"Unbelievable... Just unbelievable..."
Benson exhaled slowly, trying to keep his temper. After all, he did need to find out what exactly happened and why. The slight twinge of an oncoming migraine was starting to fill the inside of his glass head. He looked up across the meeting room table at the usual suspects behind anything weird that happens at the park: a certain duo consisting of a blue jay and a raccoon.
The shades were drawn, letting little light from the outside to seep in. Nobody in the room wanted to look outside and see the aftermath of all the carnage that took place earlier on this warm summer day.
"I know I keep letting you guys off lightly for all the weird stuff that happens around here, but this time it's gone too far." Benson said as calmly as possible.
"Look, Benson, I know most of the time it is our fault..." Mordecai admitted. "But seriously this thing came out of nowhere!"
"DON'T GIVE ME THAT LOAD OF BULL! YOU GUYS ARE ALWAYS THE CAUSE OF ANYTHING STRANGE GOING ON AROUND HERE!" Benson roared in reply.
Mordecai and Rigby froze in their seats at this outburst of anger. Looks of worry and fear were plastered on their faces. They didn't dare protest.
"PARK PATRONS DIED TODAY BECAUSE OF THIS! IT'S A VERY SERIOUS SITUATION! SO STOP TRYING TO DODGE RESPONSIBILITY AND JUST TELL ME WHAT HAPPENED!"
Mordecai and Rigby were used to Benson constantly yelling at them. But this time it was entirely different. Rigby didn't even think about snarking back at Benson as he would've usually done under normal circumstances. Mordecai finally mustered up the courage to speak.
"Benson, I am going to be totally straight up with you: we had nothing to do with that...um..." he struggled to find the right word to describe the monstrosity. "Well, it was like a giant shadow monster thing."
Benson, having calmed down significantly, bluntly said "Go on, tell me."
"Okay, so... um... first the sky turned like a sick, blotchy purple color and then we heard this droning noise. It was freaky as all hell, dude. Anyways, then that.. thing just appeared out of nowhere and just started trashing everything in sight. It leveled the snack bar, the fountain, it even went for Muscle Man's trailer."
At the mention of the Rigby snapped out of his silence and started to chuckle. Benson glared down at the small raccoon with a look of pure contempt. Rigby immediately shut up.
"At that point it had already killed a few people so the rest of the park crew came to try and stop it. We tried killing it so many different ways. It just wouldn't die. Even Skips couldn't take it down."
Benson shuddered at the thought of that. What could be that powerful that not even Skips could take it down?
"So, instead of killing it, we distracted it long enough for Skips to perform one of his spirit dance things. When he finished, the monster let out this unearthly scream and just vanished."
"Anything else I should know?" Benson asked.
"Yeah, it left this weird coin-looking thing on the ground." Mordecai replied.
He took out the object and laid it on the conference table. It was a small piece of wood cut in the shape of a slightly oblong circle. The side facing up had a weird carving etched into it. The carving was of a normal human hand. However, Benson noticed that it had six fingers instead of the usual five.
Rigby finally started to act like himself again. "It's a stupid piece of junk. Just throw it away and move on with our lives."
He received a swift punch in the shoulder by Mordecai. Rigby recoiled in pain and let out a whining groan.
"Shut up dude, it's obviously gotta be important. These symbols have to mean something." Mordecai said.
A six-fingered hand? What the hell is this supposed to mean? Benson pondered.
He then flipped over the piece of wood to see what was on the other side. There was another etching on this side. To Benson's surprise, the symbol was one that was very familiar to him after all these years at the park. The symbol was of a lone pine tree.
No, it couldn't be. We ended this awhile ago. Could they really be responsible for this instead of Mordecai and Rigby?
Benson grabbed his walkie talkie and spoke into it "Muscle Man, Fives, Skips, and Pops listen up. I need everybody in the office now."
A short time later, the rest of the park crew walked in and sat down in the dark conference room.
"Yo, Benson bro. What's the deal with all this freaky shit going on?" Muscle Man questioned loudly.
"I was just going to explain that." replied Benson. "When Skips sent the monster away, it left behind this small, wooden object."
Benson held up the object in front of everyone so that they could plainly see it. Pops looked at it with the innocent curiosity of a child. Everyone else was wondering what it had to do with the monster.
"On this side of the object, there's a six-fingered hand etched into it. Does anyone have any idea of what it could mean?" Benson asked.
Muscle Man had a smirk on his face "I don't know what it's doing with six fingers. But do you know who else has six fingers and doesn't know what to do with them?" Before anybody could silence him he blurted out "MY MOM!" and started guffawing. Fives laughed and then delivered one of his signature high-fives to Muscle Man for his stupid joke.
Benson started to turn red, and looked as if he were about to blow a fuse. Muscle Man immediately became serious again.
"Sorry, Benson. Please go on." Muscle Man apologized.
"Now on the other side is a symbol that all of you should recognize." Benson flipped the object around to reveal the pine tree etched into the opposite side.
Skips spoke out, "That's the emblem on the East Pines Park sign."
"Exactly," said Benson "But I thought we agreed to a truce after Muscle Man scared the living hell out of Gene."
"This is ridiculous, dude! Innocent people lost their lives because of this! They've gone too far this time!" Mordecai shouted bravely.
"YEAH LET'S KILL THOSE SORRY JERKS!" Rigby shouted at the top of his lungs.
Everyone agreed heartily with Mordecai's and Rigby's outburst. Except for Benson, who was thinking deeply.
"Settle down, guys." Benson said plainly "Now, I know it looks like they're behind this, but we have to be absolutely sure. So, we are going over there to get an explanation as to why their symbol was left behind by that monster. Don't bring any pranking weapons either. We go in there, get information from Gene, and then leave. Everyone understand?"
The park crew, who were ready to go back to war, deflatedly agreed to Benson's rules.
They all loaded up into the golf cart and sped toward the park on the opposite side of town.
The park crew reached the gate of East Pines Park. There were two guards standing watch out front.
"Well look what we have here, those jackasses from Quintel-Marin Park." the one guard taunted.
The park crew glared with looks of pure animosity at their former enemies. But listening to Benson's orders they didn't try to start a fight.
"What are you doing here, we still have that truce going on. Remember?" the second said condescendingly.
"We're here to talk to Gene." Benson replied, unfazed by the guards' taunting.
"Alright, but we'll be watching you. One wrong move and we'll be back to the old prank war." the first guard yelled.
The gate opened up and Benson drove the cart into East Pines. He determinedly drove on wanting to get to the bottom of this whole situation.
What the hell is going on?