Wow. So, uh, hi everyone! It's been a while, right?

I don't really have an excuse - it honestly took a while for me to get back into writing. There was about a six-month period where I wasn't doing much other than just doing my thing, and honestly, 2020 has been a garbage year for me, pandemic aside.

On the bright side, I've got more time for writing and a need for escapism with everything that's been going on, so there's that.

Anyways, enjoy!


Chapter 27

"Why wouldn't you want a tail?" Danny demanded one rainy afternoon, shoving a handful of popcorn into his mouth. "I feel like having a tail would be like having an extra hand."

"Or an extra limb to accidentally catch between the door and the door frame," Stan argued back. Danny was sprawled next to him on the couch, and Stan reached over to grab a handful of popcorn for himself. That day was a slow tour day due to the rain, and both men decided to spend their time watching the Grandpa the Kid marathon, a western series that was popular back in the seventies. "I already get accidentally injured enough times during the day; I don't need another reason. Like that golf ball that hit me in the eye last week. I mean, how does that even happen? I'm wearing glasses, it somehow missed them, and still hit me in the eye!"

"Maybe the universe just hates you," Danny supplied sagely around a mouthful of popcorn. "Or maybe it's all your bad karma just racking up its debt."

"Oh, like you're much better," Stan grumbled, and Danny cocked an eyebrow at his friend.

"Uh, I'm not the one with a job to con people out of money, Stan," he pointed out, and Stan scoffed.

"Oh please, you're my business partner! You've probably got almost as much as me, admit it," he said, elbowing Danny in the side. Danny threw a kernel at the older man, who easily caught it and tossed it into his mouth.

"Yeah, but you were doing lots of worse things before I met you, remember? Arrested for Pug Smuggling?"

"Oh, right," Stan remembered, a fond grin on his face. "Those were the glory days."

They sat back and watched the rest of the show, before a familiar voice echoed through the speakers of the television.

Danny's face screwed up. "Ugh, Little Gideon again?" he asked upon seeing the child psychic, and Stan leaned back.

"Hey, kids! Come help me make fun of this TV commercial!" he called, and within seconds, the twins joined the pair on the couch.

"Ugh, Gideon," Dipper said with disgust, and Mabel winced.

"Remember when I wouldn't date him, and he tried to destroy us?" she asked, as Wendy and Soos joined them in the living room.

"He's always trying to trick me into losing the Mystery Shack!" Stan exclaimed with a roll of his eyes, and Danny scoffed.

"Yeah, good luck with that," the halfa said with a shake of his head. "There are goldfish with more sense than him."

"One time, I caught him stealing my moisturizer," Wendy chipped in, leaning on the back of the couch with a disturbed look on her face.

"And yet, our mutual hatred for him bonds us together," Soos said cheerily.

"So come down to see Little Gideon," the announcer on TV said, "opening soon at this location!"

To everyone's shock, the commercial depicted one of Gideon's tents landing in place of the Mystery Shack. Danny sat upright, as Dipper asked, "Uh, should we be worried about that?"

"Please," Stan said dismissively, "the only way Gideon's taking over this Shack is by breaking in and stealing the deed."

"Which he can't really do anyways, not without suffering a few lawsuits and possible juvenile prison time," Danny added, scratching at his chin.

There was the sound of glass smashing from another room, and everyone straightened, just as Wendy said, "You mean, like, right now?"

Everyone bolted to the office, and Stan threw the door open to reveal a familiar, blue-suited, white-pompadour figure fiddling with the safe.

"Gideon!" Stan snapped, as Danny pulled out his phone and began to record the situation.

"Well, well, Stanford! Daniel! My arch nemeses!" Gideon exclaimed with false cheer. He rose away from the safe and turned his attention to the crowd in the doorway. His eyes narrowed, and he announced, "We seem to have entered into a dangerous game of cat and mouse! But the question remains, who is the cat, and who is the -!"

"Soos. Broom. Now," Stan commanded, holding out a hand, and Gideon paled. Danny sighed, and put the phone away. He couldn't exactly turn in evidence of breaking and entering when there was child assault and battery by one of the owners of the Mystery Shack included with said evidence.

"Oh no, not the broom!" Gideon shrieked, and Stan rushed into the room with the broom. After a few missed swings, Gideon hissed at Stan, like a cat, only to receive a mouthful of bristles and dust. Coughing, Gideon bolted out of the room and into the rain with a squeal. "Rheeeee!"

Stan chased him up to the porch, and as everyone else followed, Gideon shook a fist threateningly at them. "You mark my words! One day I'm gonna get that combination! And once I steal that deed, you'll never see the Mystery Shack again!"

"Good luck, Gideon!" Danny taunted, and they retreated back inside, leaving Gideon fuming in the rain.

"Hah!" Stan crowed victoriously as they checked the safe (mostly to make sure that Gideon didn't actually get it), and Stan shut the door and locked the safe with a cocky smile. "The combo to the safe is in the one place he'll never find! My brain!" He looked askance at Danny. "I still don't know why you never bothered with learning it," he said, and Danny shrugged, both of them not noticing the chubby figure lurking by the window.

"There's no reason when I can just reach in and grab it," Danny said as they walked away. "It's safer when there's only one person to know how to open it anyways, since I doubt anyone else will be capable of taking it like me."

"See, this is why you make such a good business partner," Stan said, slinging an arm around Danny's shoulders as they returned to the couch. "You're just as paranoid as me!"

Unknown to the occupants of the Shack, Little Gideon was still outside despite the rain, and he chuckled to himself.

"Your brain isn't as safe as you might think, Stanford Pines!" He pulled out a red and gold-bound book with a six-fingered hand on the front, and began to flip through its pages. "This is the last straw! It's time to unlock the journal's greatest secret!"

He stopped on a particular page, and the image of a triangle with a top hat, bowtie, and a single eye stared back at him.


"He put the 'old' in Old West! They call him...Grandpa the Kid!"

Danny groaned, and flipped over on the couch so that his head was hanging off the cushions, with his legs propped up by the back. He watched Dipper and Wendy absently shoot at each other with a pair of Nyarf guns as the show's protagonist appeared on screen.

The old man squinted from underneath his galleon hat. "I'm tired during the day," he said gravely, and Stan nodded appreciatively.

"I can relate to this," he said with approval, and Danny poked him.

"Maybe because you're ancient," the halfa said, and Stan swatted at him.

"Grunkle Stan, why don't we watch something that we'll all enjoy?" Mabel suggested from Dipper's side. She held up a movie that was very brightly colored. "Dream Boy High! Where love is on your permanent record!" she suggested happily, and immediately all the males vetoed it.

"Boooo!"

"You'll learn to like it!" Mabel said confidently, and Danny wrinkled his nose. He doubted it.

A crash resounded from the kitchen, and Soon dove into the room, screaming.

"AAAHHH! Dudes! There's a bat in the kitchen!" he yelled, before he shuddered and wiggled his fingers. "It tried to touch me with its weird little bat fingers!"

"Don't worry, I got this under control!" Stan said, before he reclined further onto the couch. "Dipper, take care of it!"

"Ah, what?" Dipper complained, as Mabel laughed at her twin before she cheered.

"Yes!"

"Why can't Mabel do it?" Dipper demanded with a glare directed at his uncle.

"Cause life ain't fair," Stan replied immediately, and Danny rolled his eyes. "Now, go fight a bat so we can watch TV."

"No way, Grunkle Stan," Dipper exclaimed, rising to his feet and standing in front of the TV. "You always make me do dumb chores!"

"That's not true," Stan refuted with a scowl. He slapped Danny's stomach, and the halfa let out a quiet, "Oof!" "Sometimes I make Casper do them!"

"Well, I'm putting my foot down this time!" Dipper said resolutely, and he stomped his foot for emphasis.

Stan straightened, and he leaned in threateningly. "I said do it, kid! Now!"

Danny pushed himself up to watch the proceedings as Western music played in the background. Tensions rose as Stan and Dipper stared each other down, but after a moment, the younger male backed down.

"Okay, okay! I'll do it!" he finished with a grumble, and he sighed before he stomped towards the kitchen. After a moment, Mabel hurried to her feet and scampered after him.

"Stupid chores," Danny heard him say sourly.

"Remember," Mabel warned, "bats are more afraid of you than you are of them." There was a pause, before Mabel wondered, "Maybe I'm thinking of ducklings?"

Dipper screamed, and Danny sighed before he rose to his feet. "I probably should go help the kid," Danny said, wincing when Dipper let out a high-pitched shriek, accompanied by the crash of dishes falling.

"Yeah, before he ruins any more of our plates," Stan agreed, cringing a little when a plate shattered.


"Ow, ow!" Dipper whined, jerking his hand in Danny's grasp. Danny expertly wiped on disinfectant where the bat scratched Dipper's hand. After a moment, he set the paste down before turning his attention to bandaging Dipper's head, from when the twelve-year-old smashed it into the edge of the counter.

Off to the side, Soos hummed, fixing himself a sandwich, and Mabel gathered all the errant first-aid supplies.

"Ugh, why does Grunkle Stan always pick on me?" Dipper complained. "Think about it! The more painful or difficult the chore is, the more likely it is that I'll have to do it! Why doesn't he pick on you guys?!"

"He picks on me all the time, but the thing is, I can pick on him right back, so maybe it doesn't have the same effect," Danny suggested.

"Dipper, Stan's personality is one of life's great mysteries," Soos advised, and Danny snorted aloud in agreement. "Like whether or not it's possible to lick your own elbow."

There was a pause, before Mabel challenged brightly, "I bet you can't."

"I bet I can," Soos immediately refuted, before attempting the endeavor.

"Lick it, lick it!" Mabel chanted, and together, the pair wandered from the room.

Dipper sighed in frustration, but looked up when Danny put a comforting hand on the twin's shoulder.

"Sometimes I feel like Stan hates me," he confessed, and Danny shook his head.

"He cares for you, trust me," Danny tried to console, but the effect was ruined when Stan called from the bathroom, "The sink's clogged! Dipper, get in here and fix it!"

Dipper growled, and seized the nearby Nyarf gun. He took aim, and fired, hitting a picture of Stan dead in the eye.

Danny sighed, and rose to his feet. "I'll talk to him, see if I can get him to lay off a bit," he offered, but Dipper only scowled in reply before he stormed out of the kitchen.


"So, I spoke with Dipper earlier," Danny began, taking back his seat next to Stan on the couch, and Stan grunted.

"Is he still upset from earlier?" he asked, and Danny hemmed and hawed.

"Well…he thinks you're being unfair," Danny answered with a shrug. "He thinks you keep picking on him."

"Look, I pick on him because I'm trying to toughen him up! It's something he's going to have to deal with, because life ain't fair -!"

Suddenly, mid-rant, Stan dropped off into a snore, his whole body slumping like a marionette with its strings cut. Danny jerked upright, and stared at Stan with equal amounts of surprise, shock, and wariness.

"Uh, Stan-?" he began to ask, but instead his entire body shuddered, and mist escaped his mouth. Only, instead of the usual cool blue that normally escaped him when a ghost was near, it was red.

And the last time he'd seen a red ghost sense was when he was fighting Dan.

Alarmed, Danny reached over and began to shake Stan, only to panic when the conman didn't so much as twitch. "Stan? Stan! STAN!"

After a moment, Danny rose to his feet, and suddenly the room was illuminated by a pair of twin rings. Within moments, Danny Phantom stood in his place, and he floated up into the air, the brilliant green of his eyes set on his friend.

"Sorry, Stan," he muttered, his voice echoing in the small confines of the room, and with a deep breath, he dove towards the older man.

Normally, when Danny phased into a person's body, he was able to possess it. This time, however, was different - it transported him directly to Stan's mind, which was something that he'd never done before (the dream thing he'd done to Sam and Tucker was different - he'd used one of his parents' inventions for that).

Stan's mind was like a fun house maze, Danny decided, floating through wooden corridors filled with doors, warning signs, and glass surfaces that reflected images of Stan's memories. Only, not as fun as an actual fun house. More creepy. A creep house.

Almost as creepy as being a ghost, Danny reflected, watching the memory of Stan seeing Danny transform for the first time. The sight of Stan screaming at a grinning and unrepentant Danny Phantom brought a smile to his face.

A shimmer of gold in the distance caught Danny's attention, and frowning, he floated through a series of haphazard stairs and hallways before he caught up to it.

There, searching through doors, was a triangle creature, glowing gold with a floating top hat.

Danny paused at the sight of it - for he had seen sketches of a similar creature in the first of Ford's journals, of a supernatural being called Bill. According to Ford's journal, Ford made a deal with the creature, and began learning all about the supernatural. Bolstered by the knowledge, he floated closer.

But, as Danny approached the being, the red mist escaped his mouth again. He paused, unsure, and a flash of Ford's face, from the depths of his memories, slipped through his mind. Ford had looked exhausted, worn out, and paranoid beyond all belief back then.

The creature turned, and noticed him with its single eye.

"Have you come to steal my eyes?!" Ford's voice rang through his head, accompanied with an image of Ford turning a figure away from him, so that the eyes were facing away, and Danny plastered on a brave smile.

"Bill, I presume?" he asked, and the creature's eye widened before curling in amusement.

"And you're Danny Fenton! It's a pleasure to finally meet you!" he exclaimed, his voice echoing as much as Danny's, but with a...decidedly darker quality to it. "Y'know, I've heard and seen a lot about you!" he said, floating closer to the halfa. "Daniel Fenton, Danny Fenton...hey, do you mind if I call you Dan?"

Danny's smile vanished, and he said, icily, "Absolutely not."

"Well, in that case, I'll just call you Inviso-Bill, because what a great name!" the triangle said brightly, reflecting an image of Danny in his teens, back when he first received his ghost powers. "Or maybe just Ghost."

Danny didn't feel all too comfortable with this being. And how did Bill know that Danny used to be called Inviso-Bill, a lifetime ago? "You know of my history?" he asked warily, and the triangle nodded enthusiastically.

"I like to peep in on other dimensions from time to time," he offered in lieu of an explanation, and Danny frowned with suspicion, a sinking feeling in his gut.

"So, then, what're you doing here? This isn't exactly the most exciting place to hang out," he pointed out, gesturing at the black-and-white memory realm, and the triangle laughed.

"I'm just here for a little something-something, and I'll just be on my way!" he said with a wiggle of spindly black fingers.

"And what is that?" Danny asked, but Bill waggled a disapproving finger at him.

"Oh, it's perfectly fine, you don't need to know," Bill replied airily, before floating over to the closest door. He yanked it open, and the eye narrowed a little when he came across a memory of Stan and Danny doing the Gallon Challenge back in the eighties.

"What is this called again?" Memory-Stan asked, and Memory-Danny grinned broadly, hefting his gallon of milk.

"The Gallon Challenge! It's where you try to drink a gallon of milk at once!" Memory-Danny exclaimed cheerfully. "Unless you're not man enough to handle it," he added slyly, to which Memory-Stan glared back.

"I can handle it!" he snapped, before yanking the lid off of his gallon. "If there's anyone between us that's manly, it's me!"

"Three, two, one - go!" Memory-Danny counted, and together, they started chugging their gallons. Halfway through, Memory-Danny turned green, and Memory-Stan's cheeks started puffing out.

"Urgh," he groaned, and Memory-Danny nodded in agreement, gulping down vomit, before sucking in a deep breath and raising the gallon back up.

Seconds later, Memory-Danny doubled over and began to throw up, while Memory-Stan cheered in victory.

"I win!" he exclaimed, before he also doubled over.

"Oh my god," Memory-Danny wheezed, before vomiting again, "Never doing this agai - urrrk!"

Real-Danny laughed aloud at the memory, before he turned to address Bill. "I doubt that's what you were -" He stopped and looked around.

Bill was gone.

"Crap," he groaned, knowing that a sentient, glowing triangle loose in Stan's mind wasn't the best idea.

He swiveled around for a moment, and then deflated with a sigh.

"Guess I gotta go find him," he said, before floating off to do just that.


About ten minutes of looking through Stan's mind (and revisiting some old memories - like the time Danny glued Stan to the toilet), Danny ran into some unexpected intruders, accompanied with a gasp of red mist coming out of his mouth. Swiftly, he looked around, scanning the surroundings for Bill, before he turned his attention back to Soos and the twins.

"Dipper? Mabel, Soos? What are you guys doing here?" he demanded, utterly baffled as to how they were even here, before blinking fuzzily at the two young men accompanying Mabel. He raised a hand to block out the light emanating from them. "Mabel? Who are they? And why are they so...bright?"

"Xyler and Craz!" Mabel chirped happily from between the two shiny boys, the same time Dipper side-eyed Danny.

"How'd you get in here?" Dipper asked suspiciously, and Danny rolled his eyes, and then squinted at Dipper. Did Dipper have a hole through him? The tween didn't seem to be bothered by it, though, so Danny ignored it for now.

"Ghost powers," he replied (despite the fact that he's never been able to do this before), to which Dipper frowned thoughtfully at. After a moment, Danny then asked, "How did you get here?"

"We did a crazy ritual involving candles and chicken blood. It was awesome, dude!" Soos laughed, and there was a pause as Danny, Dipper, and Mabel studied the mechanic.

A beat passed before Mabel beamed.

"Yeah, the candles were vanilla scented!"

The two multicolored boys grinned. "Sounds awesome!"

"Yeah, totally, bro!"

Danny groaned and slapped his forehead. "I'm not telling your uncle you did a crazy mind-summoning ritual or whatever," he told them, to which the trio grinned sheepishly at. "But onto more important things: Why are you here?"

"We could ask you the same thing," Dipper pointed out, but Mabel waved her arms, her smile dimming as she flailed.

"We saw Gideon summon this crazy triangle demon to get the code to the safe out of Stan's mind!" she exclaimed, and Danny felt another curl of dread in his gut. Triangle demon? "We came here to stop him!"

Danny let out a growl of frustration. "Damn it," he muttered, ignoring the wide-eyed looks the twins gave him at the swear. "I ran into him earlier. He called himself Bill." When Mabel gasped, he grimaced. "Yeah, and I figured he was bad news. He managed to get away from me a few minutes ago."

"He could already be at the safe!" Mabel screeched, "We have to find him!"

"Let's keep looking," Danny suggested, and the others nodded.

They searched through doors, each door another memory in Stan's mind. Danny opened one, and paused when he saw a young Stanley and a young Stanford sitting side-by-side on a swing set, happily chatting the day away. He smiled sadly at the scene, and gently closed the door to the memory before anyone else could see it.

"Hey, look, those memories seem to be about me," he heard Dipper say, and he turned to see Dipper approaching a door that read "Dipper Memories. Keep Out!"

"Uh, I don't think that's such a good idea, dude," Soos said warily, to which Dipper scowled in return.

"I just want to know what the old guy really thinks of me," Dipper snapped back, and Mabel smiled happily.

"We already know how Stan feels about us," she replied, striding past him and opening another door. "He loves us! We're great!"

"Yeah, let's just keep moving," Soos suggested, and everyone moved on, not noticing that Dipper doubled back to watch Stan's memories of him.

After a few minutes of walking and searching, Soos gave Danny the scare of his life.

The handyman opened a door, which showed Stan going through the secret door behind the vending machine. Danny's heart leapt to his throat, and he darted forward to close it, but before he could, Soos exclaimed, "Boring!" and slammed it shut.

Danny skidded to a halt, and goggled at the handyman. Thankfully, Soos didn't seem to notice Danny's frantic movements, and moved on when Mabel cried, "I have a good feeling about this!" Danny shook his head, and made sure the door was firmly shut before moving on, feeling as if his heart was going to pound out of his chest.

While, Mabel reached for a door that read "Top Secret," Danny hurried forward, alarmed at what this door could be.

"Wait, Mabel," he called frantically, as she was pulling the door open. "It could be...huh?"

"Hey Mr. Tummy," Memory-Stan said to his shirtless gut, and then said, in a high-pitched voice while jiggling his belly, "Hey, Mr. Stan!"

"Are you hungry?"

"Yes!"

"Eat your crackers!"

"Ugh," Soos said with a disgusted expression, and Danny felt like he needed to laugh, cry, and hurl at the same time.

"C'mon, Stan," he moaned, and Mabel shuddered.

"Sweet Sally," she said, and she slammed the memory shut.

"I think I'll need to bleach my brain for the next hundred years," Danny muttered.

"Man, we've been searching forever," Soos sighed, waving a hand at the vast expanse of Stan's mind. "What if the triangle guy finds the memory before we do?"

Mabel tapped her chin contemplatively. "If we wanna find Stan's memory, we gotta think like Stan," she said, and she turned to Danny. "He's always hiding stuff, right?" she asked, and Danny nodded.

"Oh, yeah, like a squirrel," he replied.

"Like how he hides his arrest warrants!" Soos piped in cheerfully, and there was a pause as Danny's brain broke, and then rebooted.

"His what?" he exclaimed, before he groaned for the fourth time today, and buried his head into his hands. "Stan, you and I are going to have a long talk."

"Yeah, he hides them under the rug in the gift shop," Soos supplied, and Mabel threw up her arms in celebration.

"Soos, that's it! Look!" she exclaimed, pointing, and there, not five feet from them, was the rug. She scurried over, and pulled the rug away. There, underneath the rug, sat a door.

They others opened it up, and watched as Stan put away the deed to the Mystery Shack into the safe.

"There ya go," he said, closing and locking the safe. "And now to input the code! Thirteen, forty-four, and finally…"

Soos shut the door and pumped a victory fist. "Dude, we found it!"

"Yeah!" Mabel and her two multi-colored boys cheered.

"But what do we do now?" the boys asked, and then looked at each other with delight. "Jinx!"

"Um, um, let's just destroy the door before Bill can find it!" Mabel suggested, an idea which Danny wholeheartedly agreed to.

"Good idea," he said, but before he could move, Soos held up a hand.

"Maybe I should do it? My big fat arms are great at destroying stuff!" Soos suggested, and Mabel beamed.

"Oh, okay!" Mabel said brightly.

"Or, we could just let me blast it to pieces," Danny offered, charging and holding up an ectoblast, and Mabel thought for a moment.

"Actually, yeah, that might be better," she said, just as the door began to float on its own.

"Huh?" They stared at the floating door, then at Soos, who was clearly moving it with his mind.

"Dude!" A familiar voice exclaimed, and then Soos ran up from another hallway to stand by his look-alike. "I just saw a Memory of Stan roller-skating wearing short shorts! Didn't look - didn't look half bad…" he trailed off as he took in his doppelganger, and tilted his head at the copy. "Hey, something weird is going on," he said with a laugh, and Danny jerked into motion.

He shot a blast at fake-Soos, and the man dodged with a chilling, cackling laugh. The eyes merged together to form one, and the body compressed until it was yellow, triangular, and glowing. The others gasped, and Danny snarled as he summoned another blast.

"Ah, ah, ah," the triangle tutted, and easily procured a deflecting shield, the door still floating above the demon's head. "No damaging the merchandise! And you wouldn't want to accidentally destroy one of Stan's memories, would you?" he asked Danny.

With a reluctant snarl, Danny backed down.

"Boy, you guys sure are gullible!" Bill chortled with a twirl of his cane. "I knew you'd lead me straight to the code!"

He began to laugh, evil and menacing, and added, "It's funny how dumb you are!"

"Yeah?" Mabel challenged. "Well, you're - you're a stink face!"

"Awesome comeback, Mabel!" one of the brightly colored guys cheered, and Mabel whirled on him with a glower.

"Don't treat me like a child, Xyler!"

"Well, this has been fun," Bill exclaimed, and he thrust a hand out at Danny. "But first...later suckers!"

Danny cried out as something pulled at his core, and he clenched his eyes shut in pain. When the pain finally subsided, and he opened his eyes once more, he realized that he was back in their living room.

"No!" he exclaimed in alarm when he spotted Dipper, Mabel, and Soos slumped on the floor around a pentagram, and he dove at Stan's snoring form on the couch. However, this time, when he tried to phase into the older man, he collided into something hard. It flung him away, and Danny caught a glimpse of a red light encircling Stan before he crashed into the TV.

"Ugh," he groaned, before he slumped, broken glass and plastic digging into his back and side. Two bright lights circled him, and Danny Fenton hauled himself up to his feet with a stagger. "C'mon Fenton, pull it together," he muttered to himself, and he shifted back into Phantom.

He reached a glowing hand out to Stan, and hissed with the red energy sparked and seared his hand. "Ouch. Okay, so that's not an option," he muttered, before he turned a contemplative eye on the twins and Soos. "Maybe-?" he began, but a low groan interrupted him.

He whirled and turned his attention to Dipper. The boy's eyes fluttered, and Danny rushed to his side just as their eyes opened.

"We did it!" Mabel cheered happily, and Danny nearly sank to his knees in relief.

"You got him out?" he asked, and Dipper grinned happily in reply.

"What?" Stan grunted, and Danny spun to see the older man rub at his head in confusion as he yawned. "Did what?" He squinted at them suspiciously, took in the pentagram on the floor, and demanded, "What are you all doing here? And why was I dreaming of two brightly colored and radical young men?"

"Grunkle Stan! You're okay!" Dipper exclaimed, and he tackled the older man in a hug.

Stan floundered in confusion for a moment, and he shot a bemused look at Danny. When the halfa simply shook his head and mouthed "later," Stan turned his attention back on the male twin. "What is this, a hug?" he asked uncomfortably, and Dipper's smile turned mischievous.

"Nope, it's a chokehold," he said, and he tightened his grip around Stan's neck while the others laughed.

With a grunt, Stan threw Dipper off of him before he chuckled. "Not bad, kid, not bad," he said fondly, and Dipper beamed right back at him. Something must've happened to Dipper while he was in Stan's mind, Danny concluded, because Dipper seemed much more appreciative of Stan than he was before this whole escapade started.

"I'm just glad Gideon didn't get into the safe," Mabel happily. "I really love this old shack."

"Group hug!" Soos declared as he flung his arms open, but when nobody even twitched at the suggestion, he faltered. "No?" he asked, and dropped his arms in frustration. "I never know the right time!"

Something rumbled, and everyone looked around in confusion. Dipper opened his mouth in consternation.

"Hey, do you guys feel a - aaaauuugh!"

The wall behind them exploded out, and Danny collided with the TV for the second time that day. He slumped to the ground and lost control of his ghost powers, bright rings of light shifting him back to Danny Fenton once more.

It took a second for him to realize what had happened, for the ringing in his ears to die down and for his eyes to work again. However, when they did, his breath caught at the sight of Little Gideon Gleeful standing in the wreckage, deed in hand and a gloating smile on his face.

"Oh, I'm sorry Pines Family, did I wake you?" he taunted, and Dipper pushed himself up onto his knees with a groan.

"But - we defeated Bill!" he protested, and Gideon sneered at him.

"Bill failed me! So I switched to plan B," he replied diabolically. His grin widened. "Dynamite."

"What? Bill?" Stan asked in confusion. He glanced over at Danny, but when the other man didn't say anything, he turned his attention back to Gideon. "Who - wh - what are you guys talking about?!"

"Spoiler alert, Stanford! I've got the deed!" Gideon said gleefully, and they watched as he tucked the deed into his coat pocket. "The Mystery Shack belongs to me! So get off my property!"

He dug into his other pocket, and pulled out a radio. "Daddy? Bring it around the front," he said, and he marched away with an evil smile.

"Don't worry guys," Dipper consoled hopefully, desperately, "it's just part of the dream. We're gonna wake up any second now! Right? Right?"

Danny shook his head, just as a wrecking ball crashed through the roof. "We need to get out of here before any of us are hurt," he said, and he swiftly ushered them outside.

And together, they watched in horror as the Gleefuls destroyed everything they owned.

"Someone pinch me," Soos whimpered as the ruined sign fell to the ground in front of them.

And just like that, the shack was gone.


I'm not going to make a guarantee that there will be a new chapter within the month, but with the lockdown I've found myself writing a lot more, so we'll see.

Thank you everyone for continuing to read my works, even if I've been shitty about updating it! I really appreciate all of you.

Posted and Edited: 3/23/2020, 11:35 AM EST