Stan was driving Soos, Mabel, Mara, and Dipper in a golf cart. He slammed on the brakes, and yanked the wheel to one side. The golf cart screeched to a halt.
He grinned as the five of them got out of the golf cart and started walking with him.
"In Gravity Falls, there are many pits!" he said, using the same tone that he would use on a group of tourists. He walked over to a sign, and flipped it so that there were now words facing towards them. The sign was labelled "Bottomless Pit."
"But none as bottomless as the bottomless pit!" he continued cheerfully, gesturing towards a large, and extremely deep, hole near the sign.
"Which as you can see here, is bottomless" he added.
Soos and the triplets stood on the edge of the pit, and looked down, seeing that it was so deep that they couldn't see the bottom.
"Question, is it bottomless?" asked Soos.
Stan sighed.
"Kids, could one of you try explaining this to Soos?"
Mara turned towards Soos.
"By, 'bottomless,' he means that this pit's so deep that it has no bottom" said Mara, trying her best to explain it as simply as she could to her slow friend. Unfortunately, it looked like Soos was as confused as ever.
Mara sighed.
"Forget that I said anything."
"Grunkle Stan, why are we here again?" asked Dipper.
Grunkle Stan reached into his jacket pocket.
"To dispose of things that we don't want!" he replied. "So long, Mystery Shack suggestion cards!" He took out several yellow pieces of paper out of his jacket pocket, and threw them over the pit. The papers fell into the bottomless pit.
Mabel took out several pink envelopes and pictures of Gideon, along with a box of chocolates.
"So long creepy love letters from Lil' Gideon!" said Mabel, and she was about to throw them all in, when suddenly Mara grabbed the box of chocolates from her sister.
"What are you doing? You don't throw away perfectly good chocolate!"
Mabel scrunched her nose.
"But it's from Gideon."
"Who cares? It's chocolate all the same."
And Mara opened the box and shoved several pieces of chocolate into her mouth while Mabel threw the rest of the Gideon junk mail into the pit.
"Die, die, die!"
Mara then put down the box of chocolate, and took out her own stalker love letters. All of the envelopes were a pale purple color, and smelled like lavender. Included with the letters was a pink stuffed bear.
"Goodbye, disturbing love letters from Nathaniel!" she said, but before she could throw down her junk, Mabel suddenly grabbed the stuffed bear from her sister.
"What are you doing? How could you be so heartless, throwing out a perfectly good stuffed animal?"
Mara rolled her eyes, knowing it was only fair that Mabel got to take something of hers since she had already taken something from Mabel.
She then threw the rest of the Nathaniel junk into the pit while Mabel was hugging the stuffed bear.
Just then, Soos took off both of his shoes, and threw them, one after the other, into the bottomless pit.
"What are you doing?" asked Dipper.
"Throwing stuff, dude" he replied cheerfully. "Everyone's doing it."
Soos ran away, and then hurried back with a grill in his arms. He threw that into the pit, as Mabel was struggling to push an extremely heavy box wrapped in chains over the edge of the pit.
"Whatcha got there, Mabel?" asked Stan, as he reached into his suit pocket and threw more suggestion cards into the pit.
Mabel chuckled.
"It's just my personal box of mysterious secrets" said Mabel. "Nothing worth wondering about."
But of course, just saying that made Mara start to wonder what was in the box, and she started scheming methods to get the box away from her sister so that she could get a peek at what was inside. But unfortunately for her, Mabel managed to finally push the heavy box into the pit before she could do anything.
"Goodbye forever!" said Mabel.
"Aw..." said Mara sadly, as Mabel brushed her hands against each other proudly.
"Grunkle Stan, do I really have to be the one to say that a bottomless pit is, by definition, impossible?" said Dipper.
Grunkle Stan was now holding his fez over the pit, and banging his fist over the top of it, causing more suggestion papers to come tumbling out of it.
"Says you" he said grumpily.
"I guess we'll never know" chimed Mabel.
"Or will we..." said Mara mischievously.
Just then, a storm appeared over their heads, and the wind started to push them forcefully.
"Aah!" screamed Soos. "Some sort of invisible pushing force!"
"Wind, Soos. It's called wind" said Mara.
The storm was getting more severe, as the sky was now dark and the wind was pushing them even harder.
"Quick! Everyone back to the shack!" yelled Dipper, and he, Mara, Mabel, and Soos hurriedly ran back towards the shack.
Unfortunately, Stan was still at the edge of the pit. Mara turned around and saw.
"Grunkle Stan! We have to go!" she yelled furiously.
"I'm not done getting rid of these yet!" he called back.
"Well then throw them away in the trash can when we get back inside the Mystery Shack!" yelled Mara, but Stan was stubbornly ignoring her, instead reaching into his suit pocket and trying to throw more suggestion cards into the pit. However, the increased intensity of the wind was blowing them directly into his face instead.
"Grunkle Stan, no!" screamed Mabel, as the four of them rushed back to get Stan to come with them.
Stan, however, was determined to throw all the suggestion cards into the pit.
"Almost, almost..." he was saying, grabbing the suggestion cards and repeatedly trying to forcefully throw them into the pit as the wind kept pushing them back up again.
Soos, Mara, Mabel, and Dipper grabbed onto Stan, and tried to pull him away, back towards the Mystery Shack, but Stan was stubborn, and the wind was pushing against them.
Unfortunately, Stan suddenly lost his balance, and fell into the pit, and Soos and the triplets, who had been hanging onto him, fell in with him.
The five of them plunged into the bottomless pit, their screams echoing all around.
Soos, Stan, Mabel, Mara, and Dipper screamed as they continued to fall into the bottomless pit, that is until they were falling for way too long. Immediately, the five of them stopped screaming, now looking around their new dark surroundings.
For a moment, they looked at each other awkwardly, unsure of what to say.
"So, are we done here?" said Mara.
"Anyone want to scream some more?" asked Soos.
"Where are we?" asked Dipper, looking around at the darkness of the pit. Mabel took a glow stick out of her sweater, and snapped it. A green glow started to emit from the small stick she had, as she swung it around her through the darkness.
"We're somewhere where it looks like we're nowhere" Mabel concluded.
She then took the loop that the glow stick was attached to, and hooked it onto her arm. It floated upward since they were falling.
"We're gonna land on something eventually" said Dipper seriously. "Could be any second now."
The five of them tensed, waiting for the impact.
"Don't worry, guys!" said Mara, taking another baseball-sized portal device out of her toolbelt. "I'll get us back to the Mystery Shack."
She typed in "Mystery Shack" into the keyboard, and turned the device. It popped apart slightly, and glowed its usual purple color. It was ready to be thrown.
Mara held the device in her hand, held it into the air, and then threw the device downwards. But of course, since the pit was apparently bottomless, it just sailed downward uselessly because there was nothing for it to collide against.
Stan watched curiously.
"Well, it looks like we're down here for the long haul" he said, reaching into his suit pocket and bringing out a deck of cards. "Who wants to see some card tricks?"
He shuffled the deck, but unfortunately because they were falling, the cards only flew upwards into the air as the five of them were falling.
Stan looked up at the cards for a moment, then turned back towards everyone else.
"Ta da!" he said.
Mabel clapped, Dipper put his hands on his hips, and Mara raised her eyebrow.
"Hey!" said Soos cheerfully. "Maybe we should pass the time by telling stories."
"That's the first good idea you've had all day" said Mara.
"I've got a story" said Dipper sarcastically. "It's about how Stan got us all thrown into a bottomless pit, where we spent the rest of our natural lives!" he yelled angrily, placing his hands on his hips once again.
"Not that he's bitter or anything" said Mara.
"Go on" said Soos, urging the boy to continue with what he thought was an actual story.
"Come on, Dipper" said Mabel. "You can do better than that."
Dipper sighed, and took the glow stick from his sister's arm.
"Fine." Everyone leaned in to hear.
"I'll tell you a story. A story I'd like to call, 'Voiceover'."
Dipper's story:
Wendy, Soos, Mara, and Mabel were outside, gathered in a circle around Waddles.
"Ready?" asked Mabel excitedly, as she and Soos bent down and started spinning the pink creature.
"Spin the pig!" they chanted eagerly, as they let go of Waddles and he started to spin on his own. Eventually, he stopped, and his head was facing Stan, who was sitting in a chair on the porch of the Mystery Shack reading a newspaper.
"Hey, Grunkle Stan" said Mabel. "Ever kissed a pig before?"
"I'm not gonna answer that question" said Stan grumpily, shoving the newspaper further up his face so that he didn't have to talk to them anymore.
Just then, Dipper ran up to them, a panicked look spread across his face. .
"Guys!" he screamed fearfully. "I think I just got bit by a snake!" He frantically showed them his arm, which had two red indents in it. "I need you to get me to a hospital qui-ick!" he said, but unfortunately his voice cracked on the last word, making his entire statement sound very awkward.
Stan started laughing uncontrollably in his rocking chair, kicking his legs back and forth excitedly as he did so.
"What? What's so funny?" asked Dipper in a distressed voice.
"Sorry" said Stan, trying to recover from his laugh. "It's just so hard to focus on what you're saying with that squeaky puberty voice you've got there."
"My what?" asked Dipper, confused.
"It's nothing to be ashamed of, Dipper" said Mabel. "Your voice is hila-rious!" she said, purposely making her voice crack on the last word in an attempt to mimic Dipper's voice crack.
Mara burst out laughing, and slapped on knee.
"I think it sounds more like thi-is" she said in her perfect imitation of Dipper's voice, even managing to nail the cracking part at the end.
"Are you saying my voice cracks?" asked Dipper offensively, forgetting all about the snake bite. "My voice doesn't crack!"
"Dude, no offense" said Soos, holding up a black tape recorder. "But it cracks so much we've already made a techno remix out of it. Mara's idea."
He pressed the play button, and the remix started playing a recording with Dipper's voice.
"Nice to meet you. My name's Dipper Pi-ines."
All three of the girls started to dance to the remix.
"P-P-Pines, Pines, Pines"
Dipper started blushing.
"Do I really sound like that?" he asked.
"Oh, here comes my favorite part!" said Wendy, pointing excitedly at the recorder in Soos's hand.
"Stop it guys!" said the recording, but this time his entire voice was cracked, and it was several pitches higher than it normally was.
Everyone but Dipper burst out into uncontrollable laughter. Dipper angrily snatched the recorder out of Soos's hand.
"Give me that!"
And with that, he started walking away.
They noticed, but didn't bother to go after him. They went right back to their game of spin the pig. "Spin the pig! Spin the pig!"
Dipper walked into the town, away from the others, and sighed annoyedly. Unfortunately, his voice chose that exact moment to crack once more.
"Ugh, even my sigh sounds weird!"
Suddenly, Old Man McGucket popped out of nowhere right in front of Dipper.
"Hello!"
"Aah!" Dipper yelped in surprise.
"I couldn't help but overhear your situation" said Old Man McGucket, holding out his casted hand to introduce himself. "Old Man McGucket." He spit on his hand, and held it out for Dipper to shake. "Part-time inventor."
Dipper looked at the old man's hand questionably.
"Why did you spit on your hand?"
"I don't rightly know!" replied Old Man McGucket in his usually cheery tone.
Dipper squinted at the old man, trying to remember where he had seen him. Suddenly, recognition hit him.
"Hey, I remember you. Your robot almost killed me!"
Old Man McGucket grabbed Dipper's hand and started pulling him towards the junk yard before the boy could protest.
"Come here! Follow me into this dark and dangerous alley!" he said cheerfully.
He led Dipper through the alley, which eventually spit them out into the junkyard where Old Man McGucket lived. He took Dipper to an old car, which looked like the old man had been messing with chemicals in. Instead of an engine under its hood, the car had test tubes and flasks that were bubbling over an unidentifiable heat source, each of them contained a liquid substance that was green in color.
Old Man McGucket turned a faucet that was on the side of the car, and held an empty test tube underneath it. The green substance was poured into the test tube.
"Lately I've been tinkerizing with a voice-altering tonic" he explained, turning off the faucet and then showing Dipper the green potion in the test tube. "On account of my, HORRIFYING VOICE!"
Dipper jumped a bit in surprise, but when he turned around he saw a little kid with a propeller hat on a scooter who had heard McGucket's horrible voice as well. The kid started crying, and ran away, completely abandoning his scooter.
"You can run, but I'll still be in your nightmares!" yelled McGucket. Dipper took the potion from the old man's hands.
"This will really fix my voice?" he said, though he was a hesitant to drink it.
"Well, what're you done waiting for?" asked McGucket.
Dipper paused, thinking through his words before he spoke them.
"Look, no offense or anything, but I could get my sister to make me a voice-altering tonic that is not of questionable origins." he said, looking back at McGucket, who was scratching his head. A bit of his white hair came loose and fell into his hand, and he grinned and dropped the hairs into the brewing tonic in the old car.
"Well, do you want to change your voice or not?" said McGucket. "I could always give the tonic to another gullible kid walking out in the streets by himself. Besides, was your sister, by chance, one of the people who was making fun of your ridiculous voice?"
Dipper realized with surprise that the old loon was right. He took one last glance at the questionable potion, then raised the vial to his lips and drank it all in one gulp.
"Thanks!" he said, turning and walking away back home.
"Come morning, you'll sound like a new man!" said McGucket as Dipper walked away. "If you survive..." he added.
The next morning, Dipper woke up in his bed. He sat up straight, stretched, and yawned loudly. He looked around the room at the other two beds.
The bed in the middle was empty, and unmade for that matter, and the bed on the other end still contained Mabel, who was fast asleep on top of the covers. Dipper wasn't worried. He knew that Mara liked to get up early to start working on her inventions, the only time she could actually be alone. He didn't really care. She was quite cranky if she didn't get her private time anyways. The only thing that Dipper wondered about Mara's peculiar morning routine was how she managed to get up at 5:30 am every morning.
Dipper hopped out of bed walked over to the mirror, scratching his head as he did so.
"Good morning, Dipper" he said to himself, but he sounded much different. His voice was a great deal deeper than it was before. It sounded like a grown man's voice.
His eyes widened in surprise, and he stumbled backwards a bit.
"I did it" he said in disbelief. Then, he raised his arms proudly and puffed up his chest. "I diiiid it! Now I have a neeew voice! Ha ha haa!" Dipper didn't seem to be aware of how fake his voice sounded.
He rushed over to Mabel's bed.
"Morning, Mabel!" he said in his new voice, as Mabel started to wake up. "Who's my favorite Mabel?"
Mabel sat upright and screamed. She then reached behind her bed, and grabbed a golf club from behind it. Dipper's eyes widened as Mabel started to bash him on the head repeatedly with it. Man, did it hurt.
"Who are you? What have you done with my brother?"
She swung the club again, but this time Dipper was ready, and he managed to duck just in time.
"Dipper! I'll save you from this body-switching warlock!"
She raised the golf club to hit him again, but Dipper held his hands up in front of his face.
"Mabel, it's me!" said Dipper in his new voice, and Mabel lowered her club. "If this is how you react to my new voice, I can't imagine what Mara's reaction is gonna be like"
Dipper cringed at the thought of it. "This is my voice now!" he said, putting his hands on his hips proudly as he said so.
"I sound awesome" said Dipper. "Sooouuund aweeeesoome!" he repeated, liking the sound of his new voice when it droned out vowels.
Mabel finally dropped the golf club.
"I knew that boys' voices changed, but this is weird" she said uneasily. "Weird and bad."
"Mabel, this is the best thing that ever happened to me!" Dipper insisted. "And just think of the prank calls."
He reached over and grabbed a nearby phone, then dialled a random number. He smiled as he held up the phone to his ear.
Just then, someone picked up on the other end.
"Hello?"
"Hello" said Dipper. "This is the President of the United States of America. I'm calling to tell you this."
He started to blow raspberries into the receive.
"What? Who is this?!" said the person on the other end, but Dipper hung up.
"Ho ho ho! Magnificent!" said Dipper, turning back towards his sister. Mabel turned around though, her back facing her brother.
"Mabel no like" she simply said.
After the two of them got ready, they made their way downstairs and found Mara working on yet another invention at the kitchen table. She was so concentrated on it that she didn't even seem to notice them. Dipper gulped, a bit of scared of how his more aggressive sister would react to his new voice, and then walked up to her.
"Good morning, Mara!" he said. "How's my favorite little sister doing?"
Mara immediately stood up straight from her chair, yelping in surprise, then snatched the new invention off of the table, aiming it right at him.
She leapt up from the table and put her arm protectively in front of Mabel, aiming the weapon at her brother and forcing him to back up with wide eyes.
"You!" said Mara. "I've heard about demons that can possess people! Or ghosts. Are you the spirit of a weatherman who's come back to haunt us all?!"
"C-calm down, Mara!" said Dipper. "It's still me!"
"Oh yeah? Prove it."
"Uh, every night before I go to bed while you guys are asleep, I kiss a pillow with Wendy's picture on it."
Mara lowered the contraption.
"Ok, you've got me convinced" she said. "And by the way, I'm actually awake when you kiss that pillow. I fall asleep every night in agony watching that torment."
Dipper blushed sheepishly.
"So what do you think of my new voice?" he asked.
"I think you sound like a corny weatherman or a fake news reporter" said Mara. "I liked your old voice better."
"Oh, I see. You liked it because you could make fun of it" said Dipper offensively. "Fine. Well let's see what Soos thinks of my new voice."
He turned and started to walk towards the gift shop of the Mystery Shack, and Mabel and Mara followed.
"And for the record, we're triplets" said Mara. "I'm only five minutes younger than you."
"Best five minutes of my life" said Dipper.
The triplets found Soos in the gift shop, and Dipper walked up to him.
"How are you diddly-doing, Soos?" said Dipper.
"Diddly-doing?" whispered Mara to Mabel.
"You're right, Mara, he does sound like a news reporter" said Mabel.
Soos turned around, and his eyes widened, and he screamed. He grabbed a broom from behind the counter, and started repeatedly whacking Dipper over the head with it.
"Kill it! Kill it with fire!" Soos screamed, as Dipper managed to duck and hide the counter to avoid getting hit by Soos's broom. "Everyone flee!"
All of the tourists who had been in the gift shop were now screaming as they poured out of the shack.
Dipper emerged from his hiding place behind the counter. He looked quite irritated.
"What gives, man?" he said. "You guys all made fun of my old voice. I thought you'd like the new one."
"Well at least you sounded like a real person" said Soos. "Now you sound like some weird commercial dude."
Dipper started to angrily storm towards the door.
"I'll find Stan" he said grudgingly. "He'll like my new voice, you'll see. I'll be right back after these messages!"
Soos, Mara, and Mabel all shot him weird looks at that last statement.
Dipper blushed.
"I mean, goodbye."
And with that, he opened the door of the Gift Shop, and left the Mystery Shack.
Dipper was now walking around town, yelling for Grunkle Stan in an attempt to try and find him. He walked right by the tattooed man standing in front of the biker joint.
"Grunkle Stan!" he yelled. "Grunkle Stan! Where are you, Grunkle Stan?"
"Huh?"
The tattooed man turned and looked at Dipper, fury in his eyes as he recognized the boy's voice.
"I'd recognize that voice anywhere!" He stormed up to Dipper, who turned around in fright. "You're the guy who prank called me earlier!" The man growled angrily at him, clearly about to attack.
"No, no I'm not" insisted Dipper. "I'm just a twelve-year-old boy!"
"You expect me to believe that?!" The man got up real close to Dipper's face. "YOU CRAZY-VOICED PUNK!!!" he roared furiously.
"W-w-w-wait, no!" said Dipper panickedly. "I, uh, eeeh!" In the spur of his panic, Dipper turned and bolted away.
Unfortunately, the tattooed man poked his head inside the bar and made an announcement.
"There's a prank caller on the loose! Let's get him!" He yelled, punching his fist into his other hand. All of the men who had been in the biker joint got up and started running along with the tattooed man after Dipper.
Dipper turned, and saw the entire mob of angry, rather muscular, dudes chasing after him.
"Ohhhhh!" screamed Dipper, as he continued to run panickedly down the streets of the town, looking for a way out. He caught sight of a hole in the side of a fence that was line against the dump.
Desperate, he dove through the hole, out of the grasp of the angry bikers.
"Escape!" he yelled.
McGucket was dancing on the top of an old car in the dump, watching some chickens peck at the ground. The old man was laughing maniacally.
Dipper ran towards McGucket angrily. He held up the vial at the old man, which had a bit of green serum still left at the bottom.
"McGucket, your invention was a catastrophe!" he said.
"That's probably why I live in the dump!" said McGucket, as he cheerfully started to do a jig on top of the old car hood.
"My own sisters didn't recognize me" he said. "I scared away crowds!" Dipper could feel himself tearing up at this point. "I even sound ridiculous when I cry!"
He laid his head on top of the car hood as he started to cry with his new voice. McGucket took the vial from Dipper as he did so.
"Well now, here's your problem!" said McGucket, pointing at the vial with some green substance at the bottom of it. Dipper looked up.
"I gave you the wrong drinky majig! This one's for voiceover professional."
He leaped off the hood of the car onto the ground, and then lifted the hood, exposing all the chemistry tubes underneath.
"I'm sure I've got a better voice in here somewhere" he said as he searched through it, tossing aside a boot, a cat, and an apple from the hood.
Dipper put his hands on his hips.
"Good. Hurry up."
McGucket then tossed aside a can of pitt cola.
"You got here just in time" he said. "Come sundown, you would have reverted back to your ridiculous old voice."
"It was ridiculous, wasn't it?" said Dipper, pulling the tape recorder out of his pocket and pressing the play button.
"D-D-D-D-D-D-Dipper Pines, that's me" said the recording. "This remix is dedicated to our brother" said Mabel's voice. "Dipper, your voice is one-of-a-kind" "Psh. It won't be for long. Just wait in another ten years. For now, we'll have to keep making fun of him while we still can" said Mara's voice. "Dude, I've never heard anything like it" said Soos's voice. "R-r-remix over. Pshh!"
Dipper smiled at the tape.
Just then, McGucket managed to finally find the right vial. He pulled out a test tube that was filled with a dark orange-ish liquid.
"You ready for your new voice?" He asked, handing Dipper the vial. "This one should be peeermanent!"
Dipper looked back and forth between the vial, which was in one hand, and the tape recorder, which was in the other, trying to make a decision.
Finally, he set the recorder down, tilted the vial, and opened his mouth to drink it...
That night, Soos, Mara, and Mabel were sitting in the living room watching TV. Soos was sitting in the chair, while Mabel and Mara were sitting next to each other on the ground.
They turned and saw that Dipper had entered the room. They all held their breaths, anticipating Dipper to speak in his new voice, as he inhaled deeply...
"Hey guys" he said in his normal voice, which actually cracked a little on the word "hey."
"Dipper!" exclaimed Mabel, as she and Mara ran up to hug him along with Soos.
"Brother!" exclaimed Mara. "I missed you!"
"Dude, you're back!" said Soos excitedly.
The three of them then let go of the boy.
"Yeah" said Dipper. "I guess I realized that even though my voice isn't perfect, it's still mine." He held his hand over his throat, where his voice box was. "And I wouldn't change it for the world."
Then, he held up a vial, which was mostly empty, but still had some red substance at the bottom of it.
"Not even for whatever was in this new vial."
"Where did you get that vial?" asked Mara suspiciously.
"McGucket" he replied simply.
"McGucket?! That looney man who lost his mind and lives in the dump?"
"Yup. That's the one."
"So what did you do with the rest of that potion?" asked Mabel.
"I dumped it in Stan's coffee" said Dipper.
As if on cue, Stan walked into the room, holding a steaming mug of coffee.
"Any of you kids seen my girdle?" he said in a high-pitched girly voice, which sounded like it was from New Jersey. "Where my girdle at?"
Everyone started laughing at Grunkle Stan's new voice.
"What? What's so funny?" said Stan. "I'm Grunkle Stay-an." As he said that, he shook his head from side to side in a sassy gesture. "Kids laughing. Laughing at their Grunkle."
"I spy with my little eye something... black!" said Mabel cheerfully when Dipper had finished telling his story. Soos raised his hand excitedly.
"Ooh ooh! Everything!"
"Yay for Soos!" said Mabel cheerfully, clapping for her friend.
"Yay for Soos!" Soos repeated excitedly.
"Hey guys" said Mabel, turning towards the rest of them. "Who wants to pass the time by spinning? Everyone spin!"
"No" said Dipper rather grumpily.
"Whee!" said Mabel, as she grabbed onto Dipper's foot, and threw it down, causing the boy to spin repeatedly.
Soos chuckled.
"Ooh ooh! Turn him on his side!" said Mara excitedly, and Mabel grinned at that idea, turning Dipper onto his side, and then running on top of him, causing him to spin in the other direction.
"Wheeee!" Mabel said, laughing while she spun poor Dipper.
"Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow" said Dipper, as her feet hit him repeatedly to keep him spinning.
"Five bucks if you make him puke!" said Mara.
"Dipper's pain is funny, but I'm starting to get bored" said Stan. "Soos, tell a story."
"Really? Ok" said Soos, as Dipper screamed in the background while he was still spinning.
"This story is called, 'Soos's really great pinball story!'" said Soos as he took hold of the glowstick. "Is that a good title? Do they have to be puns or whatever?"
Soos's story.
Soos was standing at a pinball machine, concentrating on his game, while the triplets were sitting on a beanbag cushion, cheering him on.
"Go! Go! Go! Go!" they chanted.
"This is it, dudes" said Soos. "After four long years of trying, I might finally get the high score on Stan's creepy old pinball machine."
"Which is probably as old as Stan" said Mara. Soos chuckled.
"If I do this, I'll go down in pinball history with lights of Sal, Gaff, and of course, Poo."
"Have you ever tried just tilting it?" asked Dipper.
"I don't know, dudes" said Soos. "Isn't breaking the rules, like, against the rules?"
"What rules?" pointed out Mara. "It's not like there's some kind of rulebook attached to the machine."
"Nuts to the rules!" said Mabel. "Tilt tilt tilt!"
Soos ignored them, and went back to the game. Unfortunately, his ball fell right through the bottom...again.
"Failure!" said the robotic skull head in the game. "You stink!"
Soos's eyes narrowed at the skull.
"Alright, that's it. Ready kids?"
The triplets eagerly ran up to the pinball machine, Mabel and Mara taking one side and Dipper taking the other. They started to tilt the machine back and forth roughly.
"Tilt! Tilt! Tilt!" they chanted.
"Quit tilting, partner. Quit tilting partner" said the skull.
Soos lifted the end, and the ball went right into the skull's mouth.
"Bullseye!" said the skull, and Soos's score skyrocketed, becoming greater than all the other high scores.
"New high score!" the game announced, and it started to flash in celebration.
"Woo hoo!" the four of them cheered excitedly.
"This is the best moment of my life!" said Soos. "This totally beats my old best moment."
"Well that ain't right" the skull in the game suddenly said, and the four of them turned back towards the game in surprise.
"You cheated."
"Oh yeah? What are you gonna do about it?" said Mabel. "You're just a pinball game, pinball game. Taunt taunt."
"Uh, guys?" said Dipper, looking worriedly at the game, as green arcs of electricity started to appear around the game. "There's an awful lot of green lightning coming out of that game."
"Nah, that's the normal amount of green lightning" said Soos.
The green lightning seemed to be getting brighter and brighter.
"Guys, take cover!!!" Mara screamed, but it was too late.
The green lightning exploded, consuming all four of them, as they screamed.
Soos woke up to the sound of a bell going off.
"Mmm, five more minutes" he said, turning over in exhaustion. However, he saw that it wasn't an alarm clock that he was pushing to turn off: it was a giant pinball machine button.
He sat up in shock.
"That's not a normal alarm clock" he said, looking down at his clothes to see that he was wearing a cowboy outfit, complete with the hat.
Just then, the triplets ran up to him, all of them were dressed up western style. Dipper was wearing a cowboy hat with cowboy boots and a black tie around his neck. Mabel was wearing a native american dress with a pink head sweatband around her forehead keeping the feather in place. Mara was dressed in a native american outfit similar to her sister's, except that her head sweatband was camo, and her native american dress was black. Her white hair was also exposed since she wasn't wearing much to cover it up.
"Soos!" exclaimed Dipper. "We're inside the game!"
For the first time, the four of them looked around at their surroundings to see the giant version of the game. It was a truly amazing sight.
"Crazy!" said Dipper.
"Sweet Sally!" said Mabel.
"Hushed exclamation of wonder!" said Soos.
The three of them started to run around in excitement, exploring their new surroundings.
Dipper was following the ball as it rolled around the track.
"Awesome!"
Mabel had jumped between two pinball buttons, and was now bouncing back and forth between the two of them.
"Boing! Boing! Boing! Boing!"
There was only one person who wasn't celebrating: Mara.
"Guys, I hate to be Johnny Raincloud or whatever" she said, running up all of them. "But might I remind you that we're trapped inside a pinball game? We could get get crushed by the next pinball that gets launched out here! We need to escape while we still can!"
But none of them seemed to have heard her, for they were all too excited by their new surroundings.
"Dudes, if this is a dream, I never wanna wake up!" said Soos.
"That can be arranged" said the robotic skull suddenly. The four of them made their way to the center, right in front of the skull.
"Welcome to tumbleweed terror, partners" said the skull, as the lights around them started to blink on and off.
"Hey, it's the skeleton cowboy guy" said Soos cheerfully. "You zapped me into your game to congratulate me on getting the high score? I beat Poo, dude!"
"Hardley" bellowed the skull. "If I do recall, I warned y'all not to cheat. I tried to be gentlemen-like, but I'm blum sick of being tilted. So now I reckon, I'm gonna tilt you."
"Oh yeah?" said Soos. "Take this!" He punched a button, but unfortunately, his fist bounced off of it and into his own face. "Ow! And this!" He punched the button, which ended up with him getting punched again. "Ow! I wish this was working better!"
He punched the button and himself yet again, and this time, fell to the floor.
"Soos!" exclaimed the triplets, as they rushed over and helped their friend up.
Just then, the skull laughed evilly.
"Get yourselves ready for..."
The lights that were labelled with the different types of pinballs started to turn off, until only one light was still on: the one labelled "multi-ball."
"Multi-ball!" the four of them exclaimed at different types. The skull opened its jaw, and several balls started to pour out of it, threatening to roll over them. The four of them bolted away to avoid getting crushed as the skull laughed maniacally.
Just then, Dipper spotted something.
"Over there!" he yelled, pointing to the left at a sign labelled "Spitoon Parlor" that was hanging above a small set of western doors.
The four of them ran through them, and hid behind the wall.
"Where are you?" exclaimed the skull. "I'm not done teaching you a lesson about cheating yet."
"How are we ever gonna get out of here?" said Dipper. "Think guys."
"There's gotta be an off switch, or something!" said Mara. "Soos, you know the game better than any of us. Is there some kind of glitch or trick to the game?"
"I'm trying" said Soos. "It's hard with that gorgeous pinball wench distracting me."
He gestured towards a flat cut out of an old western girl, winking at Soos.
Soos waved at it, then looked down to see the triplets staring at him.
"Ok, don't worry guys" he said in a more serious voice. "I know every inch of this machine."
He got down onto his knees so that only the triplets could hear what he was about to say.
"There's a manual power switch inside" he whispered. "I can sneak in there and turn off the game. But we'll have to distract the cowboy guy. Are any of you good at jumping up and down and making annoying noises?"
Mabel stood up proudly and looked off into the distance seriously.
"My time has come." she said, as her hair was blown back.
"Ok, it's not or never" said Mara, peaking around the corner at the skull.
"Alright, let's go, Soos" said Dipper. "Soos?"
He turned and saw that Soos was now talking to the flat cardboard cutout lady. "So are you, like, doing anything later, or?" said Soos.
Mara walked up to the cutout, and spun it, putting her hands on her hips and glaring at Soos.
"Right" said Soos.
"Come on out and show yourselves, varmints!" demanded the skull. Dipper, Mara, and Mabel stood at the end of the pinball machine, on top of the buttons to make them stand out to the skull.
"Hey hey hey!" yelled Mabel, and the skull's attention turned towards the three of them.
"Listen to me and look at what I'm doing!" exclaimed Mabel, waving her arms up and down. She made airplane noises as she spun around in a circle, and once she finished the 360, she started blowing raspberries and shaking her hips back and forth.
"Hey, skull dude!" yelled Mara. "Did swallow a biker? I have some cough drops for that terribly raspy voice of yours! My uncle has a voice that isn't as raspy as yours!"
Mara continued with her string of on-the-fly insults as Mabel continued to make annoying noises, and Dipper did his own attempt at a dance, since he really didn't really have anything else worthy of distraction.
"Something ain't right here" said the skull suspiciously, narrowing its eyes. "Let me see where this is going..."
Meanwhile, Soos managed to sneak off to a goldmine setting in a deeper part of the game, where there were tracks leading into the mine and a cart. He leaped into the cart, and pushed forward. The minecart took Soos to the inside of the game, underneath the western setting, where the control panel was. Soos leaped out of the cart, and stood in front of green button labelled, "Power."
"Ha ha!" laughed the skull head at the empty space in front of him where the triplets had previously been. "Yippee tai yay, what! Where are you?" He tried to rotate his head to look around the game, but found out eventually that he still couldn't.
"Darn it. I wish I had a neck."
The triplets had retreated back to their hiding place at the Spitoon Parlor.
"What is taking Soos so long?" whispered Mabel.
"Yeah" agreed Mara. "How long does it take to press a button?"
She looked around, and something caught her eye: a screw on the floor that was probably right above the control panel.
"Over there" she said, pointing. Dipper and Mabel nodded in understanding, and the three of them rushed over to the screw. Dipper bent downward and turned to the screw, finally managing to make it come loose. He spun it until it popped out of place, and there was a hole in the floor leading to the control panel underneath the game.
The triplets peaked through the hole, and saw Soos simply standing in front of the green off button.
"Soos!" whispered Dipper. Soos looked upwards. "What's going on? Just press the switch already!" said Dipper urgently.
"Ok, so I was gonna do that" said Soos. "But I've been thinking..." he gestured towards the yellow warning label that he was standing on, which read "Warning: Turning off power will erase all scores."
"...Turning off the power will erase the high score permanently. That score is like my one big life accomplishment!" explained Soos.
"What?!" exclaimed the three of them at the same time. "If you don't hurry up, we could die in here!" insisted Dipper.
"Fair point" said Soos. "But...what is life anyway? When compared the to the immortality of a high score?"
"Are you kidding me?" whispered Mara urgently. "Numbers are infinite! There's no such thing as an immortal high score! High scores are literally made so that other people can break them."
"Soos!" yelled Dipper, seeming to forget that they were hiding. "Are you out of your-"
"There you all are!" said the skull. Suddenly, the wall that had been hiding them was lowered, exposing the triplets to the skull.
"Get ready to meet your maker, kids!" said the skull. He then lowered his hat, to reveal the corporation that made him. "My maker is Ballway Games in Redmund Washington."
"Then why don't you go back to Redmund, Washington!" yelled Mara defiantly.
Suddenly, the skull started to take a deep breath inward, causing everything to get sucked towards his mouth.
The triplets felt themselves getting sucked towards it. Mabel was the first to lose her balance.
"Mabel!" yelled Mara. Without thinking, she reached out and managed to grab onto Mabel's hand to keep her from flying, but unfortunately by doing that, she lost her balance herself. Still clinging onto Mabel's hand, Mara and her sister started to get sucked in towards the skull's mouth.
"Mara!" yelled Dipper. Hooking one foot onto the edge of a fake cactus, Dipper reached out and grabbed Mara's ankle, holding on tightly as the force from the skull's long inhale was continuing to try and pull them towards him, causing the three of them to hover off the ground.
Dipper's hat flew off, and was sucked into the skull's mouth. The three of them saw the hat disappear in a fiery red glow.
Unfortunately, it looked like the cactus was starting to lose its grip on the ground from the weight of three kids being pulled towards the skull. Dipper could see it starting to snap at the base.
"Soos, TURN IT OFF!" yelled Dipper.
"Please!!!!" begged Mabel.
"Soos, think about it this way" yelled Mara over the loud winds. "What's more important: your friends or your high score?"
Suddenly, the cactus snapped, and the triplets were now flying towards the skull's mouth to their ultimate dooms.
"AAAAAHHHHHHHH!" The three of them screamed.
Soos closed his eyes.
"Goodbye, high score." And with that, he pressed the power button. Immediately, the game started powering down.
One by one, all the scores were erased from the board, including Soos's.
The game shut down completely until it was completely dark. But not before the green lightning carrying Soos and the triplets emerged from the game, making its way to the four real bodies of Soos, Mara, Mabel, and Dipper that were sleeping on the cushions in the room.
The triplets sat up in shock, along with Soos.
"Soos, you did it!" said Mabel on the floor excitedly. "You freed us!"
"Thank you, Soos!" said Mara. "Thank you so much!"
"Hey, man, I'm sorry you had to lose your high score" said Dipper.
"That's ok" said Soos. "I've got a new life accomplishment now: saving you dudes."
"Aw" said all three of them. Dipper chuckled awkwardly.
Just then, a sudden thought occurred to Soos.
"You think that pinball wench will call me?"
The five of them were still falling down the bottomless pit, looking as bored as ever. Stan, however, was quite irritable.
"I can't believe this nonsense" he said. "Magic tonics, Soos winning at something, where do you come up with this stuff?"
"It's called real life experiences" said Mara. "And for the record, they were good stories. You really think you can do better?"
"Yeah, in fact I do" replied Stan. "I'll tell you a good story. It's called 'Grunkle Stan wins the football bowl'."
Mara groaned.
"Is this gonna be an egotistical story about you winning a non-realistic football game?"
Stan's story:
Stan ran across the football field with a football in hand, reaching the endzone successfully. He celebrated as the audience cheered wildly, throwing down the football onto the ground and starting a cocky little dance.
Just then, the football team approached him.
"Mr. Pines" said the quarterback. "I thought old folks were useless, but you taught me an my gloating friends a lesson."
A huge trophy that was bigger than Stan was pushed towards him, with an attractive woman sitting on top of it.
"Here's your football-winning trophy, Mr. Pines!" she chirped.
"Thank you, beautiful woman!" said Stan. "But I couldn't have done it without my sidekick: Foot-bot."
"Thank you for building me, Daddy!" chimed a robot with the letter "F" spray painted across it.
Stan laughed triumphantly, and posed victoriously along with everyone else as the robot made its way over to him and embraced him.
"I love you, Stan!"
Everyone hated Stan's story.
"Boo!"
"Lame!"
"That story was dumb!"
"Ridiculous!"
"What?" exclaimed Stan. "That story was great! I even threw in a talking robot for the kids."
Mara sighed disdainfully.
"What do you think we are, four years old?" she said. "And please, you building a robot?"
"Hey! You're not the only one who can build stuff, you know" said Stan irritably.
"Yeah, yeah" said Mabel, taking the glowstick from Soos. "I'm gonna tell a non-terrible story. A story called, 'Trooth ache!"
Mabel's story:
Stan, Mabel, Mara, and Dipper were standing in a driveway on the side of the road in front of Stan's car. There was an orange truck parked in front of them that Manly Dan was opening the back of. Inside the truck was a rather furious-looking bear, which started wrestling with Manly Dan the instant he opened the truck.
"This attraction's gonna make me a fortune!" said Stan excitedly. "Easy with that bear, Corduroy. I need him in showroom condition!"
Manly Dan and the bear continued to wrestle ferociously, their arms locked around each other in a death grip.
"Aww, they're hugging!" said Mabel.
"Grunkle Stan, this isn't one of those dangerous stunts that somehow involves us risking our necks for, is it?" asked Mara. "Because if it is...I'm totally in" she said with a daring, adventurous look in her eyes.
"Let me get this straight" said Dipper. "Your plan is to teach this bear how to ride a bicycle."
"Nah, come on" said Stan. "Everyone's seen a bicycle riding bear. No no, I'm gonna teach this bear to drive!"
They were now in the car again, with the triplets in the back, Stan in the passenger seat, and the bear at the wheel. The car was wildly swerving from side to side into the other lane.
Dipper and Mabel were grasping the sides of the car for dear life, Mara had a crazed, overexcited look on her face as she cheered from the thrill of the ride, and Stan was sitting leisurely in the passenger seat.
"And the yellow light means, speed up!" he said to the bear. Just then, police lights started to flash behind them as their alarm went off. Stan caught sight of the car that the sheriffs of the town were driving behind them.
"Uh oh" said Stan.
Eventually, the police car had managed to pull Stan's car over. Durland and Blubbs got out of their car and made their way over to Stan's.
Stan rolled down the window, and smiled at the sheriffs.
"What seems to be the problem, officers?" he asked cheerfully, with the bear still sitting in the driver's seat.
The bear suddenly started chewing the seatbelt that was strapped around him, and roaring in frustration.
"Now there better be a darn good explanation for this" said Blubbs seriously.
"Oh, there is" said Stan. "You see, I'm a very old man. Not long for this Earth!" he said dramatically, making himself tremble as he said that last statement. "And the doctors assigned me a seeing eye bear to drive me to the hospital in case of emergencies."
While he was saying that, Mabel was looking at him with a shocked expression, wondering if what he was doing was really right.
"Is that right?" said Blubbs. "Then where's your doctor's note?"
"Why, it's right here inside my jacket!" said Stan, opening his jacket and using a pencil to hurriedly scribble something onto a piece of paper that was inside his jacket.
When he was done, he took out the new piece of paper and handed it to Blubbs.
"Here you go" he said.
Blubbs examined the note, which read "Stan is sick and needs a bear. -Dr. Medicine."
"Well, I can't argue with Dr. Medicine" said Blubbs.
"To the hospital, honey-pants!" said Stan, and with that, the bear roared and drove off.
When they had arrived back at the Mystery Shack, Stan had left the bear outside. The bear was now tearing through the garbage cans eating the leftovers in it, while Stan was in the Mystery Shack spray painting rocks gold for a display called "Gold Rocks."
Mabel approached him.
"Grunkle Stan, how could you lie to those police officers?" she said in disbelief. "Don't you know lying is wrong?"
"Ah, Mabel" said Stan. "When you get to my age, you'll learn that sometimes you have to bend the truth" he said, bending downward and picking up a plate of spaghetti that was sitting on the table on front of him. He started to slurp the noodles. "You know, for the greater good."
Just then, Dipper walked into the room.
"Hey, has anyone seen my plate of spaghetti?" asked Dipper. Stan's eyes widened. He slurped up the noodle that was in his mouth, then turned around and faced Dipper, holding the plate of spaghetti behind his back.
"Noooo" he said, his mouth smeared in spaghetti sauce. "But I bet Soos has. You know how he likes to eat."
Mabel and Dipper paused.
"This is a dark day" murmured Dipper, then he turned and ran off. "Thanks, Grunkle Stan."
Mabel was still standing there, glaring at her uncle. Mabel had her hands on her hips.
"See?" said Stan, patting his stomach. "Greater good!"
"Urgh!" Mabel exclaimed in frustration, storming up to her room.
Mabel was now laying in her bed, with her legs raised up holding Waddles on the end of them.
"Waddles, what am I going to do about Grunkle Stan?" she asked.
Mabel put her fingers up to Waddles's face, and started to move his mouth as she started to act out what he was saying to her.
"He needs to stop lying."
"I know, but how do we stop him?"
As if on cue, the door suddenly swung open, and Mara burst into the room with a wild expression on her oil-streaked face.
"Mabel, I need your help!" she exclaimed. "I may or may not have invented a contraption that can create hypersonic sound waves, and that is about to explode and destroy the entire living room!!!"
Mabel suddenly got an idea.
"Wait a minute, that's it!" she said excitedly.
"What's it?" said Mara.
"You! You're the answer to my problem!" said Mabel eagerly. "You can just invent some do-hickey-majig that can make Grunkle Stan tell the truth!"
"You mean, like a truth serum?" asked Mara.
"Yeah. A truth serum!" said Mabel.
"Hmm...." said Mara, now deep in thought as she started brainstorming ideas for that. Mabel could see the gears turning in her sister's head.
"That would be duable" said Mara. "Sure, I'll do it!"
"Yes!" exclaimed Mabel. "Thank you so much, Mara!"
"You're welcome, Mabel" said Mara. "And don't worry: you won't regret this!"
Just then, the sound of an explosion sounded from downstairs, shaking the entire Mystery Shack. An extremely high pitched sound surged throughout the entire shack, and Mabel and Mara covered their ears in pain.
Mabel looked over at the triangular attic window to see its glass shattering at the impact of the sound wave.
"Mara!!!" yelled Grunkle Stan angrily. "You'd better have a good explanation as to why all the windows in the Shack have shattered!"
"Well, then" said Mara, grabbing her sister's hand, and making her way towards the window. And with that, the two girls climbed out the window and onto the roof.
The sisters were sitting on the back of the roof, where Mara secretly had a small lab made up of a few burners, several flasks and beakers, and many test tubes of various elements and ingredients of all sorts. This was where she experimented with the chemistry part of her inventing process, such as making tonics and serums. All of the burners and flasks were sitting on a small tabletop, and the ingredient boxes were underneath the table.
Mara was now hyper concentrated on the serum that she was working on, which was a purple liquid substance that was boiling over one of the burners in a cylindrical flask.
"Ok" said Mara. "Just a bit of titian hydrochloric acid..." She reached over and turned a knob of another boiling flask, which had a clear swirling straw thing emerging out of it. The orange substance that was in the flask emerged through the swirling tube and spilled out the end into the original boiling purple substance.
Mara turned the knob again when she had put the desired amount of orange liquid in her serum, and the orange liquid soon stopped pouring into the originally purple serum, which had now turned a dark olive-green color. The newly created potion was emitting a very foul smell.
"Oh, gross!" exclaimed Mabel, plugging her nose and fighting the urge to puke. "Yup" said Mara. "That's the smell of methane. At least that means that this potion is working. Hand me that dropper, will you?"
Mabel bent down and picked up a small dropper from the box of materials, and handed it to her sister.
"Thanks."
Mara took the dropper from her sister, and inserted its end into a tube containing a red liquid. Some of the red liquid rose up into the dropper after Mara squeezed the stopper and let go. She then lifted the dropper and raised it over the churning olive-green serum. She very carefully started to squeeze the stopper, and a small red drop started to form at the end of the dropper, eventually becoming big enough to fall off the end and into the potion.
Instantly, the serum released a huge puff of smoke, which rose into the air.
Mabel coughed, and waved aside the smoke to see. When the smoke was finally clear, she saw her sister, holding up a small test tube containing a golden-colored liquid.
"It's done" she said, sticking a cork into the end of it. Mara then handed the test tube to her sister. Mabel examined the golden liquid in the test tube with amazement.
"How does it work?"
"It's pretty simple enough" said Mara. "Just get it into Stan's system. Any way would work. I would suggest maybe dumping it into his coffee like Dipper did."
Mabel started thinking about how she could get this serum into Grunkle Stan's body...
Later that night while everyone was asleep, Mabel and Waddles crept into Stan's bedroom. Stan was asleep on top of the covers with an open magazine lying on his belly. She caught sight of his dentures laying on the side table in a glass of water. Mabel took out the test tube, and uncorked it. She then poured the golden liquid into the dentures' water.
Mabel watched as the golden liquid dyed Stan's dentures gold. She then took out a pair of plastic gloves from her pocket, and pulled them onto her hands. She grimaced in disgust as she picked up the new golden dentures from the glass, and stuck them into Stan's mouth. She immediately threw away the gloves in the nearest trash can, then took the gold dentures water and dumped it into a potted plant.
Suddenly, the teeth started glowing as the serum began to take effect. Mabel shielded her eyes from the brightness. Once the glowing died down, Mabel removed her hands from her eyes and looked down at Grunkle Stan.
Now it was time to test the serum out.
Mabel gently grabbed onto Stan's nose. He flinched at the touch, and then suddenly his eyes flew open as he sat upright.
"What? What's going on?" he said, then he turned and squinted towards Mabel. "What? Mabel?"
"Quick question" said Mabel. "What happened to Dipper's spaghetti plate?"
"I ate it" replied Stan immediately. "Because I have little to no concern for other people's possessions or emotions."
Stan paused, a look of suspicion etched across his face.
"Huh, that was strangely candid" he said, scratching his chin as he thought about what he had just said. "Almost as if I'm unable to lie..."
There was a slight pause.
"Whelp, goodnight!" he said cheerfully, rolling over and falling back asleep. He started to snore loudly. Mabel turned towards Waddles and grinned.
"You, what?" exclaimed Dipper the following morning. The triplets were now sitting at the table in the kitchen while Stan was cooking breakfast on the stove. Mabel had just whispered to her siblings what she had done to Stan.
"Mabel, I'm glad that you found a way to get the serum into Stan's system, but did you really have to use his dentures?" said Mara.
"That seems like a horrible idea!" said Dipper. "Mara, why did you even agree to help her with this?"
"I helped her with this because it seemed like a horrible idea" said Mara. "I like to do the things that should be impossible, and that people are telling me not to do. It's kinda my thing."
"It's great!" insisted Mabel. "Now he has to tell the truth."
"Hmm..." said Dipper, pondering this point. Maybe this wasn't so bad...
Just then, Stan walked up to them holding a pan of breakfast up to them with his oven-mitt gloved hand.
"Scrambled meat, here it is" said Stan.
He dropped the pan onto the table.
"Stan, what do you do in secret everyday during your lunchbreak?" asked Dipper suspiciously, to test out Mara's serum.
Stan thought about this for a second. Dipper caught sight of his teeth, which were now a glowing gold color due to being soaked in the truth serum.
"Usually I spend the hour aggressively scratching myself in places I shouldn't mention" he replied, picking up a newspaper and holding it up in front of his face. "Now I'm going to avoid eye contact by pretending to read this newspaper."
He got up and started walking away from the kitchen.
"And go the bathroom without washing my hands" he added.
"Ew!" all three of them exclaimed.
"Well, that was disturbing" said Dipper.
"Which part?" asked Mara. "The scratching in places he shouldn't mention, or the going to the bathroom without washing his hands?"
"Both" said Mabel. "And don't worry, Dipper. The truth is always a good thing."
Stan was counting money behind the counter of the gift shop while it was open later that day, when a tourist walked up to him.
"Excuse me" asked the tourist. "Do you think this T-shirt is my size?"
"Never mind the T-shirt" said Stan boisterously, pointing at the man.
He suddenly stood up on top of the counter and waved his arms to get everyone's attention.
"Hey, everybody!" He announced, a huge grin spread across his face. "Look at this guy's abnormal and unattractive face!"
As the other tourists in the gift shop started murmuring, the tourist looked down sadly. Mabel appeared at his side comfortingly.
"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry" she said.
Later that day, Stan was doing his taxes in his office with a huge red marker. Dipper, who was in there as well, grabbed the tax paper that Stan had just finished. Written across the page with red ink was "I have committed tax fraud."
"Uh, Grunkle Stan, why did you write this?" asked Dipper in concern.
"Because I regularly commit massive tax fraud" said Stan cheerfully.
Dipper placed the paper in the nearby shredder and turned the machine on.
"Might wanna, tuck that one away there."
That night, the four of them were watching TV again. Stan was sitting on the couch, while Mabel, Dipper, and Mara were sitting on the floor in front of them.
On the TV was a man juggling on a unicycle, singing in the center of a crowd of alligators.
"Do do do do do do! Oh no!"
The triplets laughed and pointed at the TV.
"Sometimes I think, is this all there is?" said Stan suddenly. "Is life just some kind of horrific joke without a punchline that we're all just biding our time until the sweet, sweet release of death?"
He had pretty much ruined the rest of the night for the triplets.
Mabel was rocking back and forth uncomfortably, trying to get that brutally honest statement out of her mind.
Mara started fidgeting uncontrollably, wringing her hands repeatedly and thumping one of her legs consistently.
Dipper was shuddering and covering his eyes, lowering his head down so that his hat covered his face. The cheery show on the TV was still playing, which didn't do them any favors in lightening the mood.
They hoped that Stan wouldn't be like this forever...
The next morning, Stan was sitting at the table in the TV room, shoving chips into his mouth and scratching his back. Just then, a sudden thought occurred to him, and he decided that he needed to share it with his nieces and nephew.
"Kids!" he called upstairs.
In their room, the three of them were covering their ears in some different way, Mabel with a pair of earmuffs, Dipper with a pillow over his head, and Mara with a pair of earbuds in her ears. They were trying to block out Stan's next outburst that they really didn't want to know about, but Stan's voice was extremely loud and was practically impossible to block out.
"I think I have a growth forming on my back! Just wanted to be honest with you guys!"
While it looked like all three of them were being driven insane, Dipper looked like he was losing it the most.
"I can't take it anymore, Mabel!" he exclaimed, ripping the pillow off of his head. "You and Mara have to figure out a way to get those teeth out of his mouth!"
"But then he'd be a liar again" said Mabel, taking the earmuffs off of her head.
"Mabel, I'm with Dipper on this one" said Mara, yanking the earbuds out of her ears. "I don't think I can stand being forced to hear anymore of what goes on in that old man's head!"
"But Mara, you're the one who invented the serum" said Mabel.
"A decision that I seriously regret."
"Could it possibly be any worse than this?" said Dipper.
As if on cue, the doorbell suddenly rang. The triplets hurried down the stairs to see Durland and Blubbs standing in the Mystery Shack at the door, directly addressing Stan. They didn't look very happy.
"After further investigation" said Blubbs. "It turns out there is no Dr. Medicine in Gravity Falls."
"You'd better have a darn good explanation for this" said Durland.
"Oh, and I do" said Stan cheerfully. "You see, I lied to you. In addition I've been parking in handicap spaces, shoplifting fireworks, and smuggling endangered animals across multiple state lines" he said, counting off the crimes that he had committed on his fingers.
"Also, you're fat."
He was pointing at Blubbs.
For a moment, the officers just stood there in shock. Blubbs was so surprised that he actually dropped his cup of coffee.
"Is all this true?" he demanded, holding up a pair of handcuffs.
"No way!" intervened Mara. "Definitely not."
"No no, it's not true!" said Dipper hurriedly. "Right, Mabel?"
"Uh..." said Mabel nervously, turning towards the officers. She could feel herself starting to sweat. "Sirs, I have to be completely and totally honest with you. Our great uncle, Stan, is..."
Everyone turned to look at her, their gazes all pressing into her.
"Is...is..."
Dipper and Mara's eyes widened.
Stan held out his wrists together to the officers so that they could put the handcuffs on him. Blubbs was raising his club in anger.
"Stan is..." said Mabel, struggling between whether to lie or tell the truth. She took a very long pause, before suddenly she bursted.
"...secretly a crime fiction writer!"
Blubbs lowered his club.
"What?"
Mabel laughed nervously, walking down the stairs and standing next to Stan. "Yeah, he was just telling you about a character from his upcoming page-turner, 'Crime-Grandpa!' He's never committed a crime in his life!"
She looked at Blubbs, wondering what else she could say, because the officers were still looking a bit suspicious.
"Also...have you lost weight?" Mabel added.
Blubbs suddenly started to laugh merrily, and he finally put his club away.
"Finally, someone noticed" he said, turning towards Durland.
"Wow, an author!" said Durland excitedly, holding up an orange book. "Can you teach me how to read?"
"What?" said Stan in confusion. "Author?"
Mara hurriedly herded the officers out the door.
Mabel laughed nervously.
"Writers, masters of fiction, goodnight officers!"
Mara slammed the door shut.
Mabel sighed in exhaustion, and fell into a sitting position on the floor.
Dipper walked up to his sister, and bent down on one knee. Mara sat down on the floor next to her.
"Hey, you alright?" Dipper asked.
"I can't believe I lied" said Mabel.
"Mabel, it was for the greater good" said Dipper.
"Yeah, greater good" Mabel agreed.
"Hey" said Mara. "And if it makes you feel any better, I lie all the time. You practically look like a saint when you're standing next to me."
Mabel gave her a small smile.
"Thanks, Mara."
"Hello, police station?"
The triplets looked up panickedly to see that Stan was on the telephone in the TV room, talking to the police.
"Yeah, I forgot to tell them about my tax fraud" continued Stan. "No, tax fraud."
Suddenly, the triplets ran at him, and leapt upon him, Mara was the first to reach him. She was the first to collide with him, and with the combined force of her weight with her siblings' weights, they managed to pin Stan onto the ground.
"Get him!" yelled Dipper.
"What's gotten into you kids?" said Stan. Without answering him, Mabel suddenly reached into his mouth, and pulled out the glowing golden dentures.
"Ew, that is so gross" said Mara.
"We have to find a place to get rid of these!" she said, holding the teeth up into the air.
Mabel put the golden teeth into the locked box with chains wrapped around it, later on pushing it into the bottomless pit...
"And I never saw that box full of magical teeth again" said Mabel, concluding her story. "Oh, wait, there it is." She pointed, and the others turned to see the brown-ish red-ish box wrapped in chains, falling alongside them.
Everyone groaned.
"Oh, sweet, my shoes!" said Soos, noticing his shoes for the first time falling above his head. He grabbed onto them, and stuck them back onto his bare feet.
"I liked the part with the bear" said Stan. "The rest seemed pretty far-fetched."
"Mabel, we already know that story, we just lived through it" said Dipper irritably."
"But at least it passed the time" said Mara. "That probably took up about ten minutes of our time until we fall to our impending deaths."
"So, if we're living through that story right now, then how does it end?" asked Soos.
Dipper suddenly noticed something.
"Guys, do you see that?" he asked nervously.
The five of them looked down to see a small glowing white hole that they were falling right towards. The hole seemed to be getting bigger as they got closer to it.
"Oh, what is that?!" said Soos.
"Oh no!"
"Where are we going?!"
"What the heck is that thing?!"
"That's not good!"
The five of them screamed as they finally approached the white hole...
...only to be spat back up from the top of the bottomless pit, and back onto the ground next to it.
Something else came flying from the pit next to them, and Mara recognized it as the portal device she had thrown earlier. She hurriedly ran towards it and caught it in one of her hands before it could collide with anything. Then, she shut it down by turning the ends back to normal. The baseball-like device stopped glowing, and she stored it back into her toolbelt.
There was also a pink stuffed bear that was shot out of the pit, and Mara caught it and gave it back to her sister.
Stan rubbed his head.
"Where, where are we?"
Mabel gasped.
"Look!" she pointed. "The Shack!"
She was right. Standing several yards away from them was none other than the Mystery Shack itself. "Which means...we came right back out the top" she said, as the five of them turned around and looked at the bottomless pit.
"And I don't think any time has passed" said Dipper, looking down at his watch. "It must be some kind of wormhole."
"Yeah, dude, that sounds science-y enough to be true" said Soos.
"A wormhole with no beginning or end" murmured Mara, examining the bottomless pit. "Interesting..."
"But, but that's impossible!" said Stan, leaning against the old "Bottomless Pit" sign. "No one would believe us."
"Maybe this is one story we should keep to ourselves" said Mabel.
"Agreed" said all five of them at the same time.
Suddenly, the "Bottomless Pit" sign that Stan was leaning against gave way and snapped, and Stan was sent flying back into the bottomless pit.
"He'll be fine."