Meeting the Monsters

They were following the trail of glitter through the forest.

Danny felt like he was in some sort of fairytale, which was only added to by the weird feeling he got while in the forest. It felt like... like the Ghost Zone. Or like coming home a winter's day to find his mom had made hot chocolate. Like home.

Of course, his companions were doing as much as they possibly could to dispel that silly notion. Dipper and Robbie wouldn't stop glaring at each other, while Mabel tried to improve the mood through endless chatter. But maybe that was like home too, where Sam and Tucker would argue over any little thing and Jazz would talk his ear off.

Just as he started feeling like he couldn't take anymore of the weird tension, the four of them reached a clearing at the foot of the mountain.

Sunlight, which had only filtered through thick canopy when in the forest, illuminated the scene fully. Danny blinked rapidly as his eyes adjusted.

There, at the edge of the bared stone that made up the mountain, as a weird sort of nest made up of a pink sweater and twigs. In it he could see the metal of his Thermos reflecting the rays of the sun. Lying on top of it was their little thief.

Sitting still in direct sunlight, there was no way to mistake the creature for a raven.

Bright yellow eyes stood out against the shiny black of the scales. It had four legs and small wings with stretched membrane, like a bat. It was a dragon.

And Danny's Ghost Sense hadn't gone off all day.

"A living, breathing dragon." His voice was little more than a whisper, as if he worried he'd break the spell if he said anything too loudly and spooked the creature.

"A baby dragon." Mabel's eyes sparkled with light of entire galaxies.

Dipper was flipping through the pages of an old book.

"It's just some dumb animal." Robbie walked around them and stalked up to the nest, pulling out his mp3-player. He paid the dragon little heed, looking at it like you might look at a seagull which had stolen your hot dog.

The dragon took offence to that, or maybe just to having its treasure stolen, and it gave a tiny screech in reply.

Something higher up in the mountain rumbled.

"If that's the baby..." Dipper looked up from his reading.

Danny could feel his heart drop as he finished the sentence. "... where's the mother?"

The roar coming from up the mountain was like a horrible, pitched down echo of the baby's call.

"Run." Dipper grabbed Mabel's hand. "Run!"

They ran.

Danny tried to keep his eyes on where he was running, for fear of tripping over roots and the like, but they kept searching for the large dragon.

"Dipper!" Mabel's scream from up ahead alerted Danny, but there didn't seem to be anything wrong. Dipper had his head in his book again.

"Dragons don't like water!" Dipper shouted it loudly before putting the book back in his vest. "The river is this way!"

It felt good to have a plan.

It felt less good to see the shadow of a large creature spread before them.

The twins were running in the front, leading the group towards the river. Danny was hot on their heels, but Robbie was falling behind.

Mama dragon roared.

Danny heard a small yelp from behind and he turned his head to look. Robbie had fallen over. The dragon was coming closer.

Danny didn't even think, he just reacted. He turned around and started running back towards his new sort-of-maybe-friend.

It wasn't like he'd never fought a dragon before.

The older dragon was as pitch black as her baby, but where the scales touched golden light leaked out. She looked like the night sky, and if circumstances were different Danny would have stopped to admire her. She was slightly smaller than Dora's dragon form.

The dragon landed behind Robbie, who was to paralysed with fear to even scramble away.

The monster glowed brighter as it took a deep breath.

Danny stumbled slightly as he reached Robbie, but he was able to put up a bright green shield just in time to stop them both from being burned by the fiery breath.

The dragon's golden eyes narrowed as it realised neither teen had been cooked to a well-done perfection.

Danny bared his teeth at it.

The dragon copied his action, showing a much more impressive set of pearly whites.

Danny moved slightly backwards, without breaking eye contact, and pulled Robbie to his feet. Remaining in eye contact with a dragon was only partly and excuse to not have to see the guy's reaction.

The dragon took a single step forward.

Danny shot a blast of ice at it, clogging its nostrils, before dragging Robbie into a run.

The entire interaction hadn't taken more than a few seconds, however much it had felt like an eternity, and with their long legs they quickly caught up with the Pines twins.

The dragon sounded angrier than before... and like it had a bad cold.

Danny couldn't stop himself from smirking at that.

The feeling of wind fanned by the dragon's large wings wiped the smile off his face.

The river, just visible between the trees as they turned a sharp corner, suddenly seemed very inviting.

Still, Robbie hesitated at the edge of it. Dipper helpfully gave him a hard shove before taking Mabel's hand and jumping in after him. Danny followed.

The dragon looked at them, eyes narrowed in rage, before huffing and turning around. Apparently they weren't worth getting wet over.

Danny exhaled slowly, unwinding ever so slightly. Adrenaline was still pumping through his veins.

Mabel started giggling in relief, her laugh contagious. Before he knew it, Danny had joined her. Dipper started laughing as well, but Robbie gave the three of them a judgmental glare.

"Relax, we survived." Danny rolled his eyes, somebody needed to lighten up a bit.

Robbie's insulted humph sounded exactly like the dragon's.

Danny cradled a cup of coffee in his hands, savouring the warmth. It tasted like dirt water, but sometimes it was the thought that counted.

He was with Dipper, Mabel and Wendy in the Mystery Shack's kitchen. The three of them were covered in towels and blankets. The twins each had a cup of coffee. Neither one had attempted to drink it. That was probably a good thing, he didn't want to see Mabel on caffeine.

Wendy looked offended, but even she didn't drink the coffee she had brewed for them.

"So. Dragons." Danny stared at the black liquid. "That's apparently a thing now."

Wendy rolled her eyes. "Don't look so surprised. I mean, your par-"

"Not a word." Danny's voice was hard, but his eyes darted towards the twins.

"Dude, they-"

"Not. A. Word."

"Ugh, fine. Be that way." Wendy threw her hands into the air.

"Thanks. Sorry." Danny smiled at her, his hand making its way to his neck.

She didn't look any less irritated with him.

Mabel nudged her brother with an elbow to his side. She smiled at him and inclined her head towards Danny. Dipper nodded.

"Erm, Danny?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry for overreacting before-"

Danny blinked, going over their meeting with the dragon to find where Dipper had overreacted. "I thought you handled it pretty well, actually."

"Really?" Dipper sounded incredibly sceptical.

"Yeah, not many people can face a dragon like that and-"

"I... I wasn't talking about the dragon."

"Then what... oh. Right." Their disastrous first meeting, of course. "I was actually planning on apologizing for that, too. I didn't mean to upset you. Sorry."

"I know you didn't, that's why I'm sorry."

"Let's just... forget it ever happened, OK?"

Dipper smiled and nodded. "That sounds perfect."

Vlad Masters tried to hide his distaste as he looked out at the town before him. Gravity Falls, even from his position in the centre of the town, he could feel the mystical energies in the forest surrounding it. Some of it was ghostly, most of it was not. The rumours, which he'd barely believed when he first heard them, appeared to be true.

Yet none of the citizens seemed to have the slightest idea of what was going on. It was a far cry from Amity Park and it's ghost drills.

Operating in this... city, if one could call it that... wouldn't be that different from what he was used to. Masters would subtly search using human connections, the Northwests lived in the sorry excuse of a town, while Plasmius looked for any supernatural clues.

Yes, it would be easy to find what he was looking for... and when he did, everything he'd ever wanted would be his.

Except for maybe the Packers.

AN: I've got Weirdmaggedon feels.

Wendy knows the twins won't judge Danny for having ghost hunter parents, that's what she was trying to say. If Danny would just listen to her, things would go a lot smoother... but no, he's got to assume that they are like pretty much every other person he's ever met in his entire life. Kid's got issues.