Author's Note: I think I forgot to put this in the first chapter, so I'll put it in the second chapter. I don't own The Loud House or Gravity Falls. If I did, then let's say thankfully I don't own it.
MadHat886: Oh don't worry, there will be more. And thanks. I'm planning to turn this Fanfic into a simple retelling of Gravity Falls with some canon differences and adding alternative ways on how the plot starts and/or ends. Of course, it might not be always the case. I've already got a basic outline on all 40 canon episodes.
MilesW1998: Yeah me too :P . Although I will make some references to current things now and then (some even too niche for anyone to notice), I won't overload it and turn it into Family Guy or similar. The original series had a nice balance of referencing another medium while keeping it original and fresh.
dfelfkselkr: Thanks, I'm also excited to post what happens next! Especially the rewrite of the Northwest Mystery episode (which is way too far for me to consider about it at this point of time). *evil grin*.
Again, thanks for your comments and feedback.
It was another morning in their Pop-Pop's place. In the household, most were still sleeping but the few that were awake, situated themselves in the kitchen, eating their breakfast in peace. Well, at least one of them was trying anyway. The oldest one, Lori, was sitting down, watching Lynn and Lincoln competing against each other with syrup bottles. Lori rolled her eyes, watching them hold the bottles upside-down, above their open mouths. She could only assume that they were having some sort of syrup race.
"Is this necessary you two?"
Lori asked this simple question, bemused at the situation as she kept on eating her cereal. She watched the competition from afar, looking at Lynn, who was currently winning so far. However in a moment of desperation, Lincoln tapped the top lightly, making the syrup travel down faster. Unsurprisingly, her only brother won but ended up accidentally choking a little, coughing some of the runny liquid out, not exactly anticipating how quickly the syrup went into his mouth.
"Can you two tell me what exactly the point of that was?" Lori repeated, not amused.
"Nothing, Lori," Lincoln responded with a smile, quickly wiping leftover residue from his face, "It's just for fun!"
"But that was so unfair!" Lynn complained, "I saw you cheat!"
"It's not like you were going to swallow it," Lincoln said, "You usually have egg for breakfast anyways. A raw egg."
"Don't judge me bro," Lynn defended her breakfast choices, "They're packed with protein! Besides, there's nothing wrong with having something unhealthy once in a while."
Lincoln warm-heartedly laughed and nodded at his sister's statement as he turned his attention back to the open magazine he had been flicking through before Lynn had challenged him to a syrup race.
He looked at the first page that laid in front of him, showing an advertisement for football tryouts and the next page showing a contest ad that grabbed Lincoln's attention.
"Ho ho, no way! Hey Lynn, check this out!" Lincoln exclaimed, pointing at the contest ad. Lynn smiled, looking at the football ad.
"There are soccer tryouts here in Gravity Falls? I can totally try for that!"
"I'm not driving you Lynn to that," stated Lori as she finished the last of her cereal, putting her empty bowl on the kitchen sink, and walked out of the room, messaging Bobby with her smartphone in her hand.
"I didn't even ask," Lynn grumbled, out of Lori's range, "I was gonna use my bike."
"No, no! I'm not talking about some silly football game," Lincoln interrupted, before pointing to the adjacent page, "I'm talking about this. We see weirder stuff like that every day! We didn't get any pictures of those gnomes, did we?"
Lynn sighed and shook her head with disappointment, "No. Just memories. And this baseball bat," Lynn got out her bat and proudly leant on it, shoving it in Lincoln's face. Lincoln brushed the wooden object away from his face.
Lincoln looked at her, "Why did you even get that?" he asked, confused.
Lynn was about to answer when their Pop-pop walked into the kitchen, dressed in an undershirt, boxers and slippers. He grabbed a clean bowl from the cupboard and the cereal box, pouring some of the contents in.
"Good morning youngsters," he greeted the two of them, in an upbeat voice. He took a bunch of mouthfuls of his breakfast, while pouring milk onto it, "Do you know what day it is?"
"Wednesday?" Lynn answered.
"Happy Anniversary?" Lincoln guessed.
Pop-Pop gently ruffled Lincoln and Lynn hair on the head, laughing at the answers they gave him.
"No silly. It's opening day of Fishing Season. We're spending the whole day out in the lake and having one of those, you know, bonding-type deals! What do you say?"
"We were actually planning on doing something else for the day," Lincoln admitted. Their Pop-Pop looked over to the magazine laid in front of the boy and smirked.
"Going off to a monster hunt instead?" he asked, "All right, maybe that seems more exciting for you young whip-snappers but I swear, you can do both at the same time! There's this local legend spread amongst the locals saying that a large sea monster lives under the lake!"
"Really?" Lincoln asked with enthusiasm.
Pop-pop laughed harder, "Of course not! It's just an urban myth, drummed up by sketchy con-men to make some cash. But you can still try!"
"Really?" Lincolns face lighted up.
"Yeah sure," he answered, "I don't want to spoil your fun as long as you come back later for some actual real hunting!"
The implied meaning of that flew over the two kids heads as they finished their cereal.
"Now who wants to wake up everyone and get into my van filled with candy?"
The two of them both immediately volunteered, running towards the bedrooms before Lincoln realized what their Pop-Pop said.
"Wait, what?" Lincoln asked in a shocked voice.
"That came out wrong didn't it?" Pop-Pop slapped himself in the face.
*Cue Gravity Falls Theme Song*
The van was driving along the dirt road in the forest, with everyone seated behind Lincoln's parents. As his dad was driving the van, leaning down occasionally to adjust the radio, Lincoln started to gobble up all the candy that their Pop-pop had left on their seats. Meanwhile, Lincoln and Lynn sat at the very back with Lisa squashed in the middle.
Lynn and Lisa silently judged their brother from the sides of where he was sitting, letting a small grunt of dissatisfaction every couple of seconds.
"I can't believe there's so much candy here," Lincoln exclaimed as he took a huge bite out of his Kit-Kat, oblivious to the stares he was receiving from his sisters sitting right beside him, "I don't know why both of you are not getting some!"
"It's just unhealthy," Lynn simple stated, refusing the chocolate treats, "If you eat too much, then you'll just because fat and lazy. So far you fit one of the criteria."
"That's coming from someone who challenged me earlier to put chocolate syrup in my mouth," Lincoln crossed his arms.
"Also, not to mention," Lisa overheard the conversation from the back and decided to side with Lynn, "It can cause a barrage of symptoms that can cause diabetes which is a life-crippl-"
"Okay I get it as well Lisa," Lincoln interrupted, "But you're not gonna stop me from eating them. It will just be more for me!"
Lincoln let out an ironic and over-exaggerated evil laugh, holding two candy bars up in the air and greedily placing them both in his mouth at the same time
"Your loss," Lisa simply grumbled.
Ten minutes later, the van reached their destination. As soon as their dad turned off the ignition, Everyone got out of the van, looking around to see where they were. They saw their Pop-Pop in front of them, holding a fishing rod, underneath a large sign reading 'Fishing Season: Opening Day!'
"It's fishing season and you know what that means!" he announced happily.
"Fishing?" Lana asked, assuming that the answer was obvious, "I can just tell how much I'm gonna love this place!"
Pop-Pop nodded in response, "It was a tad too obvious I reckoned."
While the six year old tomboy could hardly contain her excitement, the rest of the Loud family groaned. Their Pop-Pop could sense their disappointment and lack of enthusiasm.
"Don't be like that! You're all gonna love it! The whole town's out there!" he smiled, showing the whole view of the lake.
Lincoln and his siblings looked at the residents of the town on their boats, most of them reeling in fishing rods, trying to catch a few fish. They saw a muscular lumberjack beating up a small fish with his sons chanting him on. They looked in another direction and saw some other townsfolk on the lake.
"Hey, I got an idea that will cheer you sad folks up!"said Pop-Pop, grinning. He pulled a fifty dollar note out of his vest and waved it in the air. He laughed as each of their eyes was locked on the bill.
"I noticed how much you love competing against each other so I'm making my own little challenge!" he offered, "Whoever catches the biggest fish, wins fifty dollars!"
"Me want!" Lana exclaimed.
"That's the spirit Lana!" Pop-Pop cheered, "Now let's buy fishing gear and catch us some lunch!"
As the other sisters cheered happily and followed Pop-Pop and Lana, Lynn and Lincoln still wanted to go on the monster hunt.
"I don't like fishing, but fifty dollars is fifty dollars," Lynn started to contemplate before snapping out of it, as a commotion by the deck started to take place with an crazy man who looked old enough to be placed in a retirement home. He was causing a scene as onlookers started to gather around him. Curiously, the duo joined the crowd and watched as the man was shouting at everyone, claiming something that sounded like it came out of a generic horror film.
"I SEEN IT! I SEEN IT AGAIN! The Gravity Falls Gobblewonker! Come quick before it scraps doodles away!" he shouted before doing a dance, slapping his knee.
"Is he dancing out of joy?" Lincoln asked confusingly.
"Nooo!" he said, grabbing his shoulders, "It's a jig of grave danger!"
"O-kay," Lincoln took a step back. The lake ranger came out and starts spraying the crazy old man with water.
"Hey, hey!" A man ran out of the bait shop with a spray bottle, spraying the older man with water, "Now what did I tell you about scaring my customers? This is your last warning, dad!"
"But I got proof this time, by guppity, BEHOLD!" the crazy man walked over to the end of the pier, pointing at a destroyed boat, "It's the Gobble-de-wonker what done did it! It had a long neck like a giraffe! And wrinkly skin like... like this gentleman right here!" he called pointing at Pop-Pop, who was nearby and joined on the other side of the crowd.
"Now that's just rude," he said in starkness to that comment.
"It chewed up my boat up to smithereens, and shim-shammed over to Scuttlebutt Island! YOU GOTTA BELIEVE ME!"
A police boat was nearby, sailing towards and stopping at the dock. On it was two policemen, a fat stereotypical sheriff with dark skin and a thin Caucasian man, taller than his partner by several inches.
"Attention all units! We have ourselves a crazy old man!" the far sheriff joked, making fun of the old man. Everyone else laughed at him, prodding the old man to leave the area sadly.
As the crowd dispersed, Lincoln and Lynn reunited with Pop-Pop who had returned with a bag of bait and another bag full of fishing rods. They looked behind him, watching their other sisters paired up, carrying a small rowing boats and wooden oars sitting on top of it. Lincoln smiled, seeing Lily the youngest, enjoying the ride on the boat that Luna and Luan were carrying.
"What was that old crazy guy even rambling about?" Lynn and Lincoln could hear Lola asked, "He looks creepy."
"That's Old Man McGucket," their Pop-Pop exclaimed, "He's one of the insane folk that you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley."
"He'll probably crazy to meet you!" Luan added, laughing at her own pun. Her siblings groaned.
"Well, there's all our equipment," Pop-Pop declared, "Now let's drag our boats onto the water and out on that lake!"
Pop-Pop started getting on one of the rickety row boats, pushing it towards the lake.
"Wait, what about Lynn and Lincoln?" Lori pointed out, noticing that they didn't come with them.
"Oh don't worry about it," Pop-Pop ominously answered her question, "They'll catch up to us later. They're going to be hunting for something big."
He winked at the two of them, giving them the all clear to leave the group. They walked towards the bait shop and started to strategize on where to start searching.
"So Linc, where should we look first?" Lynn asked her brother, knowing that he almost always had a plan. However, with Lincoln, he concentrated on another recent event.
"Lynn, did you hear what that old dude said?" Lincoln whispered to Lynn, trying to not let the others townsfolk around him hear. She repeated the insult that he said to Pop-Pop, mimicking the crazy man.
"I meant the other thing! About the monster! If we can take a photo of it, we can split the prize fifty-fifty."
"I'm not sure," Lynn started to have second thoughts, "Shouldn't we tell our other sisters, let alone our Pops?"
Lincoln gasped at the very mention of that idea, "If we tell our sisters about it, then we'll only wind up with a hundred dollar bill each! Imagine what you could do with five hundred dollars! If we must, we can give our Pop-Pop $100."
"But how are we gonna do it with just a small rowing boat? Let alone go there. It will be night time by the time we get there!"
"I've got an idea," Lincoln's hypothetical light bulb popped into existence, as he saw someone familiar in the distance, setting sail.
Lincoln and Lynn walked over to Soos, who was in his own boat, cruising around the shallow ends of the lake.
"Hey Soos!" Lynn shouted, catching the man's attention. He turned the boat around and steered his boat towards a nearby dock.
"Sup dudes," Soos greeted them, lowering the sail and anchoring it to a nearby pole, "Are you fishing here as well?"
"Actually no," Lincoln frowned, showing him the open magazine, specifically the part with the monster hunter contest, "We're going to Scuttlebutt Island for this!"
"Aren't the football try-outs somewhere else?"
"No, read the next page," Lincoln facepalmed. Soos looked over to next page, understanding what he meant, nodding.
"We could win one thousand dollars just for taking a photo!" Lincoln continued, "Think about what we could all spend the money with."
Soos started to daydream, imagining himself buying an arcade machine for the Shack and wasting his time at work playing on it. Before Soos could dream any further, Lincoln snapped his giners, snapping him back into reality.
"We'll split it three ways equally," Lincoln declared, pointing at himself, Lynn and Soos respectively, "That's fair right?"
"I guess so," Lynn agreed, "$300 is still a lot of money."
"Yeah, sounds good to me dudes," Soos also agreed. He opened the doors to the boat, welcoming them in their ship, "Come on in guys!"
"Let's sail off!" Lincoln exclaimed, once her sister jumped on, "Hoist the anchor!"
Soos hurried to where the anchor was but before he even pulled it out, Soos overheard two particular twins approaching, alongside their uncle.
"Monster hunt! Monster hunt! Monster hunt!" their chanting voices got nearer. He recognizes their voices belonging to Dipper and Mabel.
"You dudes say somethin' about a monster hunt?" Soos made his presence known, letting out a horn in the process. The twins turned around to see Soos pulled up to the docks in his boat.
"Soos!" Mabel said. Soos and Mabel did a fist bump, making explosion noises.
"Dudes, you can totally use my boat for your hunt," he volunteered, "It's got a steering wheel, chairs, normal boat stuff. Plus Lincoln and Lynn are coming!"
Lincoln tried to hint and nudge Soos to just take off but it seemed like he wasn't getting it or was just ignoring him.
"All right, all right, let's think this through," Grunkle Stan said, "You kids could go waste your time on some 'epic' monster-finding adventure with your friends, or you could spend the day learning how to tie knots and skewer worms with your Great Uncle Stan!"
The twins looked at each other then at Soos, before glancing at Stan. They scampered onto Soos's boat and drove off toward Scuttlebutt Island as Stan became saddened.
"We made the right choice!" Mabel called.
"Yay..." Lincoln said less enthusiastically.
Dipper sat leaning against a small shelter atop the boat, looking back at Stan, all alone in his dingy boat. He couldn't help but feel a little guilt in the back of his mind, like it was nagging him to go back to him. Looking at the excited, grinning faces around him; he ignored his thoughts and laughed along with them.
As the boat drifted further from the docks, Dipper walked towards Lincoln who was looking around the lake from the edges of the boat, watching the various townspeople trying to fish.
"So, you're here for the monster competition too huh?" Dipper asked Lincoln. He nodded in response.
"Yeah, but now there's like five of us and we'll need to split it into an even smaller amount," Lincoln complained, passive-aggressively. As much as he liked having Dipper around for company, today was one of the days where he would just be somewhere else. Of course, it was only a minor inconvenience to him, but he still semi-hid this fact to him.
"That's okay!" Mabel exclaimed, putting both of her arms around Dipper and Lincoln's shoulders, "It just means that we'll find it easily! Isn't that right?"
"Yeah," Lynn joined in, "We'll still have an epic adventure!"
"Yep," Lincoln said unsure.
Dipper paced on the boat in front of Soos and the others, making them line up and face him.
"Alright!" he proclaimed, "If we want to win this contest, we have to do it right! Think; what's the number one problem with monster hunts?"
"You're a side character, and you die within the first five minutes of the movie," Soos answered, thinking about it. Panic started to fill his eyes, "Dudes... am I a side character? Do you ever think about stuff like that?"
"Anyone else like to take a guess?"
Lincoln spoke up next, "Someone suggests splitting up and as a result, everyone dies one by one?"
"Lynn, Mabel, any ideas?"
Mabel shrugged but Lynn wanted to have a go at it. She grinned evilly.
"When the heroine is about to escape from the serial killer with a hockey mask but just before she gets away, she trips over and gets brutally murdered by his chainsaw!" Lynn added her own thoughts.
"Those are all horror movie clichés everybody! Man, what is up with everyone and death? What I really meant was camera trouble!" Dipper explained with annoyance, "Say Bigfoot shows up. Soos, be Bigfoot."
Soos turned to pose as if he were a creature caught in the middle of walking.
"There he is! Bigfoot!" Dipper pretended to scream out, in a sarcastic surprised voice, "Uh, oh! No camera! Oh, wait, here's one! Aw, no film!
"You see? You see what I'm doing here?" Dipper returned to his normal voice.
"You've got a point there bro!" Mabel exclaimed.
"That's why I brought seventeen disposable cameras; two in my ankles, three in my jacket, two for each of you, three extras in this bag, and one under my hat. There's no way we're gonna miss this!" Dipper proclaimed, grinning at his own genius, "Okay everybody, let's test our cameras out!"
Soos tested his camera by taking a selfie. He looked at the camera and pressed the shutter button. It flash startled his eyes, causing him to accidently throw his camera in the lake, "Oops, sorry dude."
"No worries," Dipper assured him with a grin, "This is why we need backup cameras, we still got sixteen left."
A bird swooped by and grabbed one of Mabel's cameras from her hands, "AH PELICAN!"
As a reflex, Lynn threw one of her own cameras, hitting the bird, striking it down back into the water, along with the cameras, "Bullseye!"
Meanwhile, Lincoln tried really hard to take a sample picture but as he did, he pressed too hard and lost his grip, shattering it on the floor.
Dipper mentally counted the number of cameras they lost already. Dipper groaned as a result, realizing that they lost four cameras already and were now down to thirteen.
"Okay, let's actually try not to lose our cameras," Dipper said nervously.
"Wait, did you say lose the cameras?"
"What no! Don't lose them!" Dipper repeated, aggravated.
"Sorry dude, I just threw my other camera away," Soos told him, pointing at the lake with the submerged camera. Dipper was trying to keep his cool.
"Not to worry," he said through clenched teeth, "We still have twel-"
He was cut off by the sound of a small crackling sound. He looked below him and saw that he had accidently stepped on one of the cameras.
"Eleven, we have eleven now," Dipper's left eye winced
"Hey, that was mine!" Lynn yelled at Dipper.
"Lynn, I am so sorry!"
"Now I have zero on me now," Lynn complained.
"Same here dude," Soos added on.
"Don't worry Dipper," Lincoln said, carelessly throwing his other one out onto the lake, "I brought my sister's brand new video recorder! This is better than all your cheap disposable cameras."
"Firstly, you could've given it to me! Secondly, they were not cheap at all!" Dipper said angrily, red fumes out of his face.
Lincoln put his arm around Dipper with a relaxed attitude, "Trust me, this video camera is better than the one we used to stalk Mabel's ex boyfriends."
"Please don't say it like that."
Lincoln ignored Dipper's comment, "It even has a touch screen! There is no way this can go wrong now."
He grabbed Luan's video recorder and pressed the power button. Its screen turned on with a bright light, showing a password screen, "Dang it. I forgot to ask Luan for the password."
"On the bright side, it has a headphone jack," Lynn commented, noting the entirely useless feature, before changing the topic, "Well almost all of us are out of cameras."
"Can you just give one each from the backup bag?" Lincoln pleaded, "We promise we won't lose them!"
"Fine! But as long as I'm in charge around here," Dipper stated, handing Soos, Lynn and Lincoln a camera each, "Okay, Mabel and Lynn, you'll be lookout. Lincoln, you'll be our navigator. Soos, you work the steering wheel, and obviously I'll be captain."
"Can I be co-captain instead?" Mabel requested.
"I'm pretty sure co-captain doesn't exist," Dipper deadpanned, crossing his arms. Mabel smile stealthily turned into a naughty smirk.
"Hey bro, Lynn is smashing her own camera again behind you!"
Dipper looked around, giving Mabel the opportunity to grab one of the cameras from his ankles. As soon as he realized that his sister had tricked him, it was too late as Mabel threw the ankle camera overboard, into the lake.
"Whoops!" Mabel faked surprise, "It totally slipped. If only I was co-captain..."
"Okay! Fine! You can be co-captain!" Dipper cried out, fully aware that she can trick him again into losing even more, "Just stop destroying the cameras! We're down to nine cameras already in the last few minutes!"
"Yay!" Mabel cheered, grabbing the other cameras from Dipper's ankle.
"Can I be associate co-captain?" Soos asked.
"As co-captain, I authorize that request," Mabel replied.
"And as first captain, I suggest we focus on our mission," Dipper commanded with a loud voice, prompting everyone to pay attention to him, "Our first order of business is to lure the monster out with this."
Dipper pointed to the barrel of fish food that was at the back of the boat.
"Permission to taste this?" Soos interrupted him as he looked at the barrel with hunger. Dipper and Mabel exchanged looks with each other.
"Captain granted," Dipper said with a small grin.
"As co-captain, I also grant permission," Mabel said as she pointed towards the air. She started to egg on Soos to try the fish as soon enough, everyone else was egging him on. Satisfied, Soos took some of the fish food and tasted it.
Before they knew it, Soos had begun to spit the food out and drink as much water as he could to get the taste out. Dipper, Mabel, Lincoln and Lynn instantly began to laugh as much as they could.
"Man, I didn't know fish food tasted so terrible," Soos said as he started to laugh as well.
"That's why it's called fish food and not human food," Lynn chuckled a bit.
Half an hour later, the boat was finally close to the seashore of the island, evident by the thin layer of fog that had surrounded them. While Lincoln started to light up the lanterns to help illuminate the area around them, Soos was steering the boat trying to avoid anything floating in the water and Lynn was shovelling fish food off to the back of the boat. It didn't take long for Lincoln to finish lighting up the last of the lanterns, before he started to walk towards Mabel, who was busy playing with a pelican, pretending to be a ventriloquist much to the dismay of her brother.
"Hey! How it's going everyone?" Lincoln asked the twins.
"I'm alright," Dipper was the first to respond.
Mabel moved the pelican's mouth like a puppet as she voiced for it, "It's going awesome. Bow bow ba- bow bow!"
Dipper strained to see her through the fog, and frowned at her antics.
"Mabel leave that thing alone!" Dipper told his sister off, "I don't want to lose another camera!"
"Lighten up Dipper," Lincoln chuckled, a grin forming on his face, "She's just having a little fun."
"Yeah, we're just playin'," added Mabel through the pelican, "Hey look! I'm drinking water!"
She grabbed an unopened water bottle and drank from it, while attempting to do the pelican voice like a ventriloquist, "Twinkle, twinkle, little-" she choked and sputtered on the water, making the pelican fly away.
"Aren't you two supposed to be doing lookout?" Dipper asked the both of them.
"LOOK OUT!"
A soccer ball was tossed at Dipper at full force, not giving him enough time to dodge it. He yelped in shock and surprise as it made an impact on his left shoulder, bouncing back onto the deck.
"Who threw that?" Dipper whined.
"My bad," Lynn admitted. She picked up the ball, playing with it and performing various small tricks with it, using her feet.
"That hurt!" Dipper complained, "At least warn me about it."
"I did, when I said 'look out'," Lynn defended herself, explaining her actions.
"I mean, warn me when I have enough time," the boy in the cap groaned, "Anyway, aren't you supposed to be scooping fish food?"
Lynn shrugged, "We ran out."
Suddenly, the boat crashed into something and shuddered to an abrupt stop, jolting everyone on board and cutting off the light at the helm, indicating that they have reached the island.
"We're here!" Mabel exclaimed almost immediately, being the first to get up. She helped her friend Lincoln up onto his feet nearby, "See? We're lookout geniuses!"
As everybody got off the boat one by one, getting their feet on the shoreline, Dipper and Lynn grabbed some lanterns. Once they were certain that they carried enough, they both jumped off the boat together.
Everyone on the shore each grabbed a lantern and began walking around the area, searching around the foggy trees for any sign of the monster. It was hard to see the island from afar when they were on the boat but now it was even more difficult to see anything at all thanks to the thickening fog. It was only the lanterns that each of them was holding that provided them with the limited vision they had. They eventually make it to a sign showing the name of the island.
"Dudse, check it out," Soos said. Mabel and the others turned around and saw him covering the 'Scuttle' in the sign saying 'Scuttlebutt Island'.
Mabel and Lincoln both laughed at what they read on the sign, "Soos, you rapscallion!"
Lynn chuckled a little, "Seriously? It feels like they just named it so they can made fun of it," Lynn commented.
Mabel became confused when she noticed that Dipper wasn't enjoying the moment, neither laughing nor smiling at the exchange. She walked over to her brother, "Hey, why aren't you laughing? Are you scared?"
"Pssh! Yeah right," Dipper scoffed, his tone carrying a smidge of doubt, "I'm not-"
"Yeah, you are!" Mabel proclaimed. With a teasing grin, she poked her brother in the nose and blew a raspberry, before tickling him with an assault of playful pokes.
"Hey!" Dipper exclaimed in protest, trying his best to keep his serious tone while blocking her pokes, though failing as he fell on the ground, in a fit of laughter.
Mistaking it as a wrestling match, Lynn watched Dipper trying to get up as she counted up to three, slowly.
"Game set!" Lynn yelled, grabbing Mabel's hand and holding it in the air, "Mabel wins the match!"
"I won!" Mabel exclaimed, celebrating her win before noticing that she didn't know what she was celebrating, "Wait. What did I win?"
"Nothing," Lincoln deadpanned, turning serious, "Guys! Let's focus now! One thousand dollars is at stake here!"
"Don't be a killjoy Linc," Lynn groaned, crossing her arms at her brother. Mabel nodded but in a more understanding way.
"Lincoln is right," Dipper agreed, getting back on his feet, "Let's just take a picture of the monster and get out of here!"
With Dipper leading the way with his lantern, everyone continued walking down the dirt path for a while in silence. The few minutes of silence was unsettling for some but it was what they needed to stay focused. As they continued walking, an eerie growl from afar interrupted the quietness, startling them. The kids and Soos stopped in their path and looked around them nervously, trying to find the source of the noise.
"Did you guys hear that?" Lynn asked the others, exchanging nods with everyone, "It sounded like it was ahead of us."
They slowly walked forwards, in the direction from where they heard the noise coming from, the same growl getting louder and deeper as they kept on pushing forwards. Eventually, one of them spotted a large shadow of the creature, positioned in a threatening pose. Pointing it out to the others, they all agreed to quickly hide behind a nearby log, waiting for further instructions from Dipper.
"Get your cameras ready, and wait for my signal," Dipper whispered to the others. He waited for a few seconds for his friends to get ready before silently counting down from three using his fingers.
"NOW!" Lincoln yelled before Dipper could finish his countdown, making everyone else follow him, frantically taking photos of the creature. Unfortunately, as they got closer to it, all they saw was a wrecked boat with a few beavers sitting on it, coincidently forming the same shape that they saw in the shadows a few seconds prior.
"But... but what was that noise, then? I heard a monster noise!" Dipper said in disbelief.
The noise resonated again causing everyone to look around.
"Hey Dipper, I think this was making the noise," Lynn said, pointing.
They all looked at where she was pointing, seeing a beaver chewing on a rusty old chainsaw, making the same sound whenever it bit on the power switch.
"Sweet," Soos exclaimed, taking a photo of it, "Beaver with a chainsaw."
Dipper lowered his head in disappointment.
"Maybe that old guy was crazy after all," Dipper sighed feeling dismayed. They went all this way for nothing and the twins had abandoned their Grunkle Stan who was probably not having the best time being alone. Similarly, Lincoln and Lynn also felt bad for not telling their other sisters about what they were actually doing, although the guilt wasn't as much as Dipper or Mabel.
"Let's just go back," Lincoln suggested, feeling heavy with disappointment, "It was all just a waste."
A sudden crash made the four of them jump in fear. Lincoln was the first to look up, seeing a silvery-blue dragon head leering down at him, glaring red eyes staring back at him, its greenish-blue tail swinging madly in fury. Soon enough, each of them turned around, facing the monster with equally as shocked expressions. The boy took out his camera quickly, trying to press the shutter button, before unintentionally dropping it again, after pressing too hard.
"I swear Dipper rigged these cameras," Lincoln mumbled to himself before sprinting away. The rest of them looked back at Lincoln and followed him, choosing to run for their lives, ditching the opportunity to take any pictures. Only Dipper was left standing, with an unamused face.
"Seriously? It's not that hard, guys!" said Dipper, clearly unaware of how big the monster really was behind him, "All you gotta do is point and shoot!"
"Forget about the money, just run!" Lynn yelled over at the distance, her voice getting further and further away.
"I didn't come here for nothing!" Dipper declared. He turned around and immediately took a photo of it, before immediately dropping it after encountering the creature face to face so closely.
"DIPPER RUN!" an imaginary version of Lynn told him in his brain which he obeyed instantly.
The monster chased their four, as they were sprinting for their life. As Lincoln was running away, he accidentally let go of his camera, tripping over it and falling onto the dirt. He scraped his right knee, groaning in pain. Dipper overtook him and grabbed the camera, leaving his friend behind. Lincoln eventually got up but was noticeably slower.
"Everybody; get back to the boat!" Lynn yelled to everyone before she glared at Dipper, "Seriously? You'd rather secure a freaking photo rather than help one of your only friends?"
She ran back a bit to pick Lincoln up, giving him a forced piggyback on her back, lagging behind by a few metres after tripping.
"Thanks Lynn," Lincoln thanked as he locked his hands to get a firm grip.
"No problem bro!" Lynn panted, as she somewhat sprinted to the boat.
Understandably, the two Loud siblings were the last to get on, and almost immediately after, Soos took control of the wheel and drove the boat away from the monster. As he took control of the ship in an attempt to get away from the creature chasing them, Dipper tried to get a photo before stopping, realising that his last camera has a broken lens. What was even worse was him seeing Lynn throwing away the disposable cameras that Dipper gave to everyone, hoping to keep it the monster at bay.
"What are you doing?" Dipper shouted at Lynn.
"Oh I'm sorry," Lynn sarcastically murmured, "Would you rather have us all killed?"
"Guys, shut up for a minute!" Lincoln yelled at everyone, "We need to work together!"
The white-haired boy barked orders, "Soos, drive faster! Dipper, check the journal for anything that might help us. Lynn, keep throwing those cameras!"
"And?"
Lincoln looked at Mabel who was smiling giddily, expecting Lincoln to give her a very hard task, "Mabel... just help me lookout for anything we might crash into."
"Okay sir!" Mabel smiled. Lincoln couldn't help but smile back for a moment before he and Mabel focused back on their mission.
It was probably the volume in Lincoln's voice (or perhaps the urgency of the situation) but immediately, everyone started to do their assigned jobs. Soos pulled the motor hard, zooming even faster away from the monster. Dipper was frantically searching for the pages, flicking them rapidly and skimming through the text. Lynn threw away the remaining cameras, which miraculously slowed down the monster chasing them. They finally made their way out of the fog but unfortunately, it was still chasing them. They had a bigger problem on their own as new obstacles opened themselves up on the clear air, floating, around the surroundings of the lake.
"SOOS! BEAVERS!" Mabel shouted. She spotted a big but unfinished dam made of sticks blocking their path. On top of it was a bunch of beavers, happily building on top of it. Soos got the message and tried to steer out of the way but unfortunately, unavoidably crashed into the dam, sending the many beavers up in the air and onto the boat, attacking the ship and everyone on board.
Even though the boat was at its maximum speed, the lake monster was still gradually closing the distance between them, forcing them into a dead end right where a flowing waterfall was situated.
There was hope though. After a few long seconds of being chased, Dipper's eyes focused on something that might save them. He just wasn't sure if anyone would believe him.
"In there!" he shouted, pointing to the waterfall, "I think there might be a cave behind there!"
"Might be?" Lynn shouted.
"We have no choice!" Lincoln screamed, "Just go!"
The four kids gulped as Soos steered straight into the waterfall. They all shut their eyes and screamed as they approached the waterfall, awaiting the end. To their surprise, they opened their eyes, now inside the mouth of the secret cave hidden by the waterfall.
"It's stuck!" Mabel cheered.
"Ha ha! Yeah! Wait...It's stuck?" Dipper questioned in disbelief. He turned his back and looked at the monster struggling and trashing about, trying to get free.
Mabel lifted up Dipper's hat to reveal a camera. He grabbed it excitedly as he began to take photos of the monster.
"Did you get a good one?" Lincoln asked kindly, as his knee was being tended to by his sister.
"They're all good ones!" Dipper cheered, "High-fives for everyone!"
The kids slapped Dipper's hands as his sister leaped joyfully and everyone else cheered loudly.
Dipper took photos and videos of the monster as it continued to roar and grumble. It wasn't until a loose piece of stone fell from the top of the cave, causing a metallic sound to echo through the cave. He climbed down the hill they were standing on and touched the skin with the back of his hand.
"What's wrong?" Mabel asked. Dipper ignored her and climbed further up the monster.
"Careful dude!" Soos called out.
"I've got this! Hold on!" Dipper called back, acknowledging his concern. Eventually when he reached the other side he yelled, "Everyone! Check this out!"
They all walked over to see a hatch. They opened the hatch revealing that the monster was just a metallic terror, controlled by the crazy old man from earlier.
"Work the bellows and the...Eh?" He looks up and sees them, "Aww, banjo polish!"
"Wai- Yo- You?! You created this?" Lincoln was the first to ask the woman, shocked that it was him "B-b-but why?"
"Yeah, why'd you do it?" Mabel added on, staring at the man.
"I just only wanted attention!" Old Man McGucket exclaimed, his head hanging low.
"I don't get it,"
McGucket explained the process, "Well, first I just hootenannied up a biomechanical brain wave generator, and then I learned to operate a stick-shift with my beard!"
"I honestly didn't understand a single word you just said," Lynn admitted to him.
Lincoln grew a little frustrated, "We sorta kinda get how you built it but we want to know why you did it."
"Well, when you get to be an old guy like me, nobody pays any attention to you anymore," McGucket explained, "My own son hasn't visited me in months! So I figured maybe I'd catch his fancy with a fifteen ton aquatic robot!"
She started to laugh maniacally, "But in retrospect, it seems a bit contrived. You just don't know the length us old-timers go through for a little quality time with our family."
The truth was, they all had a similar situation that they avoided today, although some were feeling more of the guilt than others. In particular, Dipper and Mabel started to feel a bit sad about abandoning his Grunkle Stan in the first place over a monster that turned out to be just a robot. And for what? $200 after dividing the prize money with the others.
Dipper sighed, fully aware that he just wasted the last few hours,"Well so much for the photo contest."
"We still got one roll of film left," Mabel pointed out, "Whaddaya wanna do with it?"
"I may have an idea..." Lynn suggested, before discussing her idea.
The five of them drove back to the lake where they saw Dipper and Mabel's Grunkle Stan fishing with Lincoln and Lynn's Pop-Pop, while talking to each other. In the middle of them was Lana, who was enjoying herself a lot, fishing and patiently waiting for her hook to bite and Luan who was listening to their conversations.
"And then, there was the time when..." a flash of a camera interrupted the two old men's chat.
"Over here!" Dipper said, driving by on the beat-up boat. Everyone looked at them.
"What the... kids? I thought you were off playing Spin the Bottle or something!" Stan said while looking at the boat up and down.
"Hi Lynn and Linc!" Luan greeted cheerily, "And who are your friends?"
"I'm Dipper and this is Mabel," he introduced, worn out. He turned back to Lincoln, "I thought you said you had a lot more sisters."
"I do," Lincoln replied, "But I don't know where they are."
"They all left to do other things after they trout Lana was gonna win."
"Ha, you're funny!" Mabel laughed, not noticing how almost everyone else was groaning, "I like you already!"
Lincoln got out the video recorder that he brought, "You know the password to this?"
Lynn chuckled, "It's one-two-one-six."
Lincoln grew embarrassed, "Whoops, I forgot how obvious that was."
"It's okay Linc," Luan replied, "It's no fin."
"She said another pun again!" Mabel exclaimed, laughing even harder. Pop-Pop ignored the laughs and asked his own questions.
"So why did you come back so early? Why is the boat so damaged? Are you hurt?" Pop-Pop asked in quick succession, rushing to the edge of the boat to see both pairs of siblings still smiling.
"Relax, Mr. Loud, we're all fine," Soos tried to reassure the man.
"Call me Albert. What happened to your shirt?" Pop-Pop asked.
Soos shrugged, "It's a long story, dude."
"Basically, we were searching, trying to find some legendary monster," Dipper began, before frowning.
"But we realized that we should've hung out with the only dinosaur that really mattered," Mabel followed as she motioned to Grunkle Stan with a warm smile.
"I don't follow," Lynn said, the hint passing over her head.
"She meant Grunkle Stan," Dipper deadpanned.
"Save your sympathy!" Stan said as he stubbornly crossed his arms, "I've been having a great time without you! Makin' friends, talking with them... I even caught a really good fish with their help!"
"C'mon Stan," Pop-Pop nudged, "Give them a chance, they're only kids."
"So I guess there isn't room in these boats for five more?" Dipper asked, "And Soos' ship is kinda sinking."
Grunkle Stan glared at the twins, but his expression changed when they put their homemade hats on. Embroidered on them were the twins' names albeit crudely, as Dipper's name was shortened to Dippy and Mabel's name was shortened to Mabe.
"They look so cute on you two!" Lynn teased. Mabel took that as a compliment, smiling warmly at him while Dipper groaned, taking it more as an insult.
"Don't push it," Dipper mouthed to Lynn.
Their Grunkle smiled, "Sure, why not! The more we have the better!"
"You know there's still a few more hours til sunset," Pop-Pop mentioned, "You can still try and win fifty dollars if you catch a bigger fish than Lana!"
"Even though there's absolutely no way you're gonna catch us a bigger fish than mine!" Lana boasted proudly, showing off her decently sized bass.
"Five bucks says I can catch bigger!" Dipper challenged as he hopped onto Stan's boat.
"You're on Dippy!"
Dipper mumbled a groan.
"Five more bucks says that I beat both of you!" Lincoln added, raising the stakes even higher. He hopped onto his Pop-Pop's boat and started to grab a spare fishing rod.
"I like those odds!" Lana smirked, daringly striking the deal with the two boys.
Before Lincoln started to fish, he looked over to the viewers, breaking the fourth wall, "At the start, I thought that we were chasing what seemed like money but in the end, we ended up avoiding what mattered most; family."
"Hey Lincoln," Dipper called out, "You finished monologuing?"
"Yeah, are you ready Dipper?" Lincoln asked his friend.
"Yep. Okay, everyone gather up..." Dipper called, holding the camera. He put it on timer mode and placed it on the top of Soos's boat, which was halfway there to slowly being submerged in water, "Say fishing!"
"Fishing!" everyone shouted as the photo was taken.
The standard length for each chapter will be around 7,500 words btw. Sometimes more and sometimes less.