"...Hurry! Hurry! C'mon, move it!" Mabel barked as she flew downstairs, swift as the wind itself. Her twin took up the rear, trying his best not to trip as he clumsily juggled both a camera and a scrap of cardboard with a flurry of hasty black scribbles.
"Welcome back to Dipper's Guide to the Unexplained, anomaly number one hundred and twenty...uh, what's that even say...uh, twenty-three, I think!" He gasped before tossing the title card aside. "Sorry, about the rush, everyone, but my sister Mabel-"
"Dipper, c'monnnnn!" His twin danced impatiently at the bottom of the stairs before firing off.
"Okay, so Mabel just told me that there's something incredible waiting in the back yard. I don't know what it is yet, but you all know the drill by now!" He flashed a bold smile. "When there's a mystery to be investigated, then I'm just the guy for the job! All right, now here...we...goooooo!"
Adrenalin pounded through his veins as he charged headlong out of the back door of the shack, camera in hand and ready to face whatever strange and bizarre thing had apparently revealed itself. To his speedy surprise though, he didn't find anything even remotely strange waiting him. That is, unless one honestly considered a teenager parking a bicycle to be a particularly unusual phenomenon.
Wendy quizzically cocked an eyebrow as she removed her helmet. A brief but awkward silence followed before she spoke up. "….You okay?"
"I…yeah, I'm fine. I just…" The utter lack of mystery and wonder had left the boy at a temporary loss. and Dipper' struggled to explain himself. "See, I…uh…"
She noticed the camera in his hands, and a mischievous grin crept across her face. "Were you doin' one of your mystery vids or whatever? Dude, if you thought I was that weird, then you could have said something."
"No!" He sputtered hoarsely. "I-I thought...see, Mabel just started yelling at me to go outside for something incredible-"
"And it is!" Mabel clapped her hands and bounced with barely restrained anticipation. "Did you have them? Do you?"
The tween girl was so wound up, she couldn't stop bouncing about even if she tried. Wendy snickered triumphantly before she reached into her backpack and dug out a white cardboard box.
"Donuts?" Dipper murmured. The lanky teen nodded as she open the top and proudly displayed twelve freshly baked delights, topped with a rich variety of colored sprinkles, thick frosting and finely powdered sugar as white as snow.
"A new place opened up in town, and I heard they make some pretty legit stuff." A mischievous chuckle rang through the air. "So while Stan was in his office I ducked out-"
"JELLY!" Mabel lunged and eagerly snatched one up. Her brother meanwhile had yet to work up so much as a fraction as much enthusiasm thanks to a cocktail of visibly lingering disappointment and a sizable splash of embarrassment.
"Oh...um, thanks." Warm scarlet crept up the back of his neck as he stowed the camera into his vest pocket. "Sorry, I just thought-"
Powdered sugar sprinkled off his sister's lips as she launched into a fit of the giggles. "Oh, what's with you? Things can't be totally awesome just because we're not looking at the new weirdest thing ever?"
Mabel bounded over to deliver a quick jab in his boney side, and took appropriate care to blow her tongue for an accompanying sound effect. "Thbbbt! Or are you just worried you won't be the skinniest thin-butt in the world now! Are you? Are you, Mister Skinny-skins! Huh? Are you? Skinny, skinny, Skinny Mc-Scrawny..."
"Hey! Mabel, quit it!" Dipper backed off a few feet as mercilessly bombarded him with playful pokes. "Cut it out!"
"C'mon Dip, just give it a break." Wendy unceremoniously plopped herself down on the wooden porch, then temptingly waved the box. "C'mon, check it out! Do-nuts! Do-nuts! Do-nuts!"
"Do-nuts! Do-nuts!" Mabel gleefully joined in on the chant as she skipped over and plucked up a rainbow-sprinkled treat. Dipper quickly found that it was literally impossible to do anything else but lighten up. After all, his crush was offering him delicious baked goods, and now that he gave it more than a moment's thought, he quick decided that was anything but a disappointing turn of events. A smile slowly took shape as he took a seat beside the teen.
"I guess I could give the guide a break for one day." He said mock-reluctantly before reaching for a honey-glazed treat.
"Dork! Mystery dork!" Mabel teased between ravenous bites.
"Really? Glazed?" Wendy's eyes twinkled cheekily as she slapped on a fake scowl of disapproval. "Laaaaaame! C'mon man, you it's alllllll about the chocolate with cream filling!"
"Sorry for being the only classy one here." Dipper shot back as he joined in on the playful taunting. Life was too short to get too wrapped up in the unknown, anyway.
"Is that how they say 'boring' where you're from? Weirdos." She shot back tit-for-tat. Teen and preteens happily carried on lounging in the warm summer sun, munching and joking away as if they didn't have a single care in the whole entire world. One would have honestly been hard pressed to find a more pleasant sight in all of Gravity Falls at that very moment.
Of course, that only made what happened next all the greater shock. It was right then that one of donuts decided to reveal that it was far more than a mere baked good. A maple cream suddenly hurled itself clean out of the box, coming to a rough landing in the grass. Before any of the trio could do little more beyond registering this abnormality, the little pastry suddenly erupted smack in its center, and released a burst of putrid, jet black smoke. Rapidly the noxious fumes spewed, growing and spreading outwards in blatant defiance of all natural laws until it had nearly formed a perfect sphere of acrid darkness.
With an earth-shattering roar, the unholy cloud abruptly dispersed, revealing nothing short of a living nightmare. Scores of spider-like legs with joints that bent at every conceivable, and some that weren't, sprouted from a massive egg-shaped body. Nearly every inch of the terrible bulk was coated in a mysterious coat that seemed to be simultaneously scaly, yet hairy, and glistened with a nauseating color that no human eyes had ever seen before. Nearly the center of its strangely pulsating frame were three winding arms, each topped with a serrated lobster-like claw. As if the assembled teen and preteens weren't utterly horrified enough as it was by the extraordinary sight, the beast didn't even have a legitimate head. The closest thing it possessed was a bald, ball-like growth atop a towering neck, bearing at least a half-dozen fang-filled mouths that spoke together as one.
"THE FINAL SEAL HAS BEEN BROKEN." It announced in a booming gurgle that sent stomachs knotting and skin crawling. "IA! KLUB-SIGGORATH! IA! IA! ALL HAIL THE COMING AGE OF DARKNESS! WHAT WAS WILL BE NO MORE. AS THE SEVEN SKULLS OF GR'A-NCCH FORSAW, DLUN'FRTCH SHALL NOW BE UNLEASHED UPON THIS PATHETIC REALM THAT YOU CALL EXISTENCE. COME AND EMBRACE THE GLORIOUS OBLIVION THAT NOW AWAITS ALL. THE END. THE END. THE END HAS COME-"
The creature paused in mid-speech, and finally took a good long look at its horrified audience through invisible eyes. The fang-lined mouths that weren't spouting a revolting viscous goo frowned in honest bemusement as it contorted its neck and lowered its speaking appendage towards the violently trembling twins.
"WHO ARE YOU?" It demanded.
Mabel quivered uncontrollably, and for the moment could utter nothing more than piteous strained squeaks as bits of half-chewed donut tumbled from her lips. She gripped her brother's arm tightly with the force of an industrial claw. After fighting to regain control of temporarily paralyzed vocal cords, Dipper somehow scrounged up enough courage to answer back.
"Dipper." He rasped in an uncontrollable quake. "My name is Dipper P-Pines."
"I-I'm...I'm M-Mabel." His twin stammered weakly as she followed his example.
The abomination looked to Wendy, who by now had gone so white that her normally pale skin was practically translucent. Still unable to speak, she dug a hand into her pocket and shakily displayed her school ID. The monster carefully looked each one over through unseen senses, and took a moment to mull over these unexpected replies.
"IS THIS NOT THE TENTH REALM-RING OF YUG-NAMARTH?"
"No...this is Gravity Falls...um, in Oregon...in the United States...on earth...uh, s-sir." Dipper added in, just to be safe. Again, another long, awkward quiet followed as the mysterious creature finally realized that it had made a mistake.
"SORRY. MY BAD." With surprisingly delicacy, it picked up the mashed remnants of the donut it had inexplicably emerged from, and politely placed it back in the box. With nothing more to say, it clenched its several jaws clenched tightly, and in a flash of violet light it wordlessly vanished from their worldly plane of being, leaving nothing more than a strange odor that was curiously similar to the stench of rotten eggs.
An epic silence descended upon the stunned trio. As she clutched her knees and rocked back and forth, Mabel finally broke the deathly quiet with a despondent whine. "...Dumb s-stinkface...he ruined donuts for today...h-he ruined donut yumminess..."
Her eyes still as wide as saucers, Wendy readily agreed with a hard sweep of her arm that sent the remainder of their afternoon tumbling off the porch. Her brunette friend whimpered piteously, and started to clumsily scootch closer as fast she could. The teen didn't raise an ounce of protest, and in moments both the rattled souls were cuddling close for badly needed comfort.
"Dipperrrrr." Mabel pled shamelessly, signaling that it wasn't nearly enough to help make the trauma go away. It took a few more moments for the boy in question to crack out of his daze. After he snapped came back to the present, he gestured with a trembling hand to the others.
"Hold on, I just...j-just have to...I-I should probably..." He muttered, and without much further ado he fished the video camera from his vest, switched it on and pointed the lens toward his ghostly white face.
"H-hey everyone...welcome b-back to Dipper's Guide to the...well, you know." He announced as he voluntarily joined the group huddle. "Today...t-today we're going to talk about the mystery of w-why we can't seem to have nice around things here..."