Pacifica's mind was racing. There they were, backing against her childhood home in a last ditch effort to prevent a group of shadow rodents from tearing it apart, and they were losing. They weren't meant to lose. They never lost! Over summer it had been success after success, and now they were quite literally backed into a corner?!

The ongoing mass of advancing, screaming fauna was impossibly intimidating. It was like a schlocky low budget picture from the 80s. Their piercing red eyes glowed through the thick smog that followed them, enrobing the creatures into a poorly defined, pitch-black mass. They could hear swords and cutlasses being unsheathed, the sound of scratching and grinding as more and more of them assembled over the Manor's walls.

Another Gazebo fell. Turf and grass were trampled. Flowerbeds (still in the perfectly preened shape of the Northwest Monogram) were flattened. Bruised beavers, beaten beavers, beavers missing ears - the injured were no less fettered in their dedication to the cause.

Scuttlebutt Island.

Lucinda.

The return of their precious timber.

Humans meant nothing. If anything they were the enemy. The perpetrators. Those that needed to be struck down.

The history of the manor, its intrinsic value, that meant nothing. That was their symbol. The symbol of the Northwest family's crime and corruption.

The only intent was to get that lumber and destroy what stood in their way, be it humans, children, the town of Gravity Falls, bricks and mortar, an army of geese, or decorative gazebos and flowerbeds.

Then, as they got closer, they smelt something and shrieked in their familiar blood-curdling manner. Blue blood. Wealth. A legacy of corruption. They could sense a Northwest . Their heads spun - their eyes piercing towards the unmistakable scent of family baggage. Revenge came to the forefront as eagerly as their terrible mission. Suddenly, rather than the manor's entrance, each one of the terrible ghouls diverted towards the young socialite, cutlasses and swords ready. The flat line of advance turned into a curve, encircling her.

Said Northwest froze solid, her eyes widening. She quickly realised exactly what was going on, and had little protest to make against the crazed attitude of the furious animals. Each dark, furry silhouette seemed to drop white foam from its buck-toothed jaws, each hateful gaze staring right to the bottom of her - as if the creatures were judging her.

"Pleaseturnaroundpleaseturnaroundpleaseturnaround-" she whimpered, her hands laying flat against the manor's icy cold brickwork as more and more smog-enrobed animals closed in on her. She closed her eyes tightly and took a deep breath, trying to control the overwhelming panic…

...Which was abruptly interrupted when Dipper dove in front, legs astride, his puny little fists raised towards the wicked creatures, his teeth were gritted and fists raised in a desperate attempt at intimidation. "Get away from her!"

For a moment, at least, Pacifica was pretty sure he was playing around. The less than convincing scene of macho behaviour was laughable enough - but as soon as it dawned on her what he was trying to do, she blinked, threw her arms around him and pulled him back against her tightly with a smile. As futile as it was, she couldn't quite resist whispering into his ear. "My hero. Don't hurt 'em too bad, babe."

She could practically feel his temperature rising in her hands as he tried to continue his display.

Stan and Ford soon stepped in, too - their far more substantial fists ready - and Mabel, in her typical manner, slid between them with a weapon far outside her usual spectrum of grappling hooks. "Get away from her, you… big jerks!"

"...Mabel, is that a paintgun?"

"Later, Dipper!"

"Ya wanna get to blondie, you better get ready to fight through us," Stan growled, picking up one of the leading revenants and promptly lobbing it back like a shot put, with a paintball from Mabel for good measure.

The creature squealed in distress as it flew to the back of the army with a squeal and a distant thump.

Pacifica fell silent, feeling a warmth in her stomach. She could only watch in surprise as the entire family took charge of the situation, eager to defend their newest member without the slightest concern. Like the beavers that were advancing on them, the Pines seemed to have little interest in self-preservation. They simply knew what, at the moment, mattered most.

And apparently, that was protecting her.

Reinforcements soon arrived, too. "Tate, get th'baseball bat an' boil up some pig fat!" McGucket yelled. "We've got some intruders on our lawn, boy howdy!"

The inventor floundered out of the doorway strapped up with all kinds of miniature accelerators and substantially less miniature firearms, rapidly shooting at every one of the beavers who dared cross his path, joining the Pines in their defensive huddle. "Don't y'all worry no way no how! T'ain't no beaver's gonna nibble on a Northwest tonight! Eheheheheh!"

One of his miniature particle accelerators sent a beavernant flying into orbit with remarkable ease. With a paintball, for good measure.

"What on earth is that thing?!" Ford asked in amazement.

"Jus' a little somethin' I put together from a few banjo strings an' hi-fi systems!"

"It's incredible!"

"Shucks, you should see what I use for a kettle!" McGucket beamed, shooting at more of the shadowy rodents. "Problem is gettin' holda th'plutonium!"

"I hope you have plenty of that crap, Fiddleford." Stan said, punching another in the chin. "There's more beavers here than state secrets in Ford's bunker."

"Nope, only got ten shots before I cause a nation-wide nuclear holocaust, so we gotta make 'em count!"

"Then what?"

"Tootin' if I know!"

"...Great." Dipper whimpered.

"I thought his brain was back in order?" Stan muttered to his brother.

"You don't just… unhillbilly a hillbilly after thirty years, Stanley."

Pacifica looked around frantically, desperate to find something - anything - that could act as a defence. Anything she could use to contribute. She didn't have any answers. She just held him and swallowed hard, trying to fight back that overwhelming fear of dread - that overwhelming realisation that there really didn't seem to be an escape.

After all, it'd take ages for Tate's pig fat to boil (And if they had set up a pig farm in her bedroom, man, she'd be annoyed.) There wasn't a way out save for a temporary respite being provided by McGucket's bizarre space-age firearms. And paintballs.

"This sure is a hairy situation, Ford. Who are these guys?"

"These are the…'guys' who attacked your son, Fiddleford. They want your mansion."

"Well dagnabbit, I paid for this place fair an' square with my war-dollars!" He replied. "I'll blast all of 'em! Jus' lemme heat up this here fuel cell an' ah'll-"

A beaver then bit through one of the dangling hydraulic hoses that were hanging from the enormous piece of firepower in McGucket's hands. In one fell swoop, fluid flowed onto the floor and the particle gun became as good as useless. It almost felt calculated.

Fiddleford's face dropped as he looked at his now disabled weapon with a twisted lip. "Banjo polish. Welp, we're doomed!"

Stan punched the perpetrator into the crowd and grimaced. "No chance of that uh… that pig fat gettin' ready?"

The inventor looked at his Rumblex watch and blinked - in his usual slightly out of kilter manner. "Not for another twenty minutes."

The old grifter huffed and looked at the kids, taking another step to ensure he was obscuring the path to Pacifica as much as he could. "Great. Well, I've been in tight spots before, but uh- this is a-"

"Sure is a sticky situation." Fiddleford said, rubbing his chin.

"Heh. That's funny, one of the-"

THUNK.

A large, golden nugget landed in the Northwest laws like an asteroid, embedding itself deep into the beaver-ravaged grass.

"Hot Jiminy! Sky gold!"

"Better!" Mabel beamed. "It's our hero!"

Ford and Stan both grimaced as a fanfare was played out in the medium of cacophonous goose honks. To the old men - particularly Ford, it was a sound as dreaded as the shrieks of the ghostly beavers that surrounded them.