, “I’ll have my marshmalla again soon. You’ll see, boys…” he closed a navy blue journal with two silver pine trees on the cover. “You’ll see…”

Chapter Text

It was a quiet day at the Mystery Shack. There weren’t that many tourists around, so the twins, Fidds, and Danny were lounging around. Ford was busy reading the journal while his twin was spinning around next to him on a globe. He was reading an interesting page about ghosts and spirits.

“Stanley, do you believe in ghosts?” he asked.

“I believe you’re a big nerd!” Stanley laughed. Stanford stopped the globe he was spinning on, causing him to fall off.

Grantie Mae came in from the front entrance, “Ria, Danny, kids!” She called out.

The boys and Ria stopped what they were doing to run up to her, “Yes, Ms. Pines?” Ria asked.

“I’m heading into town,” Mae said. “I need you guys to wash the bathrooms while I’m out, alright?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Maria nodded.

“Absolutely not,” Danny replied.

Grantie Mae laughed, “You kids stay out of trouble.”

Once she and Ria were gone, Danny spoke, “Hey guys! What’s this?” he unveiled a red curtain hanging from a wall, revealing a ladder. “A secret ladder to the roof?”

“Uh, I don’t think Ms. Pines would like that,” Fiddleford pointed out.

“Huh?” Danny asked Fidds slowly.

“Uhhhh…”

“Huuh?”

“You’re freaking me out, Dan!” Fidds yelled.

“Can we actually go up there?” Stanford asked excitedly.

Danny shrugged, “Sure we can! Roof time! Roof time!” he chanted.

“Roof time! Roof time! Roof time!” The twins chanted with him, following Danny up the ladder.

Fidds remained in the room, looking uneasy with his friends’ decision to break the rules, “Uhhhh…” he glanced out the window, seeing that Ms. Pines already left. His mind was made up, and he ran out of the room, “RIA?! You need help with those bathrooms?!”

Ford, Lee, and Danny made it to the top of the ladder and walked on the roof, until they found a spot with a lawn chair, an umbrella, a cooler, and a pile of pine cones, “This is my spot,” Danny gestured.

“You really hang out here?” Ford asked.

He shrugged, “I may or may not sneak up here all the time when I'm supposed to be working,” he threw one of the pine cones, and it hit a target placed on a totem pole. “Yes!”

“Cool!”

“Me first!”

The twins grabbed pine cones and followed Danny’s example, throwing them at the same target, but missing. Stanford threw one at a car by accident, making the car alarm go off. At first, he was scared, but then Danny cheered for him.

“Jackpot! High five,” he held up his hand. Was it just Ford, or was it getting warm out here? “... Don’t leave me hanging.”

Ford high fived Danny, but then they heard a car honking. Danny looked down and smiled, “Oh cool, my friends are here!”

The driver pulled up and waved his hand out the window, “Danny!” he called out.

Danny was about to join them, but then he turned back to the twins, “Hey, you guys aren’t gonna tell Mae about this, are you?”

Stanford zipped his lips in a silent motion. Dan smiled and copied him, “Later, dorks!” The teenager hopped on a nearby tree, slid down, and got into the car, where his friends cheered for him and drove away.

Ford was still smiling and waving, “Later, Danny!” he chuckled. “Good times…”

Stanley gave a mischievous and knowing smile, “Uh-oh!”

“What?”

Lee poked him playfully, with his smile never leaving his face, “Somebody’s in love!”

“Yeah, right!” Ford scoffed. “I just think Danny’s cool, okay? It’s not like I lie awake at night thinking about him!”

That night, Stanford was in bed wide awake with only one thing on his mind. His eyes widened further when he realized what this meant, “...Uh-oh.”

The next day, Stanford felt awkward being near Danny, despite how cool and chill he was around him and his twin. He stood on the sidelines while Lee and Dan threw a random rap battle for no reason.

"My name is Stanley!" Lee rapped. Ford recognized the lyrics from when he and Fiddleford were bored on that island. Guess he did write it down after all. "It rhymes with manly! It also rhymes with Danny!" Dan cheered the younger twin on by chanting his name and beat boxing. Stanley stood on the middle of the floor and motioned for Dan to back up. "NOW I'M GONNA BREAK IT DOWN!"

Ford watched his brother dance, first with a cabbage patch, then with a very poor attempt of a head spin. He almost didn't notice that Dan's attention turned to him. “Ford!” Danny called out. “Aren’t ya gonna get in on this?”

“I-I don’t really dance,” he tried to back away, but Stanley laughed.

“Yeah, you do!” Lee smiled and turned to Dan. “Our mom used to dress him up in a little lamb costume and make him do-”

Ford went beet red, “DON’T SAY IT!”

Lee whispered in Danny’s ear, “The Lamby Dance!”

“Stanley, I hate you in the nicest way possible.”

“Lamb costume?” Danny laughed. “Wow. Did it come with little ears and a tail?”

Ford blushed, “Well uh, uh…”

Stanley held up a picture of a younger Stanford with rosy cheeks dancing in a lamb costume, “Ford would prance around and sing a song about grazing.”

Stanford glared at him angrily. He was about to retaliate when Dan's phone alarm went off.

“Hey, look at that!” Danny exclaimed. “Quittin’ time! The gang’s waitin’ for me.”

He was about to leave when Ford stopped him, “Wait! Why don’t I-” he glanced at Stanley, “or we come with you?”

“Ooh…” Danny rubbed the back of his neck, unsure. “I don’t know. My friends are pretty intense. How old did you guys say you are?”

Lee was about to answer, but Ford covered his mouth, “We’re thirteen! So, technically, we’re teenagers.”

Danny smiled, “All right, you can come with,” he answered. “Just let me get my stuff and we’ll head out.”

After he left, Lee thought about what Ford said, “Since when are we thirteen? Did we time travel?”

“Come on, Stanley!” Ford exclaimed. “This is our chance to hang out with the cool kids. And Danny and whatever,” he added shyly.

Lee gasped, “I knew it! You love him!” Stanley danced around him mockingly. “Love love love love love love!”

“Look over there!” Ford pointed.

“Huh?” Stanley turned around, and Ford knocked him against his head. “Ow.”

When they got outside, Danny’s friends were playing some jelly bean throwing game. One of the teens tried to throw it in another’s belly button, but Danny beat them to it. The other teens cheered for him when they saw him, “Danny!”

“Danny! Danny!” One of them chanted.

“Hey, guys,” he smiled. He gestured to the twins. “These are some pals from work. They’re my boss’s great nephews, Stanford and Stanley.”

“I chewed my gum so it looks like a brain!” Lee opened his mouth to show them the wad of gum.

“He’s not one for first impressions,” Ford smiled. He held out his hand. “I'm Stanford Filbrick Pines. Nice to meet you,” he started feeling uncomfortable when no one shook his hand, so he hid them behind his back. “Okay…”

“So are you, like, babysitting or something?” One of the girls asked.

“Come on, Stacy,” Danny chuckled. He turned to the twins to introduce them to his friends. “Guys, these are Daryl and Ed,” he gestured to two boys that were laughing and noogying each other. “That’s Shandra,” he pointed to a girl with brown hair that was texting on her phone.

“Hey…” she said to the boys without looking up.

“Toby, who once ate a run-over waffle for 50 cents,” Danny continued, gesturing to a shorter boy with square glasses.

“Aw. Don’t tell them that!” Toby blushed in embarrassment.

“And this is Stacy Valentino,” he finished. He pointed to an emo-styled girl. She was wearing a black sweatshirt with a stitched heart on it.

Stanley recognized the last name, "Wait, Valentino?" he repeated. "Are you related to that news reporter lady?"

“Yeah, she's my mom," Stacy answered. "I’m also the gal that spray-painted the water tower,” she added proudly.

Ford smiled, “Oh, you mean the big muffin!”

“Um, it’s a giant explosion,” she corrected him.

Everyone looked up at the water tower, which gave a perfect view of Stacy’s spray painting from where they were standing. Ed chuckled, “It kinda does look like a muffin!” He and Daryl laughed.

If looks could kill, Ford would be dead by now with the death glare Stacy was giving him. He gulped nervously.

“Let’s hurry it up, guys. I got big plans for tonight!” Danny announced.

The other teens and Lee cheered and got in the car. Ford went over to the passenger seat only to find that Stacy had already beat him to it, “Sorry, kid. I’ll ride shotgun, alright?”

Ford sighed and opted to sitting in the back seat of the van with Lee. Toby, who was at the driver’s seat, made an announcement, “Guys, before we go, my mom said you're not allowed to punch the roof of the car anymore, so could you stop?"

The other teens ignored him and punched the roof of the car while chanting, “TOBY! TOBY! TOBY!” Toby sighed and drove away from the Mystery Shack.

Stanley looked at the interior of the car to see that there was writing on the doors. He took a marker from Stanford and wrote in ‘You Stink!’ on his door. “Ha! This is gonna blow someone’s mind!”

“Stanley, please!” Ford groaned

“What?” Lee asked. “Am I embarrassing you in front of your new BOYFRI-”

Ford slapped his hand over his brother's mouth, only to pull it away again, “You gotta stop licking my gloves, Lee.”

Back at the shack, Grantie Mae was looking around for her pig, Waddles, "Waddles?!" She called out. "WADDLES! Where is that darn pig?" Mae sighed. "Too bad the boys aren't home. They could help me-" An oink was heard from the kitchen, and Grantie Mae found the pink pig invading the decorated potato barrel. "There you are!"

The large pig squealed happily at the sight of his owner and jumped into the older woman's arms, "Eating out the stock pile again, I see," she rubbed his tummy affectionately. "You silly piggy."

Grantie Mae got out her knitting kit and sat in front of the TV with Waddles on her lap. She changed the channel to one of her favorite programs.

“You’re watching the black and white period piece old lady boring movie channel!” The TV announcer spoke. “Stay tuned for the Friday night movie, ‘The Duchess Approves’, starring Sturly Stembleburgiss as ‘The Duchess’ and Grampton St. Rumpterfrabble as irascible coxswain ‘Saunterblugget Hampterfuppinshire’!"

“Ooh, a classic!" Grantie Mae smiled excitedly as the movie began.

Just as the sky started to darken, Toby parked his van in front of an abandoned convenience store called “Dusk 2 Dawn”. The teenagers and Stanford and Stanley stood in front of the wired fence that surrounded the store.

“There it is, fellas! The condemned Dusk 2 Dawn!” Danny gestured.

The others looked at it in awe, while Ford spoke up, “Why’d they shut it down? Was it a health code violation, or-”

“Try MURDER!” Daryl said in a spooky voice to try to scare him.

Ed pointed at the store, “Some folks died in there, and the place has been haunted ever since!”

“This town has such a colorful history!” Stanley exclaimed happily.

Ford ignored his brother, “Wha… are you guys serious?”

“Yeah! We’re all gonna die!” Danny joked. He laughed. “Don't worry, man, it’s not as bad as it looks!”

He climbed and hopped over the fence, and the others followed him one by one, until it was Ford’s turn.

“Come on, Ford!” Danny yelled.

Ford was on the top of the fence, and he slowly tried to climb down to join them, “Okay! Okay! Just gotta get a foothold…”

“Dude, your brother did it!” Stacy yelled.

Stanley was, in fact, with the teens running on the ground sideways in a circle while yelling, “WOOP WOOP WOOP WOOP WOOP!”

Ed climbed up behind Ford, losing his patience, “Hey, you know what? Just…. There ya go,” he threw Stanford off the fence, and he fell screaming. “Ha! S-sorry kid!”

Daryl laughed and high fived Ed when he jumped down, “Good job throwing the kid off the fence, genius!”

“Your mom’s a genius…”

Stanford brushed himself off, slightly irritated by being shoved and being called a kid. He ignored this and followed the teenagers and Stanley to the window of the store. 

“Wow!” Danny exclaimed. “This place is amazing!”

It was dark, but to Ford, it didn’t look any more interesting than, well… a closed store. Stacy tried to open the door, but it was locked, “Let me try to open it,” Ford offered.

Stacy scoffed, “Oh yeah. I can’t get in, but I’m sure Junior here is gonna break it down like Hercules!”

“Come on,” Danny frowned. “Leave him alone, Stace. He’s just a little kid.”

Ford was upset to hear that his crush only saw him as a kid. In determination, he walked over to the dumpster at the side of the store, and he jumped on it to climb in the vents. He could hear their protests and Stanley's cheering as he kicked down the screen and climbed into the vent.

Shandra gasped, “Kid, what are you doing?”

“Hey, Ford!" Dan yelled. "Take it easy!”

“Go, Stanford!” Stanley cheered.

 Their voices disappeared as he crawled through the metal vents, looking for a way to get in the store. Stanford grabbed his emergency flashlight he kept in his back pocket and turned it on. After a moment of crawling and searching, he found an opening where he could jump off safely onto a store shelf. He hopped off the shelf and ran to the door, where Ford undid the lock and opened the front door from the inside. He held the door out with a smug look on his face and gestured everyone to come inside. Everyone cheered for him, high fiving him as each went inside.

“Good call inviting this little guy!” Ed smiled.

Daryl pointed to Ford, “Your new name is Dr. Funtimes!”

“Nice work!” Danny punched him lightly. Stanford smiled and blushed as he walked by. Once everyone was inside, he followed them in with a little skip in his step.

It was still dark in the store, but Ford kept his flashlight on to look around. The teens were joking around, asking where the ghosts and the dead bodies were. 

Danny found the light switch, “Hey, guys! You think this still works?” He flipped the switch on, and the lights came on, lighting up the store, much to everyone’s surprise.

“Why would they keep the electricity going in here?” Ford asked. No one seemed to listen to him, so he turned off his flashlight and put it up.

Danny cracked his knuckles, “Guys, it looks like we can do whatever we want!” The teens and the twins cheered, and they split to explore the store. They ran around, throwing food at each other, popping mints into soda bottles, making a mess, and they were having loads of fun. Stanley was having the time of his life, but then he found something else.

“Oh my gosh!” He gasped. He pointed to some strange foreign candy with signs on it, saying ‘DO NOT SELL’. “Smile Dip! I thought this stuff was banned in America!”

“Maybe they had a good reason,” Ford pointed out. He was about to warn Stanley not to eat the candy, but he was hit by a bag of food, and he ran off laughing.

Stanley opened a bag and stuck the candy stick in the Smile Dip. He glanced at the stick before deciding to just pour the entire package in his mouth.

Ford sat on a shelf next to Danny. They were both eating ice pops and watching everyone else have fun. When Danny wasn’t looking, Ford was blushing. He couldn’t believe that he was actually considered cool to his friends! And they named him Dr. Funtimes!

Danny laughed at something the others were making Toby do, “Stanford, this night is legendary!”

“Really?” Ford asked.

“Just look around. the guys are bonding, I’ve never seen Shandra look up from her phone this long, even Stacy is having fun! And your brother seems to be going nuts with that Smile Dip.”

Ford looked around to see that he was right. He looked over at Stanley. His face was covered in the illegal candy, and, to Ford’s mild concern, he was chewing on air after talking to himself. Ford was sure he had too much of it.

“You know, Ford,” Danny started, “I wasn’t sure if you could hang out with our crew at first, but you’re surprisingly mature for your age.”

Ford was sure that he could scream in joy at that moment, but instead, he kept a straight face and nodded, “Yes, yes I am.” He smeared his ice cream on the side of his face.

“Hey, guys!” Ed called out. He was shoving a bag of ice into Toby’s pants. “We need more ice!”

“I’m on it!” Ford jumped off the shelf and walked over to the ice freezer. He grabbed a bag of ice, only to drop it on the floor in fear when he saw a floating brain with tentacles and eyeballs inside the freezer. “AAH!” He closed the door and took deep breathes. Once his breathing was back to normal, he slowly opened the door again, only to see that the monster was not there.

“What was that?” Ed asked. “I thought I heard some lady screaming back here.”

“You freakin’ out, kid?” Daryl asked. The other teens walked up to where Ford was.

“Uh, no. I’m fine. Everything’s just fine,” Ford tried to brush off.

Stacy pointed to the spilled ice on the floor, “Then what’s all this about?”

“That’s uh, um uh…” Ford looked around, trying to come up with an explanation or a diversion. He pointed at a video game console. “Hey, look! Dancy Pants Revolution! The game that tricks people into exercising!”

The diversion worked, and the teenagers ran over to play it. Stanford chuckled uneasily, “Yeah, let’s all- let’s go play that…” He glanced back at the empty freezer before joining them.

Toby went up to play first, and the other teens cheered him on, “Wow. He’s really bad at this,” Danny commented.

Ford chuckled in agreement, still unnerved by the brain monster from the freezer. He glanced at the glass door, where he could see the reflections of himself, Danny, Stacy, Shandra, and Toby. For a second, he thought that he saw that their skin was gone and replaced with bones. Ford rubbed his eyes and looked at the glass door again, seeing that their reflections were back to normal.

“I’ll be right back,” he said quickly. Stanford ran off to the telephone located at the other side of the store and called his grantie’s number. The phone rang, but no one was answering. “Come on, Grantie Mae, pick up! Ugh, what is she doing?”

Grantie Mae was, in fact, in the living room knitting and eating ice cream while watching “The Duchess Approves”. Waddles had moved from her lap to curl up on the floor next to the chair.

"I don't care about Dukes, or Commoners, or his Royal Highness Lionel of Cornwall! I'm not afraid anymore, Mother!"  A young woman in the movie spoke.

"Duchess, I forbid you,"  the mother said.

"I may be a duchess, but I'm also a woman!" She removed her hat and allowed her long hair to flow in the wind.

“Yes! Yes! In your face, Elizabeth!” Mae laughed, not hearing the phone ringing in the other room. “It’s just like my life… in a way….”

Ford gave up trying to call her and hung up. He tried his next plan, which was to talk to Stanley about it. He was sitting on the floor in front of the Smile Dip candy, “Stanley, I need your advice. We’re hanging out in a haunted convenience store, I can’t get a hold of Grantie Mae, and if I say anything about it to any of these guys, they’ll just think I’m a scared little kid! What do I do?!”

Lee made a gurgling noise, which caused Ford to take a closer look at him. Stanley had Smile Dip all over his face and clothes. His eyes were dilated to the point where he didn’t look healthy.

“Stanley?” he asked, concern.

Stanley mumbled something incoherent, but Ford could make out, “Onward Aoshima…”

He held his brother tightly, but the younger twin swayed with his head limped on one side in his grasp, “Stan, how many of these did you eat?!”

“Beleven… teen…” he mumbled.

“Oh no!” Ford dropped him and started freaking out. “Oh no, oh no, oh no!”

To make matters worse, Stacy found something by the register, “Whoa, guys, you might wanna see this!” Ford left his twin behind and joined the teens. They gathered around the tape markings of two bodies. Stanford gulped.

“Then the rumors were true!” Ed gasped.

“Ed, I dare you to lie down in it,” Stacy smirked.

“Good idea,” Ed smiled. He turned to Daryl. “Go lie down in it!”

Daryl laughed, “Oh, look! I’m a dead body!” he was about to sit down in the markings when Ford stopped him.

“Wait! Maybe that's not a good idea…”

Ed chuckled, “Looks like somebody’s scared,” he teased.

“I am not!” Ford retorted. “It’s very disrespectful to disrupt the dead, and… I mean, what if this place really is… haunted?” he finished shyly.

The teens booed at him, and Stacy called him, “Captain Buzzkill”.

“I thought I was Dr. Funtimes,” he spoke softly.

“Well, you’re acting like Captain Buzzkill! Right?” Stacy asked the other teens. They all nodded their heads in agreement.

Ford turned to Danny, who was rubbing his hand at the back of his neck, “Yeah, little bit,” he agreed.

“I’m blogging this,” Shandra said. “Trapped in store with scared 9-year-old.”

“I’m not nine!” Ford yelled. “I’m thirteen! Technically a teenager!”

“Then go ahead,” Daryl gestured to the tape markings. “Go sit in it.”

Stanford huffed, “Fine. I will.”

The teens chanted, “Stanford! Stanford! Stanford!”

Every part of Ford was telling him not to do this, but he didn’t want to look like a scared, little kid to the teenagers. Especially not Danny. He took a deep breath, and with a look of determination, he sat and laid down in the tape markings. When he did, the markings lit up around him, and the store lights went out. Before anyone could ask what was happening, Shandra dissolved into nothing.

“Shandra!” Stacy yelled. She picked up her phone and read it. “It’s just screaming,” she gasped.

The teens and Ford looked around to see where she went. They heard someone from above banging on glass, and they looked up to see that Shandra was trapped on the security camera screen. She screamed and continued to bang her fists against it. Everyone screamed.

“Shandra! Shandra!” Danny called out for her. “Can you hear us?”

She only looked around in confusion.

“What are we supposed to do?” Daryl asked, grabbing Ed.

“I don’t know, Daryl! I don’t know!” Ed yelled frantically.

Stacy grabbed Danny’s shoulder, “Let’s just go already!”

“Wait!” Danny stopped her. “Not without Toby! Toby!” He called out. "TOBY!"

Toby was still playing the Dancy Pants Revolution game, seeming to have no idea of what was happening around him. “Wait! I’ve almost got the high score!” He said, just before he dissolved, just like Shandra had. Toby reappeared inside of the game and looked around the screen in confusion. “Huh? What?” The game activated, and arrows moved down the screen, hitting Toby, “No! So many arrows!” He screamed. Toby curled into a ball and cried while the arrows kept hitting him.

“TOBY!” Danny yelled.

Stacy grabbed his hand, “Forget them! Let’s go!”

Without further protest, they ran to the door, but it closed shut before they could leave. “What the…” Danny tried to open it, but couldn’t. “Guys… It’s locked!”

“OUTTA MY WAY!” Stacy pushed through Daryl, Ed, Danny, and Stanford to get to the cash register. They ducked so she could throw it to try to break the glass. The cash register dissolved before it could reach the door, and green light from nowhere began attacking Stacy. She ran from it in fear.

Ford thought about the journal, and he remembered some of what he read from the other day about ghosts, “Everybody, wait!” He shouted. He caught their attention. "Whatever’s doing this has to have some kind of reason for it!” Stanford, luckily, had his journal with him, but he felt uneasy opening it in front of so many people, so he kept it in his jacket. “Maybe if we can figure out what it is, they’ll let us out of here!”

“Uh-huh, they’ll let us out of here. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense!” Stacy yelled sarcastically.

“I don’t know, guys. Maybe Ford’s got a point,” Danny agreed.

Ed rolled his eyes, “Yeah right. I’m sure the ghost just wants to talk about his feelings!” he joked sarcastically. He dissolved into the air and reappeared inside the cover of a nearby cereal box.

The toucan on the cereal box came to life and laughed, “I’m bonkers for eating you alive!” It held up a spoon and stabbed Ed with it.

“ED!” Daryl screamed. He turned to Ford. “Okay, okay, fine. I’m with you, kid! All the way!”

Ford turned to see Stanley. A strong, green aura surrounded him as he levitated in the air. He was being possessed by the ghost. To confirm Ford’s thoughts, the ghost spoke through Stanley in a deep voice, “Welcome.”

The remaining teenagers and Ford screamed in fear, “THEY GOT STANLEY!”

“Welcome to your graves, young trespassers,” the ghost announced.

“We’re very sorry for hanging out in your store!” Danny apologized.

“Yeah!” Ford added. “Can we just go now and leave forever?”

Much to their surprise, the ghost allowed this, “Well… okay. You’re free to go,” the doors opened on their own. “But before you leave, hot dogs are now half off. I know it might be crazy, but you gotta try these dogs!”

Ford looked at the ghost possessing Stanley in disbelief. Not to mention, how long has this store been closed for, exactly? Ten, maybe twenty years? There was no guarantee that those hot dogs were any good. Daryl and Stacy, on the other hand, didn’t waste time to think about it. The two of them ran for the front door screaming, before the doors shut again before they could leave.

“Just kidding about the hot dog sale,” the ghost said.

Daryl punched the door, “Just give us our friends back and let us out of here already!” he demanded.

“I don’t like your tone!” The ghost dissolved Daryl. He reappeared as a hot dog on a rolling stove.

“NO! I’M A HOT DOG!”

“It begins,” the ghost declared. “Welcome to your home for all eternity!” Everything in the store floated to the ceiling, including Danny, Ford, and Stacy.

“Ford, what do we do?” Danny asked.

Stanford looked ahead, where he saw a shelf board flying at them, “DUCK!”

The boys ducked in time to avoid it, but Stacy wasn’t so lucky. She got hit and landed in a pile of rubble, where she fell unconscious. Danny pointed to the tripped over ice machine, “Quick! In there!” They ran to it and hid behind it for cover. “What do they want from us?” he asked.

“Revenge, I guess?”

“But revenge for what? What did we do wrong?”

Ford took a deep breath, “Okay, let’s try to figure out the pattern here,” he thought reasonably. “Why was each person taken? Shandra was on her phone, Toby was playing a video game, Ed and Stacy were being sarcastic, and Daryl was talking back.”

“Yeah! I mean, those are all just normal teenage things!”

Stanford’s eyes widened in thought, “Wait, say that last part again.”

“Normal teenage things?”

“Of course!” He exclaimed. “Stay here until I get back!” Ford crawled away from behind the freezer and approached the ghost.

“Dude, what are you doing?!”

Ford ignored Danny, and he spoke out, “Hey, ghost!” The ghost possessing Stanley made him twist his head around to face Ford. “I’ve got something to tell you! I’m not a teenager!” He admitted.

Everything that was floating dropped on the ceiling, and the ghosts appeared. There were two of them, one man and one woman, and they looked like they were an older married couple. Their name tags on their clothing read “Ma” and “Pa”. Pa was holding Stanley by his hair, who just blinked up at them in confusion.

“Hohoho! Well, why didn’t you say so?” Pa asked in a much kinder and friendlier voice. He dropped Stanley into a pile of candy, causing him to groan. “How old did you say you were?”

“I’m…” Ford looked back at Danny and reluctantly answered honestly. “I’m twelve. Technically not a teenager.”

Ma spoke up, “When we were alive, teenagers were a scourge on our store!”

“Always sassafrassin’ customers with their… boomy boxes and disrespectful short pants!” Pa explained. “So we decided to up and ban them! But they retaliated with this new fangled rap music.”

Ma continued, “The lyrics, they were so… hateful! It was so shocking, we were stricken down with double heart attacks!” She smiled brightly and finished, “And that’s why we hate teenagers so much! Don’t we, honey?” She turned to her husband, and they nuzzled. It was almost disgusting, but Ford thought better than to mention anything about it.

“But they’re my friends,” Ford explained. “Isn’t there anything I can do to help them?”

The deceased couple held hands, and Pa turned to Stanford, “There is one thing,” he mentioned. “Do you know any funny little dances?”

Ford blushed in embarrassment, “Well, I do know…” he sighed, “the Lamby Lamby Dance. Bu-but,” he smiled, “I can’t really do it without a lamb costume!” He closed his eyes and folded his arms happily. Pa snapped his fingers, and Ford found himself wearing a lamb costume. “Oh, well… there it is…” he took a deep breath and started singing the song.

Pa, at the very least, enjoyed it. Ford glanced at Danny, who had the biggest crap-eating grin on his face at Stanford’s humiliating moment. Once Ford was done, Pa clapped, “That was some fine girly dancin’, boy! Your friends are free.”

Ford was no longer wearing the lamb costume, but was back to wearing his regular clothes, including his gloves and jacket, “Well, I don’t think you have to worry about us coming back, so…”

Before Ford could finish, the ghosts disappeared. Along with this, everything and everyone in the store fell back on the floor from the ceiling, and the teenagers are all back to normal and freed.

Stanley groaned on the ground, “I’m never gonna eat or do anything ever again.”

Stanford pointed to a package on the ground, “Hey, look! There’s still some left!”

Lee stood up to knock the Smile Dip out of his hand, “EVIL!”

Ed stood back up and looked at Danny, “What happened after everything went crazy?” The other teens gathered around Danny, wondering the same thing.

“You are never going to believe this!” He exclaimed, laughing. “The ghosts showed up, and Stanford had to-” Danny glanced at the boy, noticing the embarrassed look on his face. Danny cleared his throat. “And, uh, Ford just started beating ghosts down left and right!” The teens sounded impressed. “And the ghosts got all scared and ran away like a couple of little girls. It was insane!”

“Alright!” Daryl cheered. “Dr. Funtimes!”

The other teenagers congratulated Ford for his heroic deed. When they weren’t looking, Danny looked at Ford and zipped his lips. Ford copied him.

Not that long later, everyone piled into the van. Stacy, Shandra, Daryl, and Ed were fast asleep in their seats, tired out from the scare. Toby was still awake, but only because he still had to drive everyone home.

“That was pretty crazy,” Ford commented to Danny.

“Yeah, it was,” Dan agreed. “Probably scarred for life now. Hey, how about next time we hang out, let’s stay at the Mystery Shack. Okay?”

“Yeah… next time,” Ford got into the car and sat in the back with Stanley, who was beginning to recover after the combination of eating illegal candy and the possession.

Stanley groaned and squinted at the writing on the door he made earlier, “What kind of sick joke is this?”

After the twins were dropped off, they weren’t expecting to walk in on Grantie Mae throwing the TV out the window, nearly hitting them. She stuck her head out of the now broken window to see the boys, “Uh, I can explain.”

Later that night, after a sincere apology from Mae for almost crushing them with a television set, the boys got settled in bed. Ford was pretty happy with himself with how things turned out, while Lee was still suffering from a massive headache. At the very least, Grantie Mae gave him some medicine to dull the pain.

"Lee?" Ford spoke from the top bunk of their bed.

"Yeah?"

"...You were right about me crushing on Danny," he admitted.

Even through the pain, Stanley managed to chuckle, "I knew it."

"Should I tell Grantie Mae?"

Lee turned his head even though he couldn't see his brother from the lower bunk, "You mean about you liking Dan or liking boys in general?"

"I-I don't know... both I guess?" Ford blushed.

"I'm sure you'll be fine. She's really nice. Grantie Mae will be happy for you," Lee said confidently. He threw his sheets over his head to go to sleep.

"Okay," Ford nodded. "I'll tell her tomorrow then. Goodnight, Stanley."

"Goodnight, Stanford..."

Chapter Text

The boys were woken up by their grantie, "Good morning, boys," she smiled. "Rise and shine!"

Stanley covered his whole body in his blanket in an attempt to block out the noise. Stanford groggily put his glasses on and glanced at the time. When he saw how early it was, he groaned, "Grantie Mae, it's seven in the morning!"

Mae huffed and opened the window in the boy's bedroom, letting the sun's bright rays peek in, "Come on, now! I want you both dressed and ready to go in fifteen minutes. Don't you want to go out for breakfast today?"

The boys gasped, and Stanley came out of his blanket cocoon, "Is there a UHIP in town?!" He asked excitedly.

"Nope," Grantie Mae shook her head, "but we're going somewhere better! Now get around, you're burnin' daylight!" Mae left the room and closed the door behind her to give the boys privacy.

Once she was out of earshot, Ford grudgingly got out of bed as well, "Hey, Ford?" Lee asked. "Are you gonna do it today?"

Ford didn't need to ask what his twin was talking about. After the night before, with the convenience store, the twins had discussed Ford telling his grantie something important, "Yeah," Stanford nodded. "I'll do it when we go out to eat."

Later, the boys finished getting ready, and Grantie Mae drove them into town, where she stopped at a local restaurant called "Greasy's Diner". In there, they said 'hello' to Crazy Chiu, Sheriff Holt, Deputy Roy, Tough Girl Dee, and the guy that keeps rooting for people, whom they learned was named Gorney. They were sitting at a table and getting ready to order when Stanford gathered up his courage to speak, “U-um, Grantie Mae?”

“Yeah, kiddo?” She asked.

“U-uh, there’s something I, well… I probably should have told you sooner, but,” Ford stammered, “I… I’m...”

Stanley and Mae looked at him. Stanley looked like he was losing his patience, but Mae nodded in understanding, “Yes, dear? Ford, whatever it is, you can tell me.”

Ford spoke softly, “Remember when I got to hang out with Danny and his friends yesterday?”

Mae nodded, but Stanley didn’t look too sure, “I remember riding a rainbow dolphin pirate creature...” he mentioned. Once he caught on, Lee gasped. “Wait! I know what you’re gonna say!” He turned to Mae, “Grantie Mae! Stanford’s-” A high-pitched squeal left his lips when Ford kicked him under the table.

“-Coming out of the closet,” Ford finished quietly. He sighed. “I told Stanley about it before coming here for the summer, but I wasn’t too sure of it yet,” he explained. “Then I met Danny Corduroy, and after I spent some time hanging out with him, I realized that I am,” he admitted, blushing a little and looking a little ashamed.

Grantie Mae rested a hand on Ford’s shoulder, “Hey, kiddo, it’s alright. What, did you think I would get mad?” She asked, chuckling.

Ford shrugged and spoke quickly, “I wasn’t sure. I mean, statistically speaking, a small town like this would most likely have a demographic of the majority-”

“Whoa!” Lee stopped him. “Slow down, Einstein.”

Stanford took a deep breath and let it out slowly, “I thought you might get a little mad,” he simplified.

Mae chuckled, “Sweetie, I’m not mad! If anything, I’m proud of you for telling me. That was very brave of you,” she smiled. “You know what? We’re having victory pancakes to celebrate!”

“YAY!” The twins cheered. The waitress came up to them with a pen and a yellow-lined notebook. The name tag she wore said “Grenda” on it.

“Welcome to Greasy’s Diner! What would you like?” The voice threw Stanford off and caused him to jump in his seat a bit. It was far too deep to naturally belong to a woman.

Grantie Mae seemed unfazed by this and looked through the menu, “Hey, Growling Grenda! Well, I was going to get my great nephews some victory pancakes, but it’s a bit more expensive than I thought,” she said uneasily.

“Victory pancakes? What’s the occasion?” She asked.

Mae looked over to Ford, as if to silently ask permission to tell. Ford nodded shyly, and Grantie Mae smiled and spoke loud enough for the whole diner to hear, “Well, my little Stanford over here came out to me just now,” she exclaimed proudly. “In fact, as soon as we’re done here, I’m gonna knit this boy a rainbow sweater!”

Stanford didn’t know what to expect, but then everyone in the diner laughed, “I knew there was something unnatural about that boy!” Sheriff Holt laughed. Ford blushed and hid under the table in shame.

Growling Grenda snarled at the policeman, “LEAVE. THE BOY. ALONE!” The entire room went silent. “You people should be ashamed of yourselves!”

“It ain’t my fault he’s a man-lovin’ wimp!” Deputy Roy added.

Ford spoke up, “I’m not a wimp!” The cops and some other people in the restaurant laughed.

“No offence, Ford,” Lee spoke, “but you kind of are.”

“No, I’m not!”

“Then prove it, boy lover,” the sheriff dared. He pointed to a game at the back wall of the diner. “Beat the manliness tester.”

Stanford glared at the cop and huffed in determination, “Fine. I’ll do it.”

“Honey,” he turned to Grantie Mae. She grabbed his hand, “you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

“I do want to,” he nodded. “Besides, if I beat it, I can get us free pancakes!”

Mae sighed, “Alright, Fordzy. Just remember that winning or losing the game doesn’t prove anything.”

Ford ignored her and went up to the manliness tester, “Alright, Ford,” he spoke out loud to himself. “Time to manhandle this… man handle…” he didn’t understand why some people were chuckling after he said that, but he took a big breath and tugged on the handle at hard as he could. It landed on ‘wimp’, and a card came out of the machine that read, ‘You are a cutie patootie!’.

“Outta my way!” Tough Girl Dee pushed Ford aside to try the game.

“I-It’s probably broken,” Ford warned her.

Tough Girl Dee ignored him, cracked her knuckles, and, with minimal effort, she made the machine automatically go to ‘Manly Man’. The game exploded, and it rained pancakes in the cafe, giving everyone a free breakfast, “Yes! Pancakes for everyone!” She yelled.

"GET 'EM! GET 'EM!" Gorney exclaimed. He tried to grab as many pancakes as possible.

The people in the restaurant applauded for Tough Girl Dee, while Ford sighed. A pancake landed on his head, and the cops pointed and laughed at him. He sat back down at the table next to Grantie Mae, who was ready to give him a strong side hug, “Don’t let them get to you, sweetie,” she said softly.

“Yeah, it doesn’t matter much anyway,” Stanley brushed off. “I mean, you do have your brains to make up for your lack of... what's the word?”

"Bronze?" Ford finished.

Lee shook his head, "I don't think that's right... OH! PUNCHES!"

Ford rolled his eyes and sighed, “It's not fair. I don’t even have chest hair. See?” He pulled his shirt down to reveal his chest. It was shining very brightly.

“Put it away! Put it away!”

“So smooth! My eyes!”

He covered his chest again, “See what I mean?”

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Mae shrugged off. “You still have plenty of growing to do, and who knows? Maybe you’re just a late bloomer!”

“A late bloomer?!” Ford shouted. He slammed his hands on the table in anger. “I’ll show you,” he pointed to everyone else in the diner. “I’ll show you all!” He ran to the exit, tripped over a beaver, and left, slamming the door shut behind him.

“Poor kid,” Mae sighed. She turned to Lee. “Is he always like this?”

Lee shrugged, “I guess he’s just jealous that I’m the tough one. He won’t be gone long, you’ll see,” he smiled confidently. “Are you still gonna make Ford that sweater?”

She dug into her pancakes with a knife and fork, “Of course, sweetie!”

“Grantie Mae?”

“Yes?”

“Do you have any friends?”

Mae paused to look at him, “That's an odd question. Now why would you ask that?”

“I dunno. I just never see you around any other old people.”

“Well,” Mae huffed, “I’ll have you know that I do have friends. I just don’t have any in my age group is all.”

“Why not?” Lee asked innocently.

“I just don’t, alright?” She crossed her arms. “End of discussion.”

“Beginning of discussion!” Lee retorted. “Grantie Mae, we’re going to get you an old lady friend!”

She sighed, “Why, again?”

“Because nothing is stronger than the power of-”

“Friendship?”

“Stanley. To VICTORY!” Lee cheered.

Meanwhile, Ford was walking down the street, feeling sad about the police officers humiliating him, “It’s not fair,” he mumbled. “Just because I like guys doesn’t mean I can’t be a man.”

It didn't help that he saw two of Danny's friends, Ed and Daryl, running around a broken fire hydrant with their shirts off nearby. He wasn’t paying attention to where he was going, and he accidentally bumped into a woman dressed in a scout uniform.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she apologized. The woman held up a letter. “I was looking for the mailman.”

“Oh, what? Are you saying I’m not a ‘male man’? Is that what you’re trying to say?” Ford asked angrily, completely misinterpreting what she was saying. “I’m not male? I’m not a man? Is that-” he sniffled, “is that what you’re telling me?”

“Are you crying?”

Ford tried not to cry, but he felt the tears coming. Ashamed by this, he ran away, until he stopped deep within the woods. It took a while for him to calm down, and when he did, he took another look at his chest, still as hairless as ever. He sighed, “What am I going to do?” His stomach grumbled, and Ford remembered that he hadn’t eaten breakfast yet, so he pulled out a bag of beef jerky from the pocket in his jacket. On the bag, it read, ‘You’re inadequate’. Ford sighed again, “You aren’t the first to tell me that, bag of beef jerky. I need help.”

The ground beneath him began to shake. At first, Ford thought it was an earthquake, but then he heard a loud roar following it. A vast array of animals, including several pixies and gnomes, were either flying or running away in the same direction. Ford ducked in fear, and a tree fell dangerously close to him. He looked in front of him to see a silhouette of a large creature. He screamed, “PLEASE DON’T EAT ME!” He yelled. “I haven’t showered! In like a week! And, I don’t have a lot of muscle. I’m mostly elbows!”

“YOU…!” The terrifying creature began. Ford let out another small scream. “...Gonna finish that?”

“What?” Ford asked. He looked to see that the creature was pointing at Ford’s bag of beef jerky. He was, in fact, planning to eat it, but after the scare, he lost his appetite. “Not anymore, I guess,” he tossed the bag to the creature, and the beast began eating. Now that the fear was out of the way, Ford took a closer look to examine the strange, talking creature. “Interesting,” he mused out loud. “Half bull, half human. What are you exactly? A Minotaur?”

“I’m a manotaur!” He exclaimed. “Half man! Half… uh… half taur!”

Ford took out a spare paper and pen to write this down. He wondered if there was a page on this in the journal, but unfortunately, he left it at home. “Do you have a name?” he asked. “Did I summon you?”

“My people call me Chutzpar, and I was summoned by the smell of jerky!” The manotaur responded. “JERKY!” He punched a tree and smashed a rock against his head, laughing and roaring loudly. He stopped and sniffed the air. “I smell… emotional issues!”

“That would be me,” Stanford confessed. “I have man-related problems, Chutzpar.” The manotaur sat down on a log next to them and patted his leg. Ford took advantage of his non-verbal offer and rested his head on his leg. “Well, these police officers were calling me a wimp…”

“Uh-huh, uh-huh,” Chutzpar nodded.

“And I kind of failed a manliness tester game…”

“Mm.”

“Do you think you can help me?” Ford asked. “You seem like a kind of guy that can give me pointers.”

Chutzpar nodded, “Very well,” he stood up and leaned over. “Climb atop my back hair, child!”

“Uh… okay,” Ford did as he was told, but the moment he did, he regretted it. The manotaur laughed loudly and ran as fast as he could, even when he crashed into trees and jumped over a gorge. Ford screamed the whole way there, until Chutzpar crashed through the side of a mountain. Only when Ford was sure he stopped did he open his eyes. “Whoa…” he gasped. Chutzpar had brought him to a cave full of manotaurs. “This place is amazing!”

“The gnomes live in trees, and the merpeople live in the water,” Chutzpar explained, “because they’re losers! But we manotaurs, crash in the MAN CAVE!” He picked up a gong nearby and rang it, gaining the attention of all the other manotaurs in the cave. “BEASTS! I have brought you, a hairless child!”

He pushed Ford forward, “...Greetings,” he waved. He wasn’t too sure if that was the best way to introduce himself, so he stood still and stayed quiet.

Chutzpar gestured to the other manotaurs, “You already know me as Chutzpar. This is, uh, Pubetor, Testosteror, and Pituitor,” the other manotaurs grunted as they were each introduced. “And you are?”

“My name’s Ford,” he answered. The manotaurs booed at him, as if they were expecting more. “Ford the, uh… Fearless?” The beasts seemed to tolerate that name, and Ford let out a silent sigh of relief.

Chutzpar banged the gong again, “Ford the Fearless wants us to teach him the secrets to our manliness.”

“I really need your help!” Stanford pleaded sincerely. He pulled his shirt down to reveal his hairless chest. “Look at this, guys! Look at this!”

The manotaurs considered his request, “I must confer with the High Council,” one of them said, then huddled with several other manotaurs.

While they were deciding, a thought came to Ford, “Wait,” he turned to Chutzpar. “If you’re all men, then how do you reproduce?”

Chutzpar definitely heard the question, if the look on his face was anything to go by. It was left unanswered, though, since the High Council members broke out into a fist fight.

“I like these guys,” Stanford decided.

Back at The Mystery Shack, Grantie Mae was gardening in the back yard. Stanley went up to her wearing his striped shirt and overalls. He took a camera out of his pocket and snapped a picture of her. Grantie Mae blinked at Lee, surprised, then chuckled, “What’cha doing now, Stan?”

“I never miss a photo album-tunity!” he exclaimed. When the picture came out, he slid it in a blank slot in a photo album book. He set the camera and the book aside and sat down on the dirt. “Ria agreed to help us. She’s going to pretend to be an old lady, and you’ll introduce yourself to her and be friends!” Lee smiled.

Ria came outside wearing older-styled clothing and a wig, “Whenever you’re ready, Ms. Pines.”

Fiddleford was watching the whole thing nearby, even though he didn’t have to work today. Mae didn’t question it though, “Alright,” she got up and approached Ria. “Hello, stranger I have never seen before. My name is Mabel. Um, can I pet your cats?”

“Cut!” Stanley yelled. “Grantie Mae, you don’t know her yet! Ask for her name first!”

Mae sighed, “Okay,” she turned back to Ria. “Hey, there, miss! My, you don’t look a day over fifty. What’s your name?”

Stanley stopped them again, “That was perfect!” he exclaimed. “Now you have to invite her to go somewhere.”

“Like where?”

“How about church?” Fidds asked. “My grandma always makes me and Dad go every week.”

Grantie Mae chuckled, “Maybe I would if I weren’t Jewish, Fiddleford, but thank you for the suggestion.”

“Wait, you’re Jewish?”

“Take three!” Stanley yelled again. “We’re not stopping until it’s perfect!”

Back at the man cave where Ford was, the High Council finally stopped fighting, and one of them approached Ford, “After a lot of punching, we have decided to deny your request to learn our manly secrets.”

“Denied!” Another manotaur repeated and punched himself in the face.

Ford narrowed his eyes. They might have the bronze, but he had the brain, “Denied? Okay, that’s fine,” he shrugged. “Obviously, you must think it would be too difficult to train me,” he faked a gasp. “Maybe, you’re not man enough to try.”

“Not MAN enough?!” One of them yelled.

Chutzpar looked over to Ford, “Fearless…” he said in a warning tone.

The angry manotaur stomped forward to Stanford, “NOT MAN ENOUGH?!” he repeated.

“He didn’t mean it,” Chutzpar tried to defend him, but the angry manotaur ignored him.

“I have three Y chromosomes, six adam’s apples, pecs on my abs, and FISTS FOR NIPPLES!” He yelled.

“Oh, yeah?” Ford retorted. He pulled off his glove, revealing his abnormal condition. “Well, I have six fingers on each hand!” Ford slipped the glove back on and folded his arms. “Seems to me you’re too scared to teach me how to be a man.”

“That’s nonsense.”

“I beg to differ. Wait a second, do any of you hear that?” he asked. “It sounds like… bock-bock. Bock. Oh, isn’t that strange- Bocock, bocAW! Is that?- BACAWK! That sounds like- BACAW! A bunch of chickens!”

The manotaurs gasped, and they huddled again. With their pride torn, they were reconsidering. One of them turned back to Ford, “After a second round of deliberation, we have decided to help you become a man!”

“MAN! MAN! MAN!” The other manotaurs chanted.

“That’s great news,” Ford smiled. “So where do we begin?”

The manotaurs led him to a hole in the ground. Near it was a sign that read, 'Pain Hole'. “Being a man is about conquering your fears,” Chutzpar explained. “Since you call yourself Ford the Fearless, I assume this won’t be too difficult for you.”

“For your first test,” another spoke, “you must plunge your fist INTO THE PAIN HOLE!” The other manotaurs winced at the mention of it.

“The what..?”

A manotaur walked up to the hole to put his fist in it, “Pain hole, schmainhole,” he scoffed. Less than a second later, he screamed painfully, clutching his hand and running away in tears.

Ford gulped, “Are you sure this is really necessary?”

“You want to be a man, don’t you?” Chutzpar asked. The other manotaurs continued chanted behind him.

Stanford took a deep breath, removed his glove, and plunged his hand into the hole, “AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!”

The screams were so loud, that if Stanley and Grantie Mae were paying attention, they would have heard it. Fidds, however, caught the distant sound, but he shrugged it off.

“Now we have to find out who you can hang out with,” Lee smiled. He turned to Fidds, “Do you know anyone?”

He thought about it for a bit, and he smiled, “There’s always Crazy Chui!”

Mae laughed in a strange way, “Yeah, okay. Anyone else?”

“Why not Crazy Chui?" Stanley asked. "Is it because she’s crazy? You’re crazy, too!” He pointed out. “Just in a fun way!”

She sighed, “She’s not exactly the best influence for you kids.”

“Point taken,” Fidds agreed. “I can’t think of any other old ladies in town though…”

Now it was Lee’s turn to sigh, “This is going to take a while…”

Forty-eight tasks later, and Ford was really starting to enjoy spending time with the manotaurs. He has never felt this level of confidence before. Not even when he was about to ace his algebra final right before school ended. He and the manotaurs were taking a break from the manliness tests in a hot spring. It felt very relaxing.

“You know, fellas,” Ford spoke smoothly, “I just gotta say… these last few hours have been very life changing for me. You took me under my wing when you didn’t have to, and I am really beginning to see the results. I can feel that there’s been some growth, not only for myself, but also between us. You’ve all been so supportive.”

“Oh, stop,” Chutzpar smiled, obviously flattered by Ford’s compliments.

“You know what,” Ford spoke up. “You really have been. Thanks to you all, I think I feel like I’m finally becoming a man!”

Chutzpar grew serious, “Not yet, Fearless. One final task remains. The deadliness trial of all.”

Stanford clenched his fist and spoke with confidence, “I’ve survived the other forty-nine trials. Whatever it is, I can take it!”

The manotaurs cheered. Later, Ford was taken back to the cave, where Chutzpar prepared him by giving Ford fake tattoos across his body. Wearing nothing but a loincloth, he approached Chutzpar. Several manotaurs played the drums behind him for dramatic effect.

“Behold our leader, Leaderaur!” Chutzpar gestured to an old, hunched manotaur that was humming to himself.

“Is he supposed to be the oldest or the wisest of your people, or…?”

The old manotaur spoke in a quavering voice, “Greetings, young-” before he could say anything more, something much larger ate him.

“Naw, he was just the offering,” Chutzpar said, answering Ford’s question. He pointed up to what just ate the old manotaur. “That… is Leaderaur.”

The beast was larger than the others, at least 15 feet tall, and he had flames coming out of his nostrils and a large, buff, and intimidating build. Nonetheless, Ford still held his own and looked at the large manotaur, “YOU. YOU WISH TO BE A MAN?” Leaderaur asked in a booming voice. In response, Stanford banged on chest and gave his best warrior cry. The manotaurs cheered behind him. “THEN YOU MUST DO HEROIC ACT! GO TO HIGHEST MOUNTAIN,” he reached into his chest and pulled out a spear, “AND BRING BACK HEAD OF… THE MULTI-BEAR!” he tossed the spear at Ford’s feet.

Ford heard gasps around him, and he grew worried, “The multi-bear?” he asked. “Is that some type of bear…?”

“HE’S OUR SWORN ENEMY! CONQUER HIM AND YOUR MANSFORMATION WILL BE COMPLETE.”

“Conquer? I-I don’t know…” Ford rubbed his arm, unsure.

He saw that Chutzpar was going through his bag, and he blushed when he pulled out Stanford’s doodles of Danny with hearts on them. “Fearless, is this yours?”

Ford snatched it out of his hand and laughed uneasily, “Oh, no! I, uh, I was holding it for a friend. It’s my, uh, cousin’s sister’s drawings. Yep. Not mine. At all.”

Another manotaur glared at him, “Mmm, I don’t know about this…”

Other manotaurs were murmuring in agreement. Wanting to prove them wrong, he went back over to the spear and lifted it up over his head, “I SHALL CONQUER THE MULTI-BEAR!” The manotaurs cheered for his bravery.

Stanley, Mae, Fidds, Ria, and Danny were sitting around the kitchen table. Stanley took out his photo album to look at Grantie Mae’s ‘before’ picture, “Okay, here you are before your social training, and here you are now, after!” he lowered the picture to see that Grantie Mae looked exactly the same.

“Huh,” Fidds mused. “Not much different.”

“You still look wonderful, Ms. Pines,” Maria assured her. “Just as lovely as ever.”

Grantie Mae smiled, “Thank you, Ria. And you too, kids,” she said to the boys.

Lee sighed, “But we still haven’t found anyone for you to hang out with!”

“Oh, that doesn’t matter none,” she shrugged off. “I got to spend the day with you guys, right?”

“But you’re still as lonely as Growling Grenda,” Danny commented.

Lee paused, wide eyed. The others caught on quickly. “Grantie Mae!” Lee yelled. “We have to go to the diner! Now!”

“No problem. Let’s go,” Mae said, getting up.

Ford traveled to where he was told the multi-bear’s cave was located, “I’m coming for you, multi-bear!” He whispered at the cave entrance. Another thought came to him. “What even is a multi-bear?” That question was answered when he accidentally woke the bear up. Except, the bear had, as the name hinted, multiple heads around the body. “Oh, that’s a multi-bear.”

The bear heads roared, and the main head spoke, “Bear heads, silence!” One of the heads continued roaring, so he hit it until the head went silent. “Child, why have you come here?”

“Multi-bear! By order of the manotaurs, I seek your head!” Ford declared. “Or… one of them, I guess…”

The multi-bear grew angry, “You made a foolish choice. Leave now or die!” Stanford held his ground and pointed his spear at him. “So be it,” the heads roared, and the multi-bear charged at him.

Ford moved quickly to avoid the bear’s attacks. He managed to jump off a rock and leaped on one of the multi-bear’s heads to choke the main head with his spear. He used as much strength as he could to bring the bear down. Stanford was glad, and a little surprised, that the fight was so short, and he pointed the spear at the bear’s neck, “A real man shows no mercy!”

The multi-bear sighed, accepting his defeat, “Very well, warrior… but will you grant a magical beast one last request?”

“Uh… okay.”

“I wish to die thinking of the one I love most,” he said, shedding a tear. “There’s a picture frame on the coffee table. If you could get it, I would appreciate it.”

Ford didn’t question why or how a bear would have either item in a cave, but he followed through the request. When he looked at the picture, he noticed that the multi-bear was with a normal bear, however, the second bear showed male characteristics.

The multi-bear shed a tear, “I will miss him…”

“Him?” Ford repeated.

He nodded, “All the manotaurs made fun of me because I loved a male instead of a female.”

Ford pulled out the crumpled-up drawing of Dan, “I was made fun of too,” he admitted, “for liking a boy.”

“I thought we were the only ones,” the multi-bear smiled. “No one else understood the love we shared.”

Despite the situation, Stanford laughed, “This is crazy! Finally, someone who understands… oh..." he frowned. "Yeah... I guess I’m suppose to kill you? Or I’ll never become a man?”

“I accept my fate.”

“No!” Ford yelled, but he paused. “Are you sure?”

The multi-bear nodded and closed his eyes, “It’s for the best.”

Ford took a deep breath and raised his spear.

The same spear was stabbed into the floor of the man cave, “I’m not going to do it!” Ford yelled.

“YOU WERE TOLD!” Leaderaur roared. “THE PRICE OF MAN IS THE MULTI-BEAR’S HEAD!”

Ford decided he had enough of listening to them, “Listen, Leaderaur, alright? You too, Tesosteraur, Pubertaur, and… B-Beardy, is it?”

“It’s Beardy.”

“You keep telling me that being a man means doing all these tasks and being aggressive all the time, but I’m starting to think that’s all bologna,” Stanford said. The manotaurs gasped. “You heard me. Bologna! So, maybe I don’t have muscles, or hair in certain places, and… I’ll admit it. I like boys, because I find them attractive, dang it! Girls just don’t get my attention the same way!”

“Fearless, what are you saying?” Chutzpar asked.

“I’m saying the multi-bear is a really nice guy, and you’re a bunch of jerks if you want me to cut off his head!”

Leaderaur grew furious. He stomped off of his throne, looked down at Ford, and snorted menacingly in his face, “KILL THE MULTI-BEAR OR NEVER BE A MAN!” he ordered.

Ford stood tall, “Then I guess I’ll never be a man.”

The manotaurs booed at him and called Ford ‘weak’. They left the cave to go do something manly. Stanford sighed, put his normal clothes back on, grabbed his bag, and left.

Stanley, Fidds, and Grantie Mae made it back to Greasy’s Diner. They went up to Growling Grenda, where she was trying to make a machine work by hitting it and yelling at it, “Growling Grenda?” Lee asked. He caught her attention. “My grantie wants to be your friend, but she’s too shy to ask you in person. She’s the nicest person I’ve ever met, and she likes baking, gardening, knitting, and watching old lady movies!”

Grantie Mae spoke up, “So what do you say?”

Grenda smiled, “Sure, why not?!”

“Really?”

“Really! Tomorrow at my place if you want!” She wrote something down and handed it to Mae. “Here’s my number! And a free pie!” Grenda gave her a pie from the spinning pie machine. “See ya later!”

Lee and Fidds cheered, “We did it!” Stanley yelled. “When are you gonna call? You wanna call now? I don’t have a phone! We can put it on a credit card. Let’s get a credit card!”

“Stanley,” Grantie Mae stopped him. “Just let me eat, alright?”

Stanley peeked out the window, where he could see Stanford walking by, “FORD!!! It’s me, Stanley! I’m looking at you through this glass! Right here! This is my voice! I’m talking to you from inside!” He smiled excitedly. Stanford nodded and gestured him to calm down before he walked back inside the diner. “Did you see me through the-?”

“Yes.”

“What’s wrong?”

Ford sighed, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Fiddleford shrugged, “That’s alright. If you don’t want to-”

“It’s just that these half-man, half-bull humanoids were hanging out with me…” Ford started.

“What?” Mae asked.

“But then they wanted me to do this really tough, horrible thing, but it just wasn’t right. So I said no.”

Stanley spoke, “You were your own man, and you stood up for yourself.”

“What?”

Mae finished what Lee was going to say, “Well, you did what was right even when no one agreed with you. Sounds pretty manly to me, I may add,” she smiled, crossing her arms.

“Hey, you guys are right!” Ford smiled. “I was my own man!”

Fidds pointed to Ford’s chest, “Wait a minute! Ford, what’s that hair on your chest?”

He looked down and smiled, “I have chest hair! Yes!” he laughed. “This is amazing! Take that, man tester! Take that, Pituitor!”

“Pituitor?”

“I have chest hair!”

Ford’s moment was sadly short lived. Stanley pulled the single chest hair out and taped it in his photo album, “Photo album-tunity!”

“Don’t worry, Stanford,” Grantie Mae said to cheer him up. “You’ll have plenty more where that came from when you’re older. And look what I made you!” She pulled out the rainbow sweater she promised to make him earlier. “Try it on!”

Stanford did, and it was a perfect fit. The police officers were right outside the window, and when they saw the sweater, they laughed, “You know what?” Ford said out loud. “I don’t care what they think. Gay or straight, I am my own man!”

At that moment, the officers walked into an angry dog. They backed up uneasily, and when the dog barked, they screamed and ran away while the dog chased after them. Stanford, Stanley, Mae, and Fiddleford laughed, enjoying the sweet revenge. And the pie.

Chapter Text

It was another spontaneous day at the Mystery Shack. Stanford and Stanley's Grantie Mae was planning a party, and the kids, Dan, and Maria were in charge of decorating, but the twins were taking a break at the moment. Ford and Stanley sat on the couch with smug expressions and hid something behind their backs. Around the room, Ria was setting up the party hats while Danny was blowing balloons. Grantie Mae was in front of the twins with her back turned and inspected the progress they were making.

Deciding that now was the perfect time to start, Ford held his stomach and groaned, pretending to feel sick, "Oh no, Stanley. I-I don't feel so good. I- BBBLLLAAAAGGHH!" He pretended to throw up and sprayed pink silly string at his twin.

Lee faked a groan, "Grantie Mae, what did you feed us?!" He made a similar retching sound and shot his can of purple silly string at Ford, and the boys kept at it until both were covered in it and laughed.

Dan Corduroy ran up to the twins, looking serious, "Guys, guys, stop! Something terrible just happened!" The boys stopped to look at him. "BBBLLAAAGGHH!" Danny had joined in, spraying the twins in even more silly string, this time green, causing the three of them to laugh hysterically.

Fiddleford ran in with a box of gold-colored confetti, "You guys are comedy gold!" He laughed, throwing the confetti at them, only adding to the mess. Fidds kept throwing confetti, and the other boys kept spraying the silly string until Grantie Mae noticed the mess they were making.

"That's enough, kiddos," she said, taking the supplies away. "You don't want to party yourselves out before it even starts, do you?"

"Ms. Pines, whose birthday is this party for?" Fidds asked.

"Nobody's. I'll have you know that back in the day, I was pro at planning people's parties. Still am today," Mae bragged. "So, I'll throw several parties a year! I'm famous in town for throwing the best Hanukkah parties in town! Not to mention it's great business for all those crazy kids and teens," she added.

Fidds looked impressed, "Nice!"

Grantie Mae handed a flyer to the twins, and Lee grabbed it, "Why don't you take this to the copier store, huh?"

"M-Ms. Pines?" Fidds spoke up. "I fixed that old copy machine in your office. We can use that instead," he offered.

"Oh, you have?" She asked. Fiddleford nodded. "I'm impressed, Fidds. Why don't you take the twins over there and show 'em how to work it?"

"Yes, ma'am!" He smiled. Fiddleford led Stanley and Stanford to Grantie Mae's office and turned on the light. Fidds pulled off a filthy, white sheet that was covering something. Underneath was a busted-up copier machine that looked like it had been partially repaired by duct tape. Several moths were flying around the machine.

"Are you sure it works?" Ford asked. He lifted the lid up to inspect it.

"It should. Give it a whirl!" Fidds offered.

Stanford did. He pressed a button, and to test it out, he rested his arm on the scanner. The machine made a loud noise, and a black and white picture of Ford's arm came out on a piece of printer paper.

Stanley picked it up. "Success!" he cheered. The paper shook in his hand, and he dropped it. "Whoa!"

"What is it, Stanley?" Fidds asked. The boys looked at the paper, and watched as the two-dimensional black and white arm shook unnaturally, obtained the exact colors of Ford's arm, and came to life, crawling out of the sheet and towards the screaming boys.

"Back! Stay back!" Ford ordered at the arm. He threw a cup of soda that he had on him at the arm, and it bubbled and sizzled, before it completely disintegrated. The boys took a moment to calm down.

"W-what was that?!" Fidds asked.

Ford looked back at the copy machine in shock, "Guys, I think this copier can copy human beings!"

Stanley gasped, "Do you realize what this means?" The other boys looked at Lee, waiting for him to finish. "BBBBLLLAAAGGHH!" He sprayed another can of silly string at the two of them. Neither laughed that time.

The twelve-year-old boys eventually went back to what they were supposed to be doing and made copies of the flyer, being extra careful to keep their body parts away from the scanner. Ford made a mental note to write this experience down later. Once they were done, the boys and Danny and Maria stood side by side in front of Grantie Mae.

"Alright party people," she addressed. "Let's talk business. Fiddleford, It's your job to take all the flyers and post them all around town. Be sure people know about the party."

"Ma'am, yes, ma'am!" Fidds saluted.

Mae turned to Maria, "Ria, you'll be on DJ, Stanford is on decoration. Daniel, you and Stanley will work the ticket stand."

"What?" Stanley groaned. "But Grantie Mae, this party is my chance to talk to girls!"

Ford raised his hand and spoke up, "I… I could work with Danny."

Mae thought about it for a moment, "If it's alright with you, then you can. You have to remember, Stanford, that if you do, you have to commit to stay at the ticket stand with Daniel. No getting out of it. Just the two of you. Alone. All night," she added in a knowing wink and smiled.

Ford looked back at Danny to see him spraying Fidd's glasses with silly string and watched them laugh. He turned back to his grantie, "I promise."

A few hours later, Ford stood in front of a mirror in his room. He decided to go for a 'party casual' look and wore a bow tie over his normal outfit. He knew it looked a little odd, especially with his gloves, but after learning that Danny would be doing something similar, he figured that he could try it as well. To spruce himself up a bit more, he went for the hair spray, only to find that Stanley was right in his face. He screamed, "LEE!"

Stanley laughed and spoke in a mocking voice, pretending to be Ford, "Uh, uh, I could work the ticket booth with you, Danny! Let's kiss!" He made kissy noises and laughed.

"Yeah, yeah. Laugh all you want, but I devised a plan to make sure my night with Danny goes perfect," Ford smiled confidently.

"Plan?" Lee asked. He groaned when he realized what he meant, "You're not making one of those over-complicated lists, are you?"

Ford scoffed, "Over complicated? Don't be ridiculous, let me… just…" he pulled out a piece of paper from his jacket, and unfolded it several times. The paper was long enough to reach the ground, "okay. Step one: Getting to know each other through playful banter. Banter is like talking, but smarter," he explained.

"That sounds like a dumb idea for poopheads," Lee complained.

"For example, what you just said. That is what I want to avoid with Danny," Ford said. "The final step is to ask him to dance with me."

Lee rolled his eyes, "Yeah, like that's gonna happen."

Ford glared at him, "I thought you would be supportive with me on this?"

"I'm just being honest. Ford, you'll never get anywhere if you can't just walk up and talk to him like a normal person."

"Step nine, brother," Ford pointed to step nine, which read 'talk to him like a normal person'. Stan sighed and rolled his eyes.

Finally, the party started, and Stanley stood at the upper level, smiling and watching the party from below. He wore a white shirt, an unzipped leather jacket, ripped jeans, a belt chain, and tennis shoes. Grantie Mae leaned on the rail next to him, wearing a pink top and skirt, red heels, triangle-shaped earrings, and a red bow on her head, "What do you say, ankle biter? Can your grantie throw a party or what?" She asked proudly.

"This party is awesome!" Lee smiled. "And the music Ria chose is great!"

"Then what are you doing up here then, kiddo?" Grantie Mae pushed him to the stairs, "Go mingle! Have fun!"

Meanwhile, outside, Danny and Ford were at the ticket station selling tickets. Ford took a deep breath and remembered the list, "Step one: Casual banter," he whispered to himself. He talked to Danny, a little too loudly. "SO HERE'S A CASUAL QUESTION!" Ford coughed and lowered his voice. "What's your favorite type of snack food?"

"Oh, man!" Dan laughed. "I can't just pick one!"

"No way! Mine too!"

"Wait, what?"

Stanford's eyes widened when he realized his mistake, "Uhh… I mean… um…" he stammered and shoved a large handful of popcorn in his mouth as a distraction. He took too much and ended up coughing.

"Dude, are you alright?"

Inside the Mystery Shack, Stanley was dancing wildly. He took a break and sat next to Fiddleford and, to his surprise, Buddy. "Hey, Buddy!" Lee waved.

"Hi, Stanley!" Buddy waved back. "Nice party here."

"Thanks," Lee smiled. "You can thank Grantie Mae for that. How're things going for you?"

"Alright, I guess," he shrugged. "Do you remember the cleaning lady, Valerie?" he asked. "She's really nice. A lot better than my dad. I-I've still been keeping up the Tent of Telepathy business, though."

"But, why?" Stanley asked. "I thought you hated that?"

"I do, but Valerie and I need to make money somehow, and if I quit, a lot of people will lose their jobs..."

An uncomfortable silence followed. To lighten up the mood, Fidds showed Lee and Buddy his pet, "I brought my pet raccoon! Do you like her?"

"Yeah," Buddy smiled. He went up to pet her, but the raccoon growled, and he drew his hand back.

"She's usually not like this," Fidds said reassuringly, but Lee wasn't listening to him. He was gawking at a very pretty girl with a lazy eye in a very beautiful orange dress. "Lee?"

Lee pointed at his new crush, "Who is she?"

"Her?" Buddy asked. "That's Susan Wentworth. Growling Grenda's granddaughter," he gasped when he pieced it together. "You like her! Dude, go talk to her!"

"W-What? Talk? I-I," Stanley stammered, but the other two boys would have none of it. They pushed Lee into the crowd, muttering to him words of encouragement. Stanley took a deep breath and walked up to her, but before he could, another boy went up to Susan.

"Hey," the boy smiled. "I'm Preston Northwest. Of course, you already know that. Wanna dance?"

"Sure," she said. Susan took his hand and they danced together.

Stanley stared at them in shock. Fidds and Bud walked up, seeing his bad luck, "Tough," Fidds said after a long, low whistle.

"Who's this Preston Northwest?" Lee asked, feeling jealous.

"The most popular boy in town," Fiddleford answered, "except, maybe Buddy, but that could be debatable. Preston is richer, though."

"He always makes me feel bad about myself when I'm around him," Buddy added.

At that moment, Maria spoke into the microphone, "The dancing contest will begin later tonight! The person with the loudest applause will win this party crown!" She held up a crown, and Stan got an idea.

"I'm gonna win that crown," Stanley said in determination.

"Oh, yeah?" Preston asked, overhearing him. He turned away from Susan. "What makes you say that, newbie? And, oh look, are those your friends?" he taunted. "Raccoon boy? Baby Man? You've got to be kidding me!"

"Hold me, Fidds!" Buddy hugged Fiddleford in fear.

"Our kind isn't welcome here!" Fiddleford exclaimed.

Stanley looked angrily at Preston, "My name is Stanley, not 'newbie', and I will win that contest, because jerks who make fun of other people don't deserve to win!" Fiddleford and Buddy gasped behind him.

Preston laughed, "Stanley? That sounds like a fat, old man's name. Fine, Stanley. The winner will get the crown… and Susan. May the better dancer win," he walked away menacingly. Susan stood where Preston left her, unsure what to do.

"He's going down," Stanley smiled confidently. Behind him, Fidds and Bud stared at Lee in total shock.

Ford and Danny continued working the ticket stand, but Danny was getting distracted by the party going on inside, "Woah! Sounds like the party's getting nuts," out of curiosity, Ford took a peek inside to see his twin brother dancing wildly and forming a crowd around him. "I gotta get in there!" Dan exclaimed. He stood up to leave.

"Wait! We're not supposed to go anywhere, remember?" Ford reminded him.

Danny scoffed, "It won't be long. I'll just party out for a minute and be right back. Cover for me?"

"Umm… well, I… um-"

"Thanks, dude!" Danny went inside and danced.

Stanford looked at Danny through the window, and then looked back at the people in line in front of him waiting for their tickets. He stood up and addressed the crowd, "I'll be back shortly!" He left his seat to go inside to join Dan. "I'm sure Mae won't mind if I'm gone for a few minutes…" He whispered to himself.

Before Ford could reach the door, Mae grabbed him by his ear and pulled him back to the table, "What do you think you're doing, Stanford?"

"OW! OW! OW! Grantie Mae, that hurts!" Ford complained.

She sat him back down in his chair, and Stanford rubbed his red ear to ease the pain, "Now stay there and sell these good people their tickets," she ordered firmly. "You made a promise. Stay committed to it."

Ford sighed and continued selling tickets. He looked back to the party, where Danny was dancing by himself, "If only I could be in two places at once," he spoke to himself. He recalled the phenomenon that happened earlier that day and gasped. Ford had an idea, but unfortunately, that would require leaving the station again, and he couldn't risk Mae catching him leaving again.

As if by a miracle, Fiddleford walked outside and saw Ford, "Hey, Stanford," he waved. "The party is going crazy in there! You should see your brother."

"Hey, Fidds!" Ford waved. "Can you do me a favor? I really have to use the bathroom, and Danny bailed on me. Can you take my place for a bit?" he asked.

Fiddleford went a little pink and smiled, "Sure! Can you make it quick, though? I really want to watch the dancing contest."

"No problem," Stanford said. Now that he was free, he ran to the copy machine in Mae's office. He lied down on the scanner and pressed the copy button. "I wonder if this is a good idea," he thought out loud, a little too late. The machine printed out a black and white picture of Ford. The paper fell on the ground, and the image obtained color and came to life, creating a Ford double. "Woah!" Ford gasped. He paused at his double. "I have a really big head."

Ford and his clone spoke simultaneously, "So, uh…" they chuckled. "Sorry, you first. Stop copying me!" They laughed in unison.

Stanford stood silent for a while, taking in the clone. His mind was boggled with interest. As much as he wanted to learn about his clone, he needed to act fast if he wanted his plan to work. He looked through Grantie Mae's desk drawers to find blank pins. With a permanent marker, he wrote a '2' on it and pinned it to his clone's jacket, "For now, I will call you Number Two."

"Definitely not," his clone disagreed. "You know a name we've always wanted?"

Ford and the clone smirked knowingly, "Shermy," they finished at the same time.

"Alright, Shermy. Let's make this quick," Ford ordered. "I'm thinking you cover me at the ticket stand, while I ask Danny to dance with me."

Shermy pulled out the exact same list that Ford had, "I know the plan, buddy," he smirked.

A thought came to Stanford, and he took a couple steps back, "Hey, we're not going to get jealous and turn on each other like the clones in the movies, are we?"

"Stanford, please," Shermy scoffed. "This is you you're talking about. Not to mention," he added, "you can always just disintegrate me with water."

"True…" He considered. "Alright. Partners?"

"Partners," Shermy smiled. They shook hands.

Shermy stood outside, where Fiddleford was, "About time, Ford!" he exclaimed. "I'm getting tired of handing people their tickets!"

"Hey, no problem, Fidds," the clone smiled. He peeked inside the window and gave Ford a thumbs up. Ford returned the gesture from the other side of the glass and walked up to Danny.

Fidds looked back at the window, "Hey, who are you looking at…?" he peeked inside and gasped. Fidds looked back at Shermy and narrowed his eyes in accusation. "You didn't."

"I didn't. He did," Shermy corrected him, pointing his thumb at the original Stanford.

Fiddleford shook his head, "Look, we'll talk about this later, but I just gotta say that I am very disappointed in you. I mean him. I mean- AUGH! I need to sit down," he sat back down in the chair while Shermy continued working the ticket stand.

Shermy glanced back at Ford again, only to see that Danny was with Stacy. He had a jealous thought towards Stacy, and, judging from Ford's expression, so had he. He called Ford, "Hey, Ford. It's me, you. I just had the same jealousy fantasy."

"We have to get rid of Stacy if I ever want to dance with Danny!" Ford exclaimed from the other end. There was a pause. "Oh, no! They're sitting on the couch! We gotta think of something quick!" Both Shermy and Ford looked outside to see Stacy's bike. "I got an idea!"

"I got the same one," Shermy nodded, "but we're gonna need some help," the two of them silently agreed to their new plan, and Ford hung up. Shermy saw that Fiddleford was still sitting next to him, and he heard the whole conversation. "So, uh… do you mind?"

Fidds frowned and folded his arms bitterly, "Oh, not at all, Ford's clone!" he replied sarcastically. "Just go right on ahead, I don't care! Make a million clones for all I care. At the very least, PROMISE me you'll have one for the ticket stand!"

"I promise," Shermy said.

He left Fiddleford alone at the stand, and once the clone was out of earshot, he grumbled, "It's a good thing he's cute..."

Ford stuck a pin with a '3' written on it on a third clone's jacket, "And that's where you come in, Number Three!" he finished.

"But what if Stacy catches me?" The third clone asked. "I'll be all alone!"

"He does have a good point," Shermy nodded.

Stanford sighed, "This isn't a problem. We'll just make one more. Four people will be enough, right?" He jumped back on the scanner to make another copy of himself, but the copier jammed.

"Uh-oh, paper jam," Shermy called out. He pulled the paper out of the copy machine, and the clone screamed as it came to life. It came out bent and distorted, and it made a screeching sound instead of talking.

"Come on!" Number Three groaned. "You're not going to pair me up with him, are you?"

Shermy shushed him, "Don't be rude!" He turned to the paper jammed clone, "Hey, it's okay."

Paper Jam Ford yelled something incoherent, and Ford sighed, "Okay. Just one more clone."

Preston was on the stage, dancing and singing a catchy R&B song. When he was done, the crowd cheered. He smiled cockily and handed the microphone to Stanley, "Try to beat that!"

Lee narrowed his eyes at Preston, "I will!" He turned to see Fiddleford running up to him and Buddy. "Hey, Fidds! Where have you been?"

"Doing your brother a favor," Fidds grumbled. "Or should I say brothers," he added under his breath.

"What was that?"

"Nothing. Now go!" Fidds gave him a push towards the stage.

Stanley walked up to the stage and pointed to Maria, "Ria! Give me that really awesome 70s, crowd pleasing song everyone likes!"

Maria began playing the song "Romanian Rap City" by King, and Stanley danced to the beat of it. He sang, "Is this a fake dream? Or is this reality? Trapped in a mudslide, don't escape from the fantasy!"

The crowd cheered wildly for him while he sang and danced, and when the song reached a guitar solo, he shouted. "NOW I'M GONNA DO A FLIP!" Instead of actually doing a flip, he fell on his face, but he smiled. "That was for YOU guys!" Lee was very proud of the jealous and angry look on Preston's face. He was even more happy when he saw that Susan was clapping for him. He wanted nothing more at the moment than to win that contest and Susan's heart.

Ford ran up to Maria and whispered something in her ear. She repeated what he said through the microphone, "I have a quick announcement: Would the owner of a silver and red dirt bike please report outside. It is being stolen right now."

Stacy looked outside, "Wait, WHAT?!" She ran outside, where Clones 3 and 4 were riding her bike away from the shack and laughing. "Hey, come back here!" She yelled, chasing them.

Ford took the chance to walk up to Danny, "Oh, tough luck. I wonder who those guys are who aren't me because I'm right here."

Ria played a slower song, and people were coupling up to dance. "This is a nice song," Dan thought out loud. He smiled and tapped his feet to the rhythm.

Stanley saw this and ran up to Ford, "Hey, doofus, now's your chance to ask Dan-" Ford covered his mouth and moved to where Danny wouldn't hear. "Now's your chance to ask Danny to dance with you! Come on! Go!"

"Okay, I'll do it!" Stanford said. It was easier said than done, though. He got too nervous to go over to Dan and ended up bailing. "I'll be right back!" Ford ran away in the opposite direction.

With Paper Jam Ford running the ticket stand, and Clones 3 and 4 still distracting Stacy, Shermy and Ford paced around each other in the twins' room, "I agree," Shermy nodded after Ford explained the situation. "You can't just DANCE with him. What if there's a glitch in the sound system?"

"Grantie Mae might get in the way," Ford added. "And Stacy might come back. There are too many variables," he clasped his hands together. "We need help."

Six more copies of himself later, Stanford made sure that the other Fords knew the plan, and they set out to put it in action. Clone Number 10 walked up to Maria, "Ria, someone threw up near the food table."

Ria sighed, "I bet it was the stale candy. Alright, stay here. Let me take care of it."

Once she was gone, the clone put in a disc labeled 'Danny's Mix'. Meanwhile, another clone attached a stuffed animal of an adorable kitten on a fishing rod and dangled it in front of Grantie Mae. "Oh my gosh!" she exclaimed. "GIVE ME THAT!" She tried to grab it, but ended up crashing into a table. She got back up and went after it. "GIVE ME THE CAT!"

Now that both women were distracted, another clone, Number Six, rang a bell. Shermy heard it and ran over to Ford, "That's your cue. Now's the perfect moment to ask Danny to dance," he gave Stanford a small push. "Good luck, me!"

"Thanks!" Ford smiled. He walked down the hallway only to see that Danny was leaning against the wall next to the bathroom door, and not on the dance floor as planned.

"Oh, hey, Stanford!" Danny waved.

Ford tried not to panic, "W-what are you doing here? Wouldn't you rather be out on the dance floor?" he glanced at his watch. "In exactly 42 seconds?"

"Just waiting for the bathroom," he shrugged.

Stanford took a deep breath and decided on a plan two: Small talk. Before he could ask anything, Dan spoke up, "So hey, let's say everyone at this party gets stuck on a deserted island. Who do you think the leader would be?"

"I, uh…"

"I think I would go with this lunatic," Danny pointed at a short, sweaty, angry-looking man that was dancing furiously.

Ford laughed and looked at the partiers, "I'd probably go for the tall guy over there, because tall people can reach coconuts?"

"Speaking of tall, wanna see something?" Dan asked. He pulled out a picture. "Those are my uncles, and that's me," he pointed to a younger version of himself with braces and no muscle, but he was strangely tall. "Yep. I was a freak."

Stanford laughed, suddenly feeling more comfortable, "You know, kids would make fun of my hands before I started hiding them all the time."

"Hands?" Dan repeated.

He immediately regretted saying that, "Uh, no! It's nothing!" he denied. "I-I…" Ford groaned. "Why did I say that?"

"No way, dude!" Danny smiled. "Now you have to show me! Show me, show me!" he chanted. Welp. It was over. Ford took a deep breath and removed his gloves to show Danny his bare hands. Ford closed his eyes, but he could still feel Dan's eyes on his fingers, counting all twelve of them. Danny gasped. "Six fingers! So THAT'S why you're always wearing gloves! And here I thought you were just a germaphobe or something," he joked. "I guess that makes us both freaks," Dan smiled.

Stanford blinked at him in shock and slight confusion, "You aren't freaked out?"

"No way, dude. Your hands are cool! If anything, you're just as much of a freak as I am!" Danny held up his cup. "To being freaks?"

"To being freaks," Ford smiled. They clinked their cups, and at that moment, a boy Ford's age stormed angrily out of the boy's restroom and Danny went in.

Shermy came in the hallway with the rest of the clones behind him. "Hey! What are you doing up here?" Shermy asked. "Ria is almost done cleaning up Number 10's fake vomit!"

"You won't believe this, guys!" Stanford smiled. "I bumped into Danny accidentally and things are actually going great!"

"That's nice," Shermy commented, "but not the plan. Do we have to remind you?" The other clones pulled out their lists and read the steps out loud from it, but out of order.

It was an odd sight for Ford, but he pushed it aside, "Listen, guys. Maybe we don't need the plan anymore, you know? I could just go talk to him like a normal person," he suggested.

Ford's clones gasped, clearly in disagreement, "If you're not going to stick to the plan, maybe you shouldn't be the Ford to dance with Danny," Number 5 said. The other clones muttered to each other in agreement.

"Guys, come on," Stanford backed away. "We promised we wouldn't turn on each other."

Shermy stepped forward, "I think we all knew we were lying. Get him!"

The clones grabbed Stanford and threw him in a closet and closed the door, despite Ford's protests. Ford banged his fists at the door, and he overheard the clones arguing over who would get to dance with Danny. He tried the doorknob to see that Shermy had forgotten to lock it, and he ran out when no one was looking. He made it to the balcony when one of the clones grabbed him and dragged him back to the other clones.

"Come on, Ford. Give it up," Shermy asserted. "You're overpowered."

At that moment, Fiddleford walked into the hallway to use the bathroom, only to see Ford and his clones in the hallway. He stared at them for a long, awkward moment before going back to the dance floor, "I'm going to forget I saw that."

With the other clones distracted, Ford punched Shermy in the face, "CLONE FIGHT!" One of them yelled. The clones start fighting each other, and Stanford snuck out of the rumble.

"Hey, Classic Ford's getting away!" A clone exclaimed. "Get him!"

The clones march towards Ford and cornered him. Ford's only weapon was a party popper that was on the ground next to him, "Stay back!" he warned. Stanford fired it, and, much to his shock and relief, the smoke from the party popper caused the sprinklers to activate, and the clones melted. Ford sighed in relief, "Glad that's over," he smiled.

"Not quite."

Stanford turned to see that one clone still remained. And it was Shermy, "Uh-oh."

Shermy yelled and jumped on Ford, and the two of them wrestled on the ground, "Say it!" the clone demanded. He hit Ford. "Say I can dance with Danny!"

"Never!"

The sound of a laugh caused them both to stop. "Danny?" They asked in unison. They looked over the balcony to see Danny chatting and laughing with Stacy. They sat down and sighed, defeated. "We blew it."

"You wanna grab a couple of sodas?" Shermy asked. Ford nodded, not thinking of anything better to do.

Stanley and Preston finished dancing, and Ria announced, "Let the party crown voting begin!"

"Good luck, Stanley," Preston said sarcastically.

"Actually, in our family, it's more common to say Mazel tov," Lee corrected him. "It's a religious term, meaning good luck."

Preston rolled his eyes, "Whatever, loser. Just know that after this, Susan WILL be my girlfriend."

Unseen by either of them, Susan looked fuming mad.

"Applause to vote for Stanley!" Ria began. The crowd applauded loudly for her. "Let's check the applause meter," she raised her hand to measure the sound. "Very good, Stanley! And the next contestant: Preston," the crowd applauded softly. Preston glared at the audience angrily, and more people clapped for him. To raise the odds, Preston went up to bribe Crazy Chiu, and her clapping, added to the others, ended up louder than Lee's. "Ladies and gentlemen, we-we have a winner," Ria hesitated, looking disappointed. She reluctantly gave Preston the crown. "Preston Northwest."

"Thank you!" Preston smiled. He walked over to Susan. "And now to claim my other prize!" He went to grab her hand, but she slapped it away.

"What do you think I am?!" She yelled suddenly. It shocked both Preston and Stan. "Do you really think that you can just label me as a prize without asking me what I want first?! I don't want to date either of you, so go away!"

"Way to be a killjoy, princess," Preston sneered. "Like I want to be with a peasant like you anyway," he turned to the crowd and announced an after-party at his place, and they all left, save for Stanley, Ria, Wendy, Susan, Fidds, and Buddy.

Stanley turned to Susan, who was looking away and holding her arm, "Did… Did I really make you feel that way?" Susan nodded sadly. "I'm really sorry, Susan. I… I should have said something to you first. I didn't mean to make you feel that way. I understand if you want to leave."

"Who said I wanted to leave?" She asked. "I won't go out with you, but I will forgive you," Susan smiled. "How about we stay friends?"

Lee smiled, "Yeah, sure! I'm Stanley Pines," he introduced himself. He pointed to the others. "That's Fiddleford, Buddy, Maria, and Danny! And you can also meet my Grantie Mabel and my twin brother, Stanford!"

Susan laughed, "That sounds great!"

"Do you kids want to keep dancing?" Ria asked. The kids cheered, and she played another song. Everyone danced along to it.

On the roof, Ford and Shermy each held a can of soda, "Some night, huh?" Shermy spoke up to break the silence. A shooting star flew across the night sky as they opened their soda cans.

"Do you think we even have a chance with Danny?" Ford asked. "I mean, we don't know if he's even into guys, not to mention that he's fifteen and we're twelve."

"To be honest," Shermy thought, "I'm not sure, but the way we're doing it isn't working. The only real progress you made with him was when you weren't following the list."

Ford sighed, "I know. Stanley was right. I do get in my own way."

"Literally!" They both laughed. The cans touched, but Shermy accidentally spilled his all over himself. He began to disintegrate.

Stanford gasped, "Shermy!"

"It's okay, Ford," the clone reassured him. "I had a good run while it lasted. Don't forget what we talked about."

"Of course."

"And don't be a wimp around Danny, okay?" Shermy added. "For my sake…" The clone completely melted and bubbled into nothing but wet paper. Stanford paid his respects to Shermy and went back to the dance floor, where only his friends, Stanley, and a new girl remained.

"Stanford!" Stanley called out. "Where have you been! Meet my new friend!"

Chapter Text

"Kids!" Grantie Mae called out. "Are you ready? We're gonna be late!"

"COMING, GRANTIE MAE!" The twins answered in unison. Mae was making them dress up in old-fashioned clothing for some occasion, but she wouldn't say what specifically. When they were dressed, they ran outside and out to the car.

"You kids all ready?" She asked from the driver's seat. The boys nodded. "How do the gloves fit you, Stanford?"

Ford smiled and felt the six-fingered gloves his great aunt made for him. To test it, he moved his fingers and gave his hand a small squeeze, "They fit perfectly! Thanks for making these."

"No problem, kiddo," she smiled. Grantie Mae buckled up and waited for the kids to do the same before she shifted the gear and drove into town.

After a while, Stanley grew bored and slipped on one of his grantie's homemade sweaters over his old-fashioned outfit with a crescent-shaped symbol on it and nudged his brother. "Hey, Ford!" Ford turned around, but Lee ended up poking his nose and laughing. "BOOP!" He did it again. "BOOP! BOP!"

"Stop it!" Ford grabbed his nose. "Grantie Mae! Lee is bothering me!"

"Cut it out," she ordered. Ford noticed that the car was coming to a stop, but they were still a while away from town, "Okay, get out of the car," Grantie Mae said. "We're walking the rest of the way."

The twins groaned in unison, "I'm sorry, Grantie Mae!" Lee apologized. "I'll stop! Promise!"

Mae caught their distraught and laughed, "I was gonna make you get out anyway. You'll see why in a bit."

Ford and Lee exchanged glances, but they got out of the car and walked the rest of the way into town. They gasped when they noticed the changes. Everything and everyone around them looked old fashioned, as if they had time traveled a hundred-fifty years in the past, "Wow! Look at this town!" Ford exclaimed.

"Ah, boy," Mae smiled. "Pioneer Day! The day we celebrate the founding of Gravity Falls!"

Thompson Determined greeted them, and he was dressed old fashioned as well, "Welcome to 1863!" Around them were people doing various activities. There was candle dipping, gold panning, and… a man marrying a woodpecker.

"I thought it was still legal to marry woodpeckers," Ford said.

The man that just married the woodpecker walked past him, "Oh, it is, son. It's still very legal."

Near them, someone was announcing the opening ceremonies, "Come on, boys!" Mae said, hurrying them along. "And don't forget..." she punctuated her next sentence with a folksy accent. "Ya'll gotta talk like 'em, too!"

Ford did his best impression of Mae's accent, "There's a carpetbagger in the turnip cellar!"

"Well hornswabber my haversack!" Lee said, mimicking the other two. The boys laughed and ran off to the crowd.

"Atta boys," Mae smiled proudly and followed them.

Lee and Ford stopped at the front of the growing crowd, and Stanley opened a bag of candy he brought and ate one. He held the bag out to Ford, "You want one?"

"No, thanks," Ford declined. He paused. "Wait. I thought the dentist said you shouldn't have anything that'll ruin your braces."

"Don't worry. It's hard candy," he smiled and popped one in his mouth. The opening ceremonies were starting, and the boys turned their attention to the stage, but they saw that the person that came up on the stage was none other than Preston Northwest.

"Howdy, everyone!" he waved. "You all know me, Preston Northwest, great-great grandson of town-founder, Nathaniel Northwest. I'm also very rich," he added smugly. The crowd applauded, but Ford and Lee didn't. Lee looked angry as he sucked on the hard candy. "Now if you've got the pioneer spirit, we ask you to come on up and introduce yourself."

Stanley smiled, and he started to go up, but Ford stopped him, "Wait, Lee! Isn't that guy supposed to be your arch-enemy?"

Lee replied with the candy still in his mouth, "Yes'h, but t'is ish m'a time to 'inally ou'shine 'im," Stanley spat out the candy into the wrapper and ran up to the stage and yelled towards the audience. "Yeah! Let's get this Pioneer Day started! Right guys? USA! USA!" He chanted.

The crowd chanted with him, "USA! USA! USA! USA!"

Preston laughed and interrupted him, "I'm sorry to break it to you, but Pioneer Day is for serious people, and you are not serious. You're even wearing a sweater in summer, stupid!"

"What do you mean?" Stanley asked. "I'm overflowing with seriousness! I can be serious right now! Look!" He tried to make a serious expression, but he only managed to pull off a strained, angry look, and he farted a little on accident. He blushed a deep red when he heard the noise slip.

Preston laughed at him, "Wow, I'm almost embarrassed for you," he turned to the audience. "Everybody give him a hand!" The audience clapped and laughed, but Ford looked worried. Stanley sadly walked off the stage. "Now who wants to hear more about me?"

Ford and Mae ignored Preston so they could check up on Lee, "Hey, you okay?" Ford asked.

"I need some old-timey butterscotch," Stanley pouted.

Grantie Mae took some old coins from her purse, "Here you are, Stanley. They only accept old-fashioned coins today. And let me know if you see any horseshoes or roadkill on the ground, because they take that as money too," she bent down to hug Stanley. "Don't listen to that boy, alright, my little Stanley?" Stanley only nodded a little, but that was enough for Mae. "I'm going to the candle-making station in case you need me. Alright?"

The moment she left, Stanley ran away. Stanford ran after him, until Lee stopped near a large statue of Nathaniel Northwest. He sat down and cried, and Ford sat next to him and tried to comfort him. "Ford, can I ask you something? Do you think I'm silly?"

"Uh, nnnoooo?"

"I knew it!" Lee exclaimed sadly, seeing through Ford's petty attempt of a lie. "I thought I was being charming, but people only see me as a big joke," he took off the sweater and threw it on the ground.

"Come on, Stanley. You love that sweater!"

"I did before Preston ruined it for me. He ruins everything!" Lee complained.

Ford glared at the statue of the town's founder, "Preston!" he sneered. "Why does he think that being related to the town founder means he can treat everyone like garbage? Someone needs to take him down a notch. Or a peg," Stanford gasped. "Wait a minute!" He reached into his bag and pulled out the journal with the three pine trees on it. "I feel like I read something about Preston's great-great grandfather before," Ford opened the journal and flipped through the pages until he found it. "A-ha! In my investigations," he read, "I recently made a discovery. Nathaniel Northwest may not be the true founder of Gravity Falls! I believe this secret is buried somewhere on the enclosed document. If only I could crack the code," Ford pulled out a document from the page. It contained a complex series of letters, symbols, and words. "Wow! If this cover-up is true, it means that Preston's whole family is a fraud! This could be a major conspiracy!" He exclaimed.

"Really?" Lee asked hopefully. "Hey, if this is true, and I help you uncover the conspiracy, would that make me serious?"

"Definitely," Ford nodded. "Mystery twins?"

"I thought you hated that."

Stanford shrugged, "I'm starting to accept it," they fist bumped and ran off to solve the mystery. Unknown to either of them, Sheriff Holt and Deputy Roy had listened in to the entire conversation from behind the statue.

Holt spoke in a walkie-talkie, "This is Sheriff Holt. We've got a code sepia!"

"What?!" the person on the other side asked. "And what are you doing about it?"

"I'm following them right now," he confirmed.

"Find them and stop them. There's no room for error."

"I understand. Holt out," he ended the call and turned to Deputy Roy, "Deputy, maintaining this cover-up is the mission we've been training for our entire careers. Are you ready?"

"You know it," Roy smirked.

"Let's go get 'em!"

Ford decided that the best place to begin was the Gravity Falls Library. The twins started looking through books on deciphering messages, which Lee munching on his candy while reading. Ford found several methods to be interesting, and he noticed that some of the ciphers matched some of the secret messages written down in the journal. He would have to remind himself to check out those books later if he wanted to further decode the book, but so far, there was nothing on deciphering the document.

"It's not Egyptian," Ford sighed. "It's not numerology either," he read something else, and he gasped. "Wait- of course! The triangle is the alchemist symbol for flame. Lighting the parchment on fire will reveal the secret message!"

"Hooray!" Stanley cheered. "We're solving the mystery!"

"Okay," Ford said, walking over to the fireplace. "Now where's the- Stan!"

Stanley was wearing the document as a paper hat, "Yay! I just made a hat!" Lee groaned when he realized what he just did. "I just did something silly again…"

Ford was paying more attention to the document on his head, and he noticed something, "Wait, Stanley! You folded it into a map!" He paused. "...And I was going to burn it…"

Before he could read the map, the boys heard that the officers were looking for them. They hid under a table while the cops searched the library, "What do they want with us?" Lee asked.

"I don't know, but we should go somewhere safer," Ford suggested. They managed to sneak past the policemen and headed outside, where they would find their next clue.

Meanwhile, Grantie Mae was at the candle dipping booth, only she wasn't just dipping candles, she was decorating them with tools she brought and some leftover colored wax from the old wax museum her nephews destroyed.

"Ma'am," the man that ran the booth spoke up. "You're holding back the line," Grantie Mae peeked behind her to see that were a lot of angry people behind her waiting for their turns to dip candles. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave, or I'll have to escort you out."

Mae scoffed, "You'll be thankful once I finish this. It'll do a lot of good for your business," she put the last, final touches on her candle and held it up for the man to see. "You like cats, right?"

The man's expression remained stern, "Are you going to leave or not?"

"I'll leave when I'm dead!" Grantie Mae yelled, holding her candles and art supplies protectively. She ignored the angry protests from people waiting behind her.

The man that ran the booth shook his head, "I'm sorry, Ma'am. I didn't want to do this."

She rolled her eyes, "What're you gonna do? Lock me in a stock?" She asked sarcastically.

Grantie Mae found herself locked in a stock and unable to get out, "I should really keep my mouth shut…" she mumbled.

The twins walked down the streets, trying their best to blend in with the crowd. Stanford looked through the document turned to a paper hat. "It looks like the map is leading us to…" he followed it and pointed ahead of him. "The Gravity Falls Museum of History!"

"Are we gonna break in?!" Stan asked excitedly.

"What? No. It's open," Ford said. They walked in the main entrance and a kind lady gave them free Pioneer Day passes and balloons. "See? Open."

Stanley frowned at his blue balloon, "I wanted pink!"

"Focus, Lee," Ford looked carefully at the map. "According to the map, the next clue about the real town founder should be right… here!" He pointed to a triangular exhibition piece made of carved stone mounted on the wall. "We've gotta figure this one out quick. I have a feeling those cops might be after us…"

The twins looked at the exhibit and analyzed it. Ford was thinking that the piece could be abstract, but then Lee got bored, so he sat upside down on the bench. He gasped, "Stanford, look!"

"Huh?" Ford copied his twin and gasped when the painting started making more sense. "It's not abstract, it's upside-down!"

It was a picture of a stone statue, "I think I've seen that statue at the cemetery," Lee said.

"When were you in the cemetery?" Ford asked. Lee shrugged. "Never mind. Let's go! Quick!"

The boys stood up and got a head rush from turning around so quickly, but they shook it off and ran out to the cemetery. Little did they know, the police officers were following them more closely than they thought…

Grantie Mae continued trying the break out of the stock, but it seemed like she would be stuck there for a while. In a last attempt to break out, she grabbed her hair pin with her teeth to try to undo the lock, but it fell from her mouth, "Darn it," she grumbled.

"Well, look at this," came a young voice she recognized from the ceremony. "If it isn't Stanley's old-lady aunt," Preston teased.

"Beat it, kid," she spat. "You mess with one Pines, you mess with all of us. Don't think I'm just going to ignore what you said to my nephew earlier."

He laughed, "Like that matters! By the way, what was up with his loser brother? Was it just me, or did he have, like, twelve fingers?"

"That's none of your business, Northwest," she growled. "Where are your parents?"

Preston leaned casually against the stock, "They're busy flaunting their money. So it's just you and me for now," he noticed a hair pin on the ground and picked it up. "You want me to help you out?"

"What do you want?" Grantie Mae asked. "Money? A football? Candles?"

"I want you to say that I'm better and smarter than those loser twins," he smiled smugly.

"You want that in writing?" Preston held out a notepad and stuck a pen in her mouth, and she wrote on it. "There you go."

Preston looked at the note, but it read, 'You look nice today!', "What?" he asked, confused.

"Well, what did you expect me to do? Lie?" She laughed, ignoring Preston's growing anger. He whistled to get the attention of some towns folk and pointed at Grantie Mae. They held tomatoes in their hands, prepared to throw them at her. "Oh, COME ON!" She yelled.

Stan and Ford made it to the cemetery and found a statue of an angel pointing off in the distance, "It looks like the statue is pointing to the next clue," Ford said. He turned to his right to try to find where the statue was pointing at, but turned to see that Lee had the statue's finger stuck in his nose.

"Oh, gross! She's picking my nose!" Stanley laughed. The tip of the finger bent upward. "Ach!"

Ford was about to tell his brother to get down, but then a secret door opened in the grave in front of the statue, "Stanley, look!" He pointed.

"Ha! Who's silly now, Preston? Bam!" Lee struggled to get his nose out of the statue's finger, hurting himself in the process, and then jumped off. "I'm okay."

The twins walked down the staircase, and as they traveled further from the surface, the area around them darkened. Ford fumbled through his bag and pulled out his trusty flashlight to help them see better. At certain times, the twins had to duck or move around to avoid cobwebs and bones of small rodents that once lived here.

"Now we're getting into real conspiracy mode," Stanley said in a hushed voice. "I feel serious…" He took out his bag of candy and popped another few in his mouth.

"Watch your step," Ford warned. He extended his arm to block Lee from walking ahead of him. They reached the bottom of the stairs, but there was a long, empty path ahead of them. "This looks too easy. I think there might be booby traps set out for trespassers."

Stanley giggled, "Booby traps…" he glanced at Ford, noticing his glare, and stopped laughing. "Serious. Right. Don't worry, Poindexter. I got this," he found a heavy slab of rock near him and threw it on the ground in front of him. Nothing happened. "Huh. Looks like it's clear."

"I wouldn't be too sure," Stanford frowned skeptically. "Maybe it's a specific tile that activates the trap, and you missed it. Okay, on the count of three, we both jump to where you threw the rock. Got it?" Lee nodded, and Ford took a deep breath. "One, two, three!"

The boys jumped off the last stair and landed right next to the rock. Ford couldn't balance himself, and he started to fall, "W-Woah!" Stanley caught him, but not before Ford stepped on another tile. The twins hugged each other in fear, but they sighed in relief when nothing happened. Ford and Lee looked at each other when they noticed they were still hugging, and they separated and dusted themselves off, mentally deciding not to mention the hug. "I guess there are no booby traps," Stanford admitted.

"Told you," Stanley teased, crossing his arms. "Come on!" The boys kept walking, but then Stanley felt one of the tiles he was standing on sink into the ground beneath him. "Stanford…?"

"What?" He asked. Stanford looked around him in time to see darts flying out of the walls towards them. "Tranquilizer darts! RUN!"

The boys ran as fast as they could to maneuver past the darts. They saw a small opening ahead of them where the booby trap ended, and they made a break for it. Miraculously, neither was hit by a dart as they fell through it. Stanley groaned, but he gasped when he saw the room around them. There were hidden artifacts and files all around them, and everything there contained confidential, historical information.

"We found it!" Ford gasped.

"Woah!" Stanley walked around the room and picked up a top-secret document. "Hey, Ford! The reason Abraham Lincoln wears a long top hat is because he has a hand sticking out of his head! And look at this!" He pointed to another section. "Ben Franklin was secretly a woman!"

"Let's stay on topic, Lee. We're proving the Northwests to be fakes, remember?" Stanford reminded him.

"Right. Where is that?"

Ford continued to look around until he found a document labeled 'Northwest Cover-up', "Here it is! Now we'll find out who the real town founder was."

"And humiliate Preston!" Lee exclaimed.

Stanford read from the document, "Let it be here recorded that Nathaniel Northwest, fabled founder of Gravity Falls, was, in fact, a fraud…" he smiled, "as well as a waste-shoveling village idiot?!" Ford laughed loudly at that. "Oh, man! Bad news for Preston! Wait'll the papers hear about this!"

"And once people see that I uncovered a historical conspiracy, they can never call me silly again!" Lee exclaimed. He glanced at Ford. "With the help of my trusty sidekick, of course."

Ford frowned, "Wait, I thought you and Fidds were the sidekicks."

Lee shrugged, "I kinda feel like the roles were switched today. Anyway, if Nathaniel Northwest never founded Gravity Falls, then who did?"

"That's what I'm finding out right now," Stanford continued reading from the document. "The true founder of Gravity Falls was sir lord, Quentin Trembley, the third, Esquire."

Stanley glanced over Ford's shoulder to look at the document, "Who's Quentin Trembley?"

"That. Is none of your business!"

The twins gasped, and saw that the two police officers caught up to them.

"How did you avoid the darts?" Ford asked.

Deputy Roy raised a finger, as if to answer, but then he passed out. Several tranquilizer darts were sticking out of his back, "He didn't," Sheriff Holt answered, "You kids shouldn't have been snooping around in the first place, and how you got that document that lead you here is beyond us, but the point is that Quentin Trembley's a matter of national security."

The blond officer started regaining consciousness. While still woozy, he stood up and pulled out the darts from his back, "Ouch… Nathan, I think I'm colorblind now…"

"What do you mean, 'national security'?" Stanford asked.

"And who is Quentin Trembley, anyway?" Stanley added.

"See for yourself," Sheriff Holt took out a reel of film from beneath his hat and inserted it into an old, dusty projector. The projection screen in front of them showed a countdown in black and white.

"Aww, it's black and white?!" Lee groaned. Ford shushed him, and the reel started.

A government official in an office spoke, "If you're watching this, then you are one of eight people in these United States with clearance to view this information. In fact, I myself will be shot as soon as the filming is complete," he looked offscreen for a moment, like someone was talking to him. "What? No? Ho! Well, that's a relief!" The official looked back at the camera. "Of all of America's secrets, the most embarrassing was that of Quentin Trembley: The eighth-and-a-half president of the United States."

"President?" Ford asked.

"Eight-and-a-half?" Lee repeated, both in equal confusion.

"After winning the 1837 election in a landslide," the video continued. It showed a picture of an actual landslide where the other presidential candidates were killed, "Quentin Trembley quickly gained a reputation as America's silliest president. He waged war on pancakes, appointed six babies to the supreme court, and issued the de-pants-ipation proclamation. His state of the union speech was even worse."

A pre-recorded tape of President Trembley played, "The only thing we have to fear is gigantic, man-eating spiders!"

"He was kicked out of office and escaped to an uncharted valley he named Gravity Falls, after plummeting into it at high speed. Trembley's shameful term was erased from history and officially replaced by William Henry Harrison as President and local nobody Nathaniel Northwest as founder of Gravity Falls. The whereabouts of president Trembley's body are unknown."

The reel ended, and Sheriff Holt spoke, "Until now," he shone his flashlight to a man that was completely encased in an amber-colored rectangular prism. It was none other than Quentin Trembley himself.

Stanford gasped, "Is he trapped in amber?"

Sheriff Holt scoffed, "The idiot thought he could live forever by encasing himself in a block of solid peanut brittle. Great job, Mr. President!" He added sarcastically. Holt turned back to the boys. "Finding Trembley's body was our special mission, and thanks to you, it's complete."

Deputy Roy held up one of Stanley's wrappers, "Who knew all we had to do was follow a little kid's trail of candy wrappers?"

"Ugh," Stanley face-palmed sadly, "silly!"

"Now that you know the truth," the sheriff continued, "we can't let you go around talking about it."

Ford gasped, "Does that mean…?"

"Are you going to KILL US?!" Stanley asked frantically.

The officers laughed, "Kill you?" Holt repeated. "We're not going to kill you. We're just going to escort you and all this stuff back to Washington. You won't be coming back, by the way," he added.

"But that's ILLEGAL!" Stanford exclaimed. "What about our great aunt?! And our parents?!"

"Pops won't like it if we become government property," Stanley added nervously.

The police officers glanced at each other, and turned back to the kids, "We'll let the FBI sort that out. Until then, you're coming with us."

Inside of a moving train, Lee and Ford were trapped in a large wooden crate along with Quentin Trembley's body. They banged on the wood and yelled for help, but no one heard them. Giving up on that plan, Lee leaned against the crate and slid onto the ground, "I can't believe I left a trail of candy wrappers," he groaned. "This is all my fault. Preston was right all along… I'm nothing but a silly failure, like that embarrassing president what's-his-name."

Stanley broke off a piece of peanut brittle from the block and tried to eat it, until Ford stopped him, "What part of 'braces' don't you get, Stanley? Don't eat that! Not to mention that thing's over a hundred years old!"

"Nag, nag, nag," he bit into it anyway, but he turned back to the block to see it was cracking.

The boys screamed and ran to the other corner of the crate. Trembley broke out of his peanut brittle prison, "It is I, Quentin Trembley," he declared. The founder ripped off his pants.

"You're alive!" Stanford exclaimed. "But how?"

Stanley picked up a broken piece of peanut brittle, "It's the peanut brittle! It really does have life-sustaining properties! You're not silly, you're a genius!"

"And so are you, dear boy, for following my clues are freeing me from my delicious tomb!" Trembley said.

"He's right!" Ford turned to his brother. "Making maps into hats, hanging upside-down; your silliness solved the code that serious cops couldn't crack in a hundred years!"

Lee gasped and held his cheeks, "I did, didn't I?"

"By Jefferson!" Trembley exclaimed. "We seem to be trapped in some sort of crate-shaped box."

"It's a crate, Mr. President," Stanley smiled.

The president pulled out a large key, "Good thing I have the President's Key, which can open any lock in America!" He repeatedly slammed it into the side of the crate.

Stanford held up a finger, "I… don't think that's going to work…"

"Wood! My age-old enemy," he turned to the kids. "In order to get out of here, this is going to take the silliest plan ever conceived."

Ford crossed his arms behind his back, "I think I know who can help you," he smiled at Stanley.

Stanley thought for a moment and looked around the crate, "Hmm. How about… that hole?" he pointed at a tiny hole near the corner of the crate.

"We will leap through it!" Trembley declared. He and Stanley jumped at the hole to try to squeeze through it, but all they managed to do was stick a finger through the hole. "Almost. Almost there. Good! Keep pushing," the president said, giving Lee words of encouragement.

Ford watched their futile attempt to escape from the other corner and frowned, "Guys… I'm not sure this is working."

"Trust… the silliness!" Lee exclaimed.

The sound of a woodpecker pecking on wood was heard, "Is that my third wife?" Trembley asked. "Sandy?" The crate fell apart, much to the twins' relief. Trembley huffed. "Well, we didn't fit through the hole. Let's rebuild the box and try again!"

"Forget about that! We have to get out of here!" Ford yelled. He and Lee ran out of the box.

"Also good!" The president followed them.

Stanford opened a door in the train, but stopped when he saw Deputy Roy in front of him, who was getting a large amount of ice from a machine. He gasped when he saw the three of them and dropped the bucket of ice, "NATE!"

They ran away to look for another exit before the police officers got to them. Ford found an emergency escape on the roof of the train car and they climbed up the ladder, but as they reached the opening, Trembley pulled out his President's Key to try to open it even though there wasn't a lock.

Ford took the key from him, "Give me that!" He turned the handle, and they climbed on the roof of the train car. The police officers followed them up, and Stanford looked behind him to see that they were on the last car. They were trapped.

Sheriff Holt took out his cuffs and approached them cautiously, "You kids are in a heap of trouble."

"But Sheriff Holt, do you really want to lock us all up in a government facility somewhere?" Stanford asked.

"We don't have a choice! Our orders come from the very top!"

An idea popped in Ford's mind, "Wait!" He turned to the town founder. "Quentin, did you ever sign an official resignation?"

"No, sir," he answered. "I ate a salamander and jumped out the window."

"But then that means…" Stanley gasped. "You're still the President of the United States, right?"

Stanford fixed his glasses, "Well, I suppose technically, yeah," he turned to Holt and Roy. "Quentin Trembley is legally your boss, and you have to answer to him now!" He exclaimed.

"Huh?" The officers shared confused looks.

Trembley stepped forward, "As president of these several United States, I hereby order you to pretend none of this ever happened. And- and go on a delightful vacation," the train drove under a metal rail that struck him in the back of the head. "Ow! Mmm yeeees!"

"Vacation?" The cops looked at each other questionably, and they smiled in unison.

Later, the twins and Trembley have returned safely to the Gravity Falls train station, and the train left, with the police officers on board, all packed and ready for their vacation.

"Michigan, here we come!" Declared Deputy Roy. They waved their good-byes to them until they were out of sight.

Trembley turned to the boys, "I don't believe I learned your names," he commented.

"Stanley Pines, at your service," he smiled and shook the man's hand.

The president got down on one knee and looked at him, "You've already done a great service, Stanley. Not only for myself, but also for this country. As thanks, I'd like to make you an official U.S. congressman," he unfolded a black top hat and handed it to Stanley.

He placed the hat on his head and smiled, "I'm legalizing everything!"

Trembley turned to Stanford, "And other Stanley…"

"Uh, actually, I-I'm-"

"You, dear boy, are on your way to unlocking the mysteries of this great land. So I'd like you to have my President's Key," he handed the large key to Ford, who smiled at the kind gesture.

"-And then he chased me around and spanked me with a paddle for, like, three hours. Bottom line, George Washington was a jerk," the president finished.

Stanley smiled, thoroughly enjoying Trembley's stories he told to pass the time, "Agreed."

They finally made their way back to the main street, where the celebration was still going on as if nothing happened. Preston could be seen with some friends, being a typical snot to a younger kid. Once he was alone, Stanley approached him smugly with Quentin Trembley and Stanford shortly behind him.

"Hey, Preston!" he waved. "I just uncovered a government conspiracy about the eighth-and-a-half president of the United States! Who's silly now?"

Preston hesitated, thinking about what he just said, "What?" He looked behind Stanley, where Trembley was chasing after a bald eagle, intending to fight it. "Who is that idiot?"

"Sir lord, Quentin Trembley the third, esquire," Stanley answered. "The eighth-and-a-half president of America. How is he alive, you ask? Well, it turns out you can hibernate in peanut brittle and it-"

The other boy broke out in laughter, interrupting Lee, "Wow! You really are a stupid little kid. What's with the dumb hat anyway?" he teased.

"Preston Northwest!" A voice exclaimed. The boy stopped laughing and turned around to see his mother. She was frowning angrily at him. "What did I tell you about your behavior?" She asked.

Preston looked back between his mother and Stanley, "B-but Mom!"

"No buts. Except for your's in the limo. We're leaving," she asserted. Preston grumbled and reluctantly left to do what he was told. Once he was gone, Mrs. Northwest turned to the other boys. "I'm incredibly sorry about my son. I'm sure you'll be great friends eventually," she grabbed each their hands and shook it. "Pacifica Northwest. I believe you kids are Mabel's nephews."

"You know our Grantie Mae?" Ford asked.

"Of course I do," she smiled. "By the way, where is she?"

The twins glanced at each other, "I think she said she was at the candle dipping booth," Lee answered.

"Oh, is she, now?" Mrs. Northwest laughed. "Then she wouldn't want to be bothered right now, would she? Well, it was nice to meet you boys," she left to join her son in the limo.

Stanford blinked in confusion and held up the document to Stanley, "Uh, Lee? Aren't you gonna tell him about his ate-gray ampa-gray?"

"You know, Stanford, I don't really want to do that now," Stanley admitted. "Besides, I've got nothing to prove. I learned that being myself is awesome!"

Ford frowned and glared at the limo that was beginning to drive off, "Well, I haven't learned anything!" He ran to the Northwests' car. "HEY, PRESTON!"

The car stopped and Preston rolled down his window, "What do YOU want?" he asked bitterly.

Stanford handed him the documents of the cover-up through the window, "Nathaniel Northwest didn't found Gravity Falls, and your whole family is a sham. Deal with it!"

The limo drove away, but Ford could see Preston's shocked expression through the back window, "What?! Mom!"

Ford smiled, feeling accomplished, "That actually felt good," he turned to Lee, who had caught up to him. "Who knew revenge was so underrated, am I right?"

Stanley gave his brother a playful punch on the arm, "You're such a dork."

The kids laughed, but they were interrupted when Trembley spoke, "Children, I am needed elsewhere. Just know that I'll always be right here…" he gestured to his heart, but then he pulled out a bill from a pocket in his coat. "On the negative twelve dollar bill," he handed the money to Ford.

He examined it, "Whoa. This is worthless," he smiled.

"It's less than worthless, my boy. Trembley away!" Quentin Trembley jumped backwards onto a horse that just happened to be standing nearby and rode away.

After a short moment, Stanley spoke up, "Where do you think he's going?"

"I'm gonna say… off a cliff," he guessed. Ford looked at the sky and noticed that the sun was setting. "Let's find Grantie Mae."

It was a shock for both of them when they finally found Mae trapped in the stocks in the town square. The twins listened to the whole story of her imprisonment.

"-And then Maria came by and talked to me for like, an hour. Eventually, the guy at the booth said he would let me go if I said I was sorry, but in no way was I going to apologize for art," she finished.

Stanley placed his hand on her shoulder, "You've been through so much," he sympathized.

"Here, let me try something," Stanford offered. He took out the President's Key to unlock the stocks and free Grantie Mae. "It works!" he exclaimed happily.

She laughed, "Thank Sweet Baby Moses! You kids really are something, aren't ya? Where'd you get that key? And the top hat?" Mae asked.

"They're souvenirs!" Stanley answered. "From the eighth-and-a-half president! He made me an official congressman!"

"Hmm, I don't remember that attraction," Grantie Mae thought to herself. She checked the time. "Oh, well. Looks like I'll have to wait until next year to see it. It's gettin' late, kiddos."

The boys looked around to see that their aunt was right. The sky was getting dark, shops were closing, and people were leaving. Stanley broke out a yawn, and Grantie Mae hoisted him up on her shoulders. "Let's go home."

As they walked to the car, it started to get chilly, and Stanley grabbed his sweater from around his waist and slipped it on, "Hey, you're wearing your sweater again," Stanford pointed out.

Grantie Mae smiled up at her nephew, "You feel better, sweetie?" Stanley nodded and smiled contently. "You are a special boy," she said. "No matter what anyone says, you are your own unique mark on this world. You are not weird, Stanley. The same goes for you too, Ford," she turned to the other twin. "Both of you. I couldn't have asked for better grand nephews than you two."

"I'm also a silly goofball," Stanley giggled with his eyes closed. "But I wouldn't have it any other way."