"Focus, Deputy" said Blubbs in the police car with Durland. "Remember your training."
It was nighttime, and the two police officers were parked right next to the road scanning for people speeding by. However, they were too busy doing a maze in a magazine to even notice the car that sped past them at 99 mph.
Durland was doing the maze with a pencil, just a few inches away from the treasure in the middle. His hand was shaking nervously.
"Easy, easy" said Blubbs. "You're almost there."
But unfortunately, Durland's pencil slid to the left, right into the shark instead of the treasure.
"Dang it!" exclaimed Durland. "I almost got the treasure!"
"It's ok" said Blubbs, taking the magazine from his friend's hands. "It was just one maze. You'll get it next time."
He tossed the failed maze into the back, and it landed on top of an entire pile of magazines that all had failed maze attempts by Durland on them.
Suddenly, the ground started to rumble.
"Hey, you feel that?" asked Blubbs.
Suddenly, claws dug into the roof of the police car, and the two officers screamed as the roof was suddenly ripped off.
The officers gasped as they saw the creature fly off into the night sky with the roof of the car in its claws.
Durland turned back towards Blubbs.
"Reckon we should report that."
"Or go for a ride in our new convertible!" cheered Blubbs, pumping his fist up into the air.
Durland slammed on the gas, and the convertible sped onto the road. The officers both cheered excitedly.
The following morning, Stan was giving tours in a train of golf carts. He was driving the front-most cart that was pulling all the other carts in a long line. There were tourists in each of the carts.
"Ladies and gentlemen!" announced Stan, as they drove right past the Mystery Shack. "Continuing our mystery tour, you'll see our world famous outhouse of Mystery!" he said, gesturing towards the outhouse which had signs pointing at it labelled "Behold!" and "Wow!" There were flies flying around near the smelly outhouse.
The tourists gasped in amazement.
"I got stuck in there once!" said Stan.
A little boy in the cart behind Stan turned towards him.
"Can I go to the bathroom?" he pleaded.
"Hold all questions until the end of the tour!" said Stan cheerfully.
The boy groaned in pain, and the line of golf carts ran over a bump, which didn't seem to help the boy at all.
They continued to drive away from the Mystery Shack, down the road leading into the town.
"And up ahead if you look really closely" said Stan. "Everybody get your cameras, you're gonna wanna see this."
From the open Mystery Shack gift shop window, Mabel's head peeked up to see Stan driving the golf carts away. Waddle's head popped up next to hers.
"Finally, Waddles, we have the whole house to ourselves!" exclaimed Mabel excitedly. "Wendy's out with her friends, Dipper and Soos are out in the woods solving a mystery, Mara's in the lab, and now Grunkle Stan is gone!"
She turned towards her pig.
"What do you think?" she asked him, pausing to think about what they could do together when nobody else was there. "Dance party?"
Waddles oinked in response.
Mabel grinned.
"I'm not hearing a 'no!'"
Mabel walked up to the shut front door of the gift shop, and flipped the "open" sign to "closed."
She then made her way over to the stereo, and turned up the volume loud.
As the music started to play, Mabel danced around joyfully.
She tried her best to make Waddles to dance as well. She made him stand on his hind legs by holding him by his front legs. After this effort, she started prancing around while holding Waddles up in the air. Then, she stopped and held him above the ground, using her hands to make his little legs move up and down to the beat. Getting tired of holding up his weight, she set him down onto the ground, and danced around him, bumping him slightly in the process as well.
When they were done dancing, they broke into the ice cream cooler, dumping purple popsicles onto the ground. They were both on all fours eating the popsicles off of the floor, not caring about the mess that they were making.
When they were done, Mabel poked the sides of Waddles's cheeks just for fun, then slid a pair of sunglasses onto both of their faces, snapping a photo of the two of them with a camera.
Waddles started to eat a book, and Mabel decided to copy him, grabbing the phone book on the counter and shoving it into her mouth as she started to gnaw on it.
The two of them shuffled back and forth on the top of the front counter, before they hopped onto the ground and Mabel started to break dance, spinning around until she landed in a cool pose on her side. She adjusted Waddles so that he was in a cool pose as well.
However, Mabel was now exhausted from all the dancing.
"Yes yes!" she exclaimed weakly. "Yes...yes!"
She dropped to her knees, and then fell flat on her face in exhaustion.
Just then, the door to the gift shop was opened, and Mara stepped into the room.
Mabel sat upright and faced her her as Mara walked up slowly to her.
"Hey, Mabel, have you seen Wendy around?" she asked. "She promised that we would go out to the woods at 3:30 today to have a tree-climbing contest."
Mara glanced at the clock hanging on the wall in the gift shop. It was 3:30.
"She took the day off to hang out with her friends" said Mabel.
"What?" said Mara, clearly upset by this news.
"Don't worry, Mara, maybe she just forgot" said Mabel, trying to look on the bright side.
"But we've been planning this contest for two weeks now! How could she have forgotten so easily?"
Mabel saw that this was clearly upsetting her sister, so she decided to change the subject.
"Well, I just finished having a pig dance party with Waddles."
Mara paused for a moment, and then smirked, rolling her eyes as she did so.
"Mabel, I swear, you spend more time with that pig than you do with your own family."
Waddles started to lick Mabel's hand, and she finally sat up and grinned as he started to crawl towards her.
"Uh oh! Cuddle time!" she said, as Waddles started to lick her face.
Mabel flipped Waddles so that he was laying in her arms on his back in a baby position.
She leaned in close to his chubby face.
"Waddles, can I tell you a secret?" she whispered. She hugged his face close to hers as she started to cuddle him.
"You're my favorite pig in the whole wide world."
Mabel then yawned, and fell asleep right there on the floor, with Waddles in her arms.
Mara smiled at the scene, then suddenly heard the sound of the front door to another part of the Mystery Shack opening.
Mara ran out of the Gift Shop, through the "employees only" door, and made her way to the front door that was right in front of the attic stairs.
Just as she had expected, it was Wendy.
Wendy was laughing as she walked into the Mystery Shack, turning towards her friends one last time as they drove off.
"See you next time! And bring an extra pair of pants next time, Thompson" she called after them. She laughed to herself, then turned back into the Mystery Shack.
Wendy's eyes widened in shock when she saw Mara standing there. The incredulous look on her face told Wendy that something was wrong...
Then she finally remembered.
She face palmed herself.
"That tree-climbing contest thing today, wasn't it?" she said.
"Mmm hmm" said Mara. "You know, the one we've been planning for two weeks? Not that I'm bitter or anything..."
Wendy sighed.
"Look, I'm sorry I missed out on our plans today, Mara, it's just that Thompson got a new car today, and Nate, Lee, Tambry and I wanted to test it out. Turns out, we almost drove off the side of a cliff, and Thompson was so scared he wet his pants!"
She started laughing at the memory.
Wendy looked back down at Mara to see that she wasn't amused.
She sighed, and then bent down onto her level.
"Look, how about we go and hang out tomorrow. I promise, ok?"
Mara looked down at the ground, and sighed, before looking directly into Wendy's eyes.
"Fine."
Wendy grinned, and then stood back up and started to walk further into the Mystery Shack.
"Thanks, Mara, you're the best!" she said. "And hey, no hard feelings, right?"
Mara laughed nervously.
"Yeah...no hard feelings..."
The front door to the gift shop was swung open by Stan, who was greedily fingering through a wad of money.
He didn't seem to see Mabel and Waddles on the floor, as he was walking right toward them, and suddenly he tripped right over them. He yelped in surprise as he fell onto the floor.
Stan landed with his face on the floor, his butt in the air, and his hand holding the money up, as if he was trying to save it from the fall. It looked like his glasses had fallen off as well.
Mabel rubbed her head where Stan had tripped over her, now awake along with Waddles.
"Mabel? What are you doing on the floor?"
Mabel poked the side of her cheek and Waddle's cheek.
"Being cute and great."
"And I thought your siblings were weird" said Stan, putting his glasses back onto his face.
Mabel reached over to a shelf full of pine tree hats like Dipper's, and stuck one onto her head.
"Nah" she said. "Dipper's more like, Ah!" she imitated her brother. "Let's go solve a Mystery! I kiss a pillow with Wendy's face drawn on it."
She then took off the hat and put it back on the shelf, and then picked up a camo bandana that Mara had apparently left on the counter of the front desk. Mabel tied it over her head, and then quickly put her hair back in a makeshift ponytail.
"And Mara's more like, let's invent things for the sole purpose of making them blow up in the end just because I'm bored!" Mabel said, imitating her sister. She actually didn't look much different from Mara, the only difference was the clothes she was wearing and her pink cheeks.
Stan laughed at her imitation of her siblings.
"Ha! That's pretty good! Kissing a pillow, and blowing stuff up"
Just then, Waddles walked up to Stan, and started to chew on his pant leg.
Mabel cheered.
"Go go! Chew on that pant leg!"
Stan pulled back in disgust, and then lifted his leg upward with the pig still hanging onto him. Stan was now trying to shake Waddles off of his pant leg.
Finally, Waddles dropped back to the ground, but had ended up tearing Stan's pant leg. A part of the fabric was now being chewed on by the pig.
Stan angrily opened the window.
"Alright" he shouted. "Outside, now!"
"No!" exclaimed Mabel, running over towards Waddles, and picking him up off the ground protectively. "It's not safe for Waddles outside! There's predators, and barbecuers!"
"That's natural order!" said Stan. "It's not my fault your pig's potentially delicious."
"He should be inside like a person!" said Mabel.
"People don't roll around in their own filth" argued Stan. "Except for Soos."
"And we're the lesser for it!" said Mabel. "Maybe we're the ones who should be put outside. Huh? Huh? Think about it!"
She then lifted her head up into the air, and walked into the TV room, still carrying Waddles.
"Today's the day, Soos" said Dipper, who was sitting in the back of Soos's truck in the middle of the woods Soos was standing on the ground in front of him. "Thanks for coming along on this mission. I originally asked Mara to accompany me, but she said she had some kind of contest-thing with Wendy."
"Dude, it's an honor!" exclaimed Soos. "Today I'm sweating from heat and excitement!" he said, wiping away the sweat that was forming at his brow. He then sat down in the back of the truck next to Dipper.
Dipper held up a folder and opened it. Inside were pieces of newspaper that served of evidence of a new monster.
"There's something hiding in these woods" he said. "Something big enough to rip the roof off a car. If we get a photo of this thing, we'll be heroes!"
"Yeah, we'll get all the babes!" said Soos, lightly shoving Dipper. "You'll be fending off smooches with a stick!"
Dipper laughed. If he had brought Mara along, she would have never made a joke like that.
"Shut up, man!" he said joyfully.
Soos poked him again.
"With a stick, dude!"
Dipper chuckled, then hopped off the back of the truck.
"Here, give me a boost" he said, and Soos followed the boy.
Soos finished tying the camera to the top of the tree, and he slid down to the lower branch, where Dipper was reaching into his backpack.
Unfortunately, he managed to get tree sap all over his hands as he slid down the trunk.
"Ugh, is sap supposed to be this sticky?" he said, wiping the sap onto his shirt in an attempt to get it off of him.
Dipper continued as if he hadn't heard him.
"If everything goes according to plan, the creature will grab that steak, cross through the string, and set off cameras A, B, anc C" he said, gesturing to the steak that they had laid in the middle of a tree stump, which was laying on top of four ropes, which were each connected to a camera.
Dipper and Soos were now on the ground, watching the trap from a distance.
"And nothing can go wrong" said Soos.
The two of them high fived cheerfully, but unfortunately Soos still had sap on his hand, so their hands were now stuck together.
Dipper stared at their hands.
"This was poorly planned."
Just then, the wind started to blow so fiercely that both of their hats flew off their heads.
Suddenly, the wind stopped, as if some sort of creature had just flown past, and four camera flashes went off.
When the two of them looked back at the trap, the steak was gone.
Dipper and Soos looked at each other and gasped in excitement.
Mabel was fitting a red knitted sweater around Waddles in the TV room while the TV was on, and Mara was (shockingly) working on yet another invention on the floor next to her sister. Mabel noticed that her sister seemed a bit more agitated than usual. There was clearly something on her mind. Mabel wondered if it had anything to do with Wendy forgetting about their hangout.
There was an ad playing on the TV.
"Hey, you!" said the TV.
Mabel turned and looked at the screen.
"Me?"
"Sick of constantly dropping your baby?"
The man on TV, who was trying to eat a slice of pizza while holding a baby, put the slice down.
"Yes."
Just then, the salesman appeared on the screen.
"Hi, I'm Bobby Renzobbi, and what you need is the Huggy Wuvvy Tummy Bundle!"
"I can hold ten babies at once!"
"I know what you're thinking: does it work for pigs? Yeah, it does work for pigs, stupid! Feel your pig's heartbeat next to yours! It works for piiiiiiiiiiiiigs!"
Mara was taken aback by the commercial.
"Eesh, did humanity really get desperate enough to create that?"
But Mabel seemed to be amazed by the commercial, for she gasped in excitement at the TV.
Mara sighed.
"I spoke too soon."
Mabel then turned towards Stan, who was adjusting his tie in a mirror that was hanging on the wall.
"Grunkle Stan!" she chirped. "I'm off to get a huggy wuvvy tummy bundle!"
Stan turned towards her in disgust.
"Eesh, isn't knitting matching sweaters for that pig enough?"
Mabel was wearing a red sweater with Waddle's face stitched onto it, and Waddles was wearing a red sweater with Mabel's face stitched onto it. His sweater was still attached to the red ball of yarn.
"Nope" said Mabel. She then picked up Waddles off the ground and dropped her knitting needles. "Anyways, I need you to look after this little gentleman while I'm gone."
There was a fly that was buzzing by the pig, and Waddles opene his mouth and ate it.
Stan turned back to the mirror, and continued to adjust his tie.
"Not now, kid, I've got some tourists coming through."
Mara walked up to their uncle.
"Then I'll look after those idiotic tourists while you watch Waddles."
Stan laughed.
"Ha! After that 'boss Mabel' incident a few weeks ago? I don't think so, kid."
Mabel then walked up to him, and stood right in front of the mirror so that he was forced to face her.
"Grunkle Stan, I know you don't really care for Waddles."
Stan frowned.
"He's a fat naked jerk."
"But you do care about me" she said, putting her hand on Stan's arm. "Promise me you won't let him outside?"
She tipped her head to one side, and made cute eyes at him while she smiled sweetly, trying to get his soft side.
It was obviously working, but Stan refused to let his face soften, so he frowned a bit harder before finally giving in.
"Fine, yeah, I promise."
Mabel grinned, then ran out the door.
"Thanks, Grunkle Stan!" she yelled, shutting the door behind her.
Mara smirked.
"I'm off to take care of those gullible saps you call 'tourists'" she said, walking out the 'employees only' door that led to the gift shop. "Have fun babysitting!"
She slammed the door shut, and Stan was left alone with Waddles.
He groaned, and crouched down to the pig's level, shooting him a hard glare and pointing at him with a finger.
"I'm watching you, pig."
Waddles lifted his hoof up, and touched it to Stan's finger.
Stan pulled his finger back in disgust.
Just then, Dipper and Soos entered the Mystery Shack, both of them looking ecstatic. Dipper's arms were full of sap-covered cameras.
"We did it! It tripped the wire!" exclaimed Dipper excitedly. "Somewhere in these cameras is a photo of that creature! I'll go develop the film."
"I'll go make us victory nachos" said Soos. "Dipper and Soos for life!"
The two fist-bumped each other and laughed, then parted ways; Dipper sprinting up the stairs as quickly as he could, and Soos hurrying excitedly into the kitchen.
Meanwhile in another part of the shack, Mara was giving a tour of the place to a group of tourists. She was wearing her normal clothes, except for the eyepatch that she had placed over one eye.
"And here, ladies and gentlemen, is our final exhibit" said Mara, leading them to a picture with a curtain covering it.
"Behold! The most hideous creatures known to man!" she exclaimed, ripping the curtain away to reveal that there was a mirror underneath, which was showing a reflection of the dumbfounded tourists.
They frowned for a brief second, before they broke out into laughter.
"Oh, that's us!" said one of the tourists.
Mara was laughing along with them.
Suddenly, someone put their hand on Mara's shoulder, and shoved her aside behind him.
It was Stan.
He was laughing merrily and pretending that it was all a joke, but in actuality he was trying to take over the tour.
He laughed along with the tourists, but then turned his head in Mara's direction.
"What do you think you're doing, kid? Insulting the tourists? I could lose money with reckless stunts like that if they get angry."
Mara shrugged.
"I was just trying to spice up your little sham of a show. Besides, they liked it." she said. "Aren't you supposed to be watching Waddles?"
"That pig can take care of himself" said Stan, completely overshadowing her as he turned back towards the tourists, who were getting over their laughter.
He raised his eyebrows towards them.
"Right? Right? Ha ha, we have fun here" he said, making his way towards the next attraction, which was covered by a blue cloth. "But seriously, folks, this is something" he said. "I present to you, a unicorn made out of corn. The corn-i-corn!"
Mara groaned, and facepalmed. Seriously? She couldn't believe that Stan really thought that this would be more appealing to tourists than her mirror joke. Then again, these were tourists.
"I, I don't know" said Stan, rubbing his hands over his face before reaching for the cloth. "I'm tired."
He ripped the cloth away for the tourists to see, but they only gasped in anger.
Stan finally looked to see that something was indeed wrong with the display: All the corn was gone, and all that was left was wiring in the shape of a horse, and a few empty cobs hanging from it.
"What the-"
Waddles, still wearing Mabel's sweater, was in the corner chewing on one of the cobs. Sitting around him were several empty cobs.
"What a rip off!" exclaimed one of the tourists angrily. "Kids, we're leaving."
The two kids, who had been a part of the tour, threw the Mystery Shack merchandise that they were originally going to buy onto the ground, and stormed away along with all the other tourists.
"No!" exclaimed Stan, reaching out towards the tourists. "NO!!!"
But it was too late, for the last tourists stepped outside of the Mystery Shack, and slammed the door shut.
"You know, if you had just let me handle the tour while you babysat Waddles, this would have never happened" said Mara.
But of course, this didn't seem to help Stan's temperament. He growled, and then turned on Waddles, pointing at him furiously.
"YOU!!!!"
As Waddles stared up at him, a kernal of corn dropped from his face.
Mara walked up towards Stan.
"Look, Stan" she said. "It doesn't matter whether those tourists stayed or left anyways."
She reached into her cargo pants pocket, and brought out several wads of cash.
"I already robbed them dry."
Stan only snatched the bills from her hand furiously, and stormed away.
"Come on, come on..." said Dipper anxiously to himself as he developed the photos from the cameras in the dark room.
He took out the photo that he had been soaking in water, and then hung it up onto an overhead string by a clothespin.
He squinted as he was trying to decipher what the photo was of.
He gasped in amazement.
"That's a wing!" he said. "If camera B got the wing, then then the one that should have got the rest is...camera C!" he exclaimed excitedly, running over to the bin where the photo that camera C had taken was soaking.
The photo was just starting to develop.
"The creature!" gasped Dipper, staring at the developing photo.
Suddenly, light flooded into the room as Soos opened the door.
Soos held up a bowl in the air excitedly.
"Who wants victory nachos?" he announced cheerfully.
The light from the open door caused the photo from Camera C to become black again. The developing image disappeared entirely.
Dipper's eyes widened.
"NO!" he screamed, taking out the photo from the water in the bin, but it was useless. The photo was black.
"Don't worry, dude, I only ate like a third of them" said Soos cheerfully, not seeming to detect Dipper's distress. "Half of them" he then corrected.
Soos suddenly burst out laughing, as he flipped the empty bowl upside down and shook it.
"I ate all of them, dude!"
Stan was now walking outside from the Mystery Shack, with Waddles under one arm, and the red ball of yarn that was still attached to his sweater in his free hand.
Admittedly, it had been difficult to snatch Waddles away without Mara's detection, but he had finally managed to slip away with Waddles when one of Mara's inventions "accidentally" went beserk.
Mara was currently inside the gift shop, trying to shut down the contraption that had "magically turned on and went rogue."
Stan walked up to a stake outside that had a rope attached to it. He looked around, as if someone was watching him, and then bent down onto one knee.
He set Waddles onto the ground, and tied the rope around his neck.
"Just ten minutes without this pig in the house" said Stan, as he took out a mallet. "Is that too much to ask?"
He used the mallet to drive the stake further into the ground so that Waddles couldn't wander off.
Stan smiled at his handiwork.
"There."
He then reached into his jacket pocket, and took out a dollar bill, sliding it under Waddles sweater.
"If Mabel asks, this never happened" he said, before he got up and started to walk away back to the Mystery Shack, leaving Waddles tied to the stake.
He started to mimic Mabel.
"Oh, but Grunkle Stan, it's not safe out there! There's predators!" he said. "Oh brother."
Suddenly, there was the sound of a creature roaring, and the creature swooped down and grabbed Waddles.
The force of the wind blew Stan's fez off of his head.
Stan turned around in shock to see Waddles being carried off by what looked like a giant pterodactyl. Waddles was squealing frantically as the pterodactyl was flying off with him in his claws, doing one last swoop right above Stan, who ducked hurriedly.
Stan stared in absolute shock at the flying creature.
Dipper was now yelling angrily at Soos for messing up the photo. He held up the black picture from camera C up to Soos.
"I can't believe you, man!" he scolded.
"I'm sorry, dude" said Soos. "I was just so excited. Nachos cause excitement."
"Soos, no offense, but you've gotta be more careful sometimes" said Dipper a bit more gently. "I mean what are the odds that we'll ever get another picture of-"
As if on cue, the pterodactyl flew past the window of the Mystery Shack, and Dipper and Soos got a quick glance at it.
The entire Mystery Shack shook as the creature flew past the window, and a painting in the room dropped from the wall.
Soos and Dipper sprinted outside to try and get another picture of the creature.
Wendy and Mara were now in the gift shop, hiding behind the front desk for cover as the little invention was spinning wildly, wrecking everything in its path, and throwing random merchandise everywhere.
"Is there a way to shut this thing down?" said Wendy.
"There is" said Mara. "There's an off button on the back off it, but this invention has a thermal locator: it follows anything that radiates heat."
Wendy and Mara looked each other in the eye, both of them having the same crazy idea at the same time. They both nodded in understanding, and Mara leapt up onto the top of the front counter.
"Hey!" she yelled, to get the machine's attention. "Over here!"
The invention turned towards her, and started to wheel its way towards her, throwing merchandise at her as it did so.
Mara ducked and started to run far away from the counter.
Meanwhile, Wendy was sneaking up from behind the machine, as Mara led it towards a corner.
The machine had managed to pin Mara in a corner.
"Now!" she shouted.
"And...gotcha!" Wendy yelled.
Wendy pounced up into the air and lunged at the rogue invention from behind, slamming the off button on the back of it.
The machine froze, and then slowly powered down.
When it was over, Wendy and Mara grinned, and high-fived each other in celebration.
"Yeah!"
"That was awesome how you tackled the thing from behind!" said Mara.
"I know, right?" said Wendy. "I haven't had to use that move since Kevin used a slingshot to shoot a pebble at me!"
She and Mara laughed together joyfully, and when the laughter died down, they finally looked around at the mess of the gift shop. There was merchandise everywhere, randomly split floor boards, and the front desk had been pushed over onto its side.
"Well, it looks like we've gotta clean up this mess" sighed Mara, grabbing the nearest broom and starting to sweep up all the merchandise. "You helping?"
"Uh..." said Wendy, backing up towards the exit of the gift shop. "I just got a text from Tambry, the gang dared Thompson to lick a dog. I'm gonna go hang out with them. But, hey, see you tomorrow."
And with that, Wendy disappeared out the door, leaving Mara with a broom in one hand and an entire room to clean up by herself.
Mara sighed in irritation, then started to get on with the sweeping, when suddenly there was a loud roar from outside, and as Mara turned a huge flying creature flew right by the Mystery Shack, causing the entire building to tremble.
She hurried outside, and found that she had been the last one to arrive, for Stan, Wendy, Dipper, and Soos were already standing outside.
All five of them were now watching the flying creature disappear into the distance, leaving behind a trail of red yarn.
"Whoa, did you see that?" said Soos excitedly. "That thing was a dinosaur, bro!"
"How is possible a dinosaur survived sixty five million years?" asked Dipper, turning towards Soos.
"In this town, literally anything can happen" said Mara, reminding her brother. "And yet, the weirdness of Gravity Falls never ceases to amaze me."
"Oh, man!" said Wendy in amazement. "They should have dared Thompson to lick that!"
"Did you see that Mr. Pines?" asked Soos, and for the first time, the four of them turned towards Stan and noticed his absolutely shocked face.
He was apparently so shocked that he didn't even respond.
"Mr. Pines?"
"It...it took him" stuttered Stan.
"Took what?" asked Dipper.
"It...it took the pig...it took Waddles" said Stan.
"What did you say about Waddles?" asked Mabel, arriving at the shack on bike with a wrapped present in the bike basket as if on cue.
The five of them turned towards Mabel. Soos, Mara, Wendy, and Dipper had pitiful expressions on their faces while Stan had a shocked expression on his face, like someone who had just been caught doing something they shouldn't be doing.
"Whoa, awkward silence" said Mabel cheerfully. "Blaaah!"
Mabel got off her bike.
"What's going on? Why are you standing there all awkwardly?" she asked, looking around for the first time. "And where's Waddles?"
"Uh..." said Stan, quickly grabbing the stake in the ground and hiding it behind his back.
"The good news is, you're getting a puppy!"
"What happened?" asked Mabel.
"Well...uh...you see" stuttered Stan, who was at a nervous loss for words.
"Your pig got eaten by a pterodactyl, bro" said Soos, pronouncing the word 'pterodactyl' with a 'p.'
"WHAT?!" exclaimed Mabel, throwing off her bike helmet and calling out Waddles's name.
"Waddles? Waddles!" she yelled desperately, before turning to Stan.
"Where did he go? How did this happen?" she exclaimed in a distressed tone.
She started to breathe in and out in her anxiety, and Mara walked up to her sister, and put her arm around her shoulders, patting her in a comforting matter until Mabel was relatively calm again.
When Mabel was finally breathing normally, Mara let go of her sister, and Mabel walked up to Stan.
"Grunkle Stan, you didn't put him outside?" she asked.
"What? No, I didn't put him anywhere!" exclaimed Stan nervously, backing up right into the totem pole.
"I'm not acting suspicious, you're acting suspicious. What's a pig?" he exclaimed, blurting out every lie he could think of.
"Then, what happened?" asked Dipper.
"Yeah, what happened?" said Mara, but in a more skeptical tone.
Stan gulped.
"Uh, it went down like this, see?" he offered anxiously. "So there I was in the living room, tenderly nursing him with only the richest of creams, when all of a sudden a pterodactyl broke into the house. It grabbed Waddles out of my hands. So I said, 'NO DICE, COWBOY!' So I start punching him in the face, but he played dirty. He poked me right in the eyes. That really happened."
Stan started to cry dramatically, putting his hands over his eyes so that they couldn't see that he wasn't actually crying. He peeked through his hands after a while to see if Mabel was convinced.
She was sad.
"Oh, Grunkle Stan, you tried to save him!" she said, hurrying up to him and putting her arms around him in a hug.
"Um, yup" Stan lied anxiously. "I'm a great man, alright."
"You punched a pterodactyl in the face?" said Wendy. "Sweet!"
"I thought you didn't believe in the supernatural" said Dipper skeptically.
"Dinosaurs aren't magic. They're just big lizards" said Stan, as Mabel was still hugging him. "Get off my back!"
Mabel let go of Stan, and pulled out the photo that she had taken of her and Waddles earlier. She looked at it sadly.
"Waddles" she whimpered, wiping her hand over her eyes as she started to cry. Of course, this got to Dipper and Mara.
Dipper put his arm around Mabel.
"That's it" he said determinedly. "No pterodactyl messes with my sister."
"Yeah" added Mara with a resolute tone. "We're gonna get out there, kill that old dinosaur, and save your pig!"
"Take it down a bit, Mara" said Dipper. "How about we just capture it."
"Ok, sure that works" said Mara.
"For Mabel!" declared Dipper, Wendy, Soos, and Mara.
Stan was more reluctant.
"But how will we even find the little guy?" he asked.
Mabel looked around, before she gasped, pointing at the red yarn that the pterodactyl had left behind. It was leading miles into the forest.
She gasped excitedly.
"We follow that!"
"Ha ha!" said Soos.
"Yes!" said Mara.
"Alright!" said Wendy.
"Genius!" said Dipper.
Stan chuckled nervously, as he started to twiddle his fingers.
"Or, you know, we could just call it a day, maybe hit the pool hall or..."
But one look at the expressions on their faces, and Stan knew there was no talking any of them out of this.
"I mean, uh...yeah!" said Stan with an "excited" tone, as he crossed his arms and smiled a clearly fake smile. "Let's go save Waggles!"
"Waddles" Mabel corrected.
"Him too."
Soos was now spraying painting the phrase "pterodactyl mobile" onto the side of his truck. The triplets were packing backpacks for the trip, and Wendy was hauling a giant cage for the pterodactyl into the back of the truck.
Mara walked up to Wendy.
"Wendy, are you sure you want to come?" she asked.
"What, you think I can't handle it?"
"No, of course not" said Mara. "I mean, this is a really important mission for Mabel, and everyone here has to be 100% dedicated to it. We can't abandon it to hang out with other friends."
Wendy raised an eyebrow.
"You really think I'd leave you guys to be with the gang?" she asked.
Mara stood there, raising an eyebrow. Wendy knew what she was getting at.
She sighed, and then leapt down from the truck onto the ground in front of Mara.
"Look, I won't leave the mission unless an emergency pops up" she said. "I promise."
As Wendy turned back towards the truck and started to push the cage further into the truck, Mara muttered under her breath.
"That's what you said about the tree-climbing contest two weeks ago."
"Alright!" said Soos excitedly when he finished spray painting. "That p-terodactyl won't know what his him!"
Dipper laughed nervously.
"It's pterodactyl, Soos."
"Actually no one knows how it's supposed to be pronounced" said Soos, lying down onto the ground and sliding underneath the truck to secure the cords that were holding the cage in the back of the truck. "Since no one was alive during the dinosaur days, so..."
Suddenly, the truck turned on and started to roll forward by about a foot. Fortunately, Soos managed to sit back up in time before he was run over.
"Whoa!" he exclaimed. "Almost ran over my own head there!" He started to chuckle. "Wow."
Dipper walked over to his two sisters.
"Mabel, Mara, we need to talk" he said urgently, making sure to keep his voice down so that Soos couldn't hear. "This is a really high-stakes mission, and I'm a little worried about Soos coming along on this one." He leaned in closer so that only his sisters could hear what he was about to say. "I love the guy, but sometimes he messes stuff up."
"What?" said Mabel. "Since when?"
Mara raised her eyebrow in disbelief. "Oh, I think I can account quite a few times..."
Flashback:
Soos was sweeping in the Mystery Shack, when he backed up too much and accidentally knocked over a purple crystal ball display.
It fell from its table, and shattered as it hit the floor.
"Sorry, dudes."
Soos was installing a window, and when he finished pressing it into place, he took a step back to admire his handiwork, placing his hands on his hips.
Unfortunately, the glass fell right out of the hole in the wall, and shattered as it hit the floor.
"Sorry, dudes."
The triplets were in their attic room sitting at a table in front of the window; Dipper was reading the journal, and Mara was inventing. Suddenly, Mabel pointed at the window excitedly.
"Look! A fairy!" she exclaimed.
Dipper and Mara looked up from what they were doing to see a small pink glowing figure floating from the outside of the window.
Dipper laughed, and Mara was reaching downwards to grab a camera, when suddenly, a flyswatter appeared out of nowhere, squashing the fairy against the window.
Soos appeared at the window, and looked at the pink guts of the fairy against the window.
He started to laugh.
"Oh, sorry dudes, I killed that fairy."
"And I didn't even mention the time when he tried to clean one of my inventions, and in the process, blew up the entire kitchen" said Mara.
Mabel sighed.
"Let him down easy" she said, putting her hand on Dipper's shoulder.
Dipper walked over sadly to Soos, who seemed to be even more excited than usual.
"This is so great!" he said, slamming the trunk of the truck shut. "You and me, bro. Best friends!" he said putting his arm around Dipper's shoulder. "Fighting, potentially high-fiving dinosaurs..."
"Soos, look" said Dipper nervously, scratching the back of his neck. "I need to tell you something."
"Ok, but before you do, check out these matching shirts I made for us!" said Soos, holding up two white t-shirts with red writing on the front. The words on the front were "Pterodactyl bros." He handed Dipper one of them, and pointed to one of the pictures on the front, who was obviously Dipper.
"Who's this guy right here?" he said excitedly. "You! Totally you, dude" he said, pointing to the rays that were surrounding the picture of Dipper and Soos on the shirt. "And these rays represent friendship" he said.
Dipper looked down at the shirt guiltily, and then looked up at Soos.
"So what was it you were going to tell me again?" he asked.
"Um...pterodactyl here we come!" said Dipper, laughing nervously as he pumped his fist up into the air weakly and pronouncing the word incorrectly.
"Yus!" exclaimed Soos, hurrying to the truck.
Dipper sighed, and started to walk towards the truck as well.
Once everyone was in, the truck drove off, with Soos at the wheel. The vehicle headed into the forest, following the red string.
"Bros before dinos!" exclaimed Soos excitedly.
They followed the string all the way to what looked like an old abandoned church in the middle of the woods that had an old white paint coating.
Soos parked the truck, and the six of them got out, walking towards the small building.
They followed the string, which was taking them right inside the little church.
"Ok" said Mabel as they walked up the entrance. "The red yarn leads to..."
The five of them peeked inside the building to see a ramshackled interior. There was even a huge hole in the middle of the floor.
Someone was singing and rocking in a chair right in front of the hole.
"Dooda lee doo da!"
"Old Man McGucket?" said Mabel.
"The guy who was in my body during the electron carpet incident?" said Mara.
Wendy turned towards Mara in confusion.
"Wait, what?"
The crazy old man turned towards them in the rocking chair.
"Howdy, friends!" he said cheerily.
"What are you doing out here?" asked Dipper skeptically.
"You'll never believe me!" said McGucket. "So I was doing my hourly hootinanny. Deeda lee dee dang!" he sang, as he started to demonstrate.
Stan groaned in annoyance.
"Ugh. This guy."
"...when this enormous wingly critter stole my musical spoons, and flew lickety split into the abandoned lines down yonder."
He pointed down into the huge hole in the floor, and the five of them looked down. It was too deep to see exactly what was at the bottom, but the red string was leading down there.
"Looks kinda hairy down there" said Stan.
"C'mon, Grunkle Stan" encouraged Mabel. "You can handle it! You punched a pterodactyl in the face, remember?"
"Oh, yeah!" exclaimed Stan, laughing nervously as he scratched the back of his neck. "I did do that, didn't I?" He started to laugh nervously again, before stopping awkwardly.
"My! What suspicious laughter!" said McGucket.
"Guys, we're going in" said Mabel seriously, narrowing her eyes in an intense manner.
"Need someone to tag along and tell weird personal stories?" asked McGucket, completely ruining the moment.
"No thanks" said Stan.
Mara lowered a rope into the deep hole, and the seven of them started to climb down it, Mara first, then Dipper holding a lit lantern, then Mabel, then Wendy, then Soos, then Stan, and last McGucket.
"So there I was, fighting a raccoon for the same piece of meat" said McGucket cheerfully. "When our mouths get close. And we kiss each other accidentally."
"Ew" said Wendy.
Stan sighed annoyedly.
"You can't take a hint, can you?" he said.
"Nope!"
Suddenly, the rope snapped at the top, and the seven of them went tumbling down into the deep hole.
Everyone screamed as they fell down through inky blackness.
Mara whipped out a portal device, typed in 'bottom of the dinosaur hole,' twisted it, and threw it downwards. As the device collided against the bottom, it exploded into a purple portal.
The seven of them tumbled into the portal, and soon enough the other end of the portal opened up a few feet away at the bottom of the cave.
They were all spit out the other end just before both of the portals closed.
Dipper was the first to rise, brushing himself off before helping his sisters up.
"By the way, thanks, Mara" he said.
"No problem" she replied.
The triplets looked around for the first time.
"Whoa."
In front of them was a huge mining cave, complete with the railway track and everything. And it looked like the red string was leading right into it. The six of them wandered into the cave.
Dipper held up the lantern towards a prehistoric plant that was growing on the side of the cave.
"These plants look all jurassic-y" he said.
Soos walked up to another plant on the opposite wall.
"This little fella smells like battery acid!" he said cheerfully. Just then, the plant shot up a puff of yellow fumes into Soos's face.
"Ugh! Looks like I've lost my sense of smell!" said Soos, before laughing merrily.
As the seven of them had started walking again, Mabel took out the picture of her and Waddles and stared at it sadly again.
"Oh, Waddles!" she said. "We're gonna find you!"
Mara, who had been walking next to Mabel, put her hand on her shoulder. It pained her to see her sister so sad.
"Don't worry, Mabel" she reassured. "I promise you, when we find that winged dinosaur, he's gonna wish he never took your pig" she said fiercely. "I'll make sure of it."
Mabel smiled a tiny smile back. She knew her sister was just trying to help, but her methods of doing so were always so violent.
They all continued to follow the string with Dipper holding the lantern in the lead. None of them seemed to notice the bones of a miner that they had walked right past.
Suddenly, it appeared as if they had reached the end of the tunnel, and Dipper held up the lantern in the darker section of the cave.
The light revealed the face of a t-rex
All of them screamed in terror, until they realized that the dinosaur was perfectly still. In fact, it seemed to be trapped in a huge glob of what looked like yellow tree sap.
Now over their fear, they continued to walk forward, Dipper holding up the lantern, as they looked around in amazement. The t-rex wasn't the only creature trapped in the tree sap: there were dinosaurs everywhere that were trapped in the solid amber-colored substance.
"Whoa!" exclaimed Wendy, squinting at the yellow stuff that the dinosaur was encased in. "Is that...amber?"
"No, it's treep sap!" exclaimed Dipper in amazement. "They're all trapped in tree sap! That's how they survived for sixty five million years!"
"This reminds me an awful lot of that Trembly guy who encased himself in peanut brittle for hundreds of years" said Mara.
"Exactly" said Dipper, walking up to a glob of tree sap that had a pterodactyl-shaped hole in it.
He held the lantern up closer to it, and observed how the heat from the lantern seemed to be melting the tree sap.
"The Summer heat must be melting them loose!" he exclaimed.
"Whoa" said Mara, observing the tree sap where the pterodactyl had once been trapped. "Remind me to trap myself in an amber-like substance to keep myself alive for millions of years."
"Holy moley!" exclaimed Stan, walking around and observing all the dinosaurs trapped in tree sap. "Forget the cornicorn, this is the attraction of a lifetime! I could bring people down here and turn this into some sort of theme park. Jurassic sap-hole!"
"Uh, dudes?" said Soos with a fearful tone, pointing at one of the encased dinosaurs.
They all turned to see that the dinosaur that Soos was pointing to had a finger that was loose from the tree sap, and it was moving up and down.
"Maybe we should keep moving" said Dipper, pointing further into the cave.
"Yeah, that's a good idea" agreed Wendy.
Everyone seemed to agree, and started to walk with Dipper away from the dinosaurs, but Stan was too excited.
"This could be a gold mine!" he exclaimed, waving his arms up in the air excitedly. He started to point to random sections of the cave. "Velvety rope type deal here, ticket booth here...ha! I should have put the pig outside ages ago!"
He realized his slip too late.
"Wait, what did you just say?" said Mabel.
Stan turned to her nervously.
"Hmm? What's that?"
Mabel walked up to her uncle angrily, pointing a finger at him.
"You said the dinosaur flew into the house." She gasped in realization at the fact that Stan had lied to her.
Stan saw her come to this conclusion in her head.
"No, wait, if you think about it-"
"You put Waddles outside, then you lied to me about it!" Mabel exclaimed furiously. "And now thanks to you my pig could be dead!" Mabel's eyes started to tear up. "Waddles could be dead!!!"
"Look, he's an animal. He belongs outside" Stan tried to reason with her.
"No, that's it!" exclaimed Mabel, her voice starting to crack. "Grunkle Stan, I am never ever speaking to you again!"
She turned around and crossed her arms over her chest stubbornly.
"Look, you can't be serious" said Stan.
"Oh, is someone talking right now, because I can't hear them!"
"Kid!"
"La la la la la la!" Mabel chanted loudly, putting her hands over her ears, as she started to walk away.
"Mabel!" said Stan, following his niece anxiously.
"I can't hear anyone!" announced Mabel. "No one's talking to me!"
Wendy was about to intervene, when suddenly her cell phone went off. She took it out, and flipped it open. She gasped at what she saw.
"Oh my gosh" she said in surprise, before laughing in excitement. "The gang is about to prank the school! I have to be there!"
She started to walk towards the exit, when Mara suddenly intervened.
"Whoa whoa whoa" she said, standing in Wendy's path. "You promised that you wouldn't abandon the us" she said.
"No" said Wendy. "I said that I wouldn't leave unless an emergency popped up. And this is an emergency! Do you have any idea how hilarious it would be if we go back to school and there are slices of bologna sticking to the ceiling or something?"
"No!" exclaimed Mara. "That's not an emergency! An emergency is when someone's been seriously injured or someone's dying! It's like having fun with your friends is all that you care about!"
"All that I care about?" exclaimed Wendy furiously, turning on Mara. "That's so not true! Name one instance where I chose having fun with my friends over what really mattered!"
"Ok" spat Mara, counting off her fingers as she listed them off. "You took your friends' side against Dipper in the convenience store when he was supposedly ruining your fun to keep you all safe, you stepped all over Mabel when she was the boss of the Mystery Shack and let your friends come to the gift shop to mess around and later on get the day off, and you bailed out on me about our plans for that stupid tree-climbing contest so you could hang out with your friends! And on top of all of that, now you're abandoning us to go and, surprise, hang out with your friends!"
"Have you seriously been holding all that in this entire time?" exclaimed Wendy, crossing her arms over her chest. "And I thought Robbie had an issue with holding grudges!"
"Guys, guys, don't fight!" said Soos cheerfully. "Why can't you be more like me and Dipper?" he said, putting her arm around Dipper and unintentionally putting him in a chokehold.
"Everything's gonna be cool" said Soos, letting go of the boy and walking over to the string. He picked it up off the ground. "All we gotta do to find the pig is follow this string!" he said, as he started to wrap the yarn around the ball that it was attached to.
"We'll just keep following and following, and when we reach the end..."
He stopped. He had just finished wrapping the yarn around the ball, and had pulled in the end.
Soos started to look around confusedly at all the different tunnels that they could go down.
"Uh, which cave was it again?" he asked.
Dipper growled in irritation.
"Ugh, Soos!" he exclaimed irritably. "You lost the trail!"
"Aw, come on, we'll find our way" said Soos cheerfully. "Trust me."
He slapped Dipper on the back, causing the lantern in the boy's hands to fly out of them and shatter as it crashed against the ground.
They were now lost and in the dark.
Soos turned towards Dipper.
"Sorry, dude" he said.
Dipper growled furiously.
"THAT IS IT!" he exclaimed. "See, this is why I didn't want to bring you along!"
"What, what do you mean?" asked Soos nervously, now finally realizing that Dipper was angry at him.
"I mean this is really important to Mabel, and you keep screwing everything up!" the boy exclaimed angrily. "You ruined our photograph, and now you've got us hopelessly lost!"
"But, we're pterodactyl bros" said Soos sadly. "I made us t-shirts" he said, holding up the t-shirts.
"Those t-shirts are useless!" exclaimed Dipper. "And they're too large!"
Now, Soos was starting to get angry.
"I...have...a...different body type, dude!" he yelled furiously.
The six of them started arguing fiercely, yelling at each other back and forth as their furious screams echoed throughout the cave walls.
"Hey, cheer up, fellers!" someone said, and they all stopped arguing and turned back to see McGucket, standing there with the fixed lantern.
"I fixed your lantern!" he said cheerfully, holding up the lit lantern. Unfortunately, this revealed the enormous pterodactyl that was standing right behind him.
Everyone but McGucket screamed in terror.
"Aaaaaaah!"
"Aaaah!" screamed McGucket, not knowing exactly what they were screaming at. He then started laughing. "What, what are we doing?"
McGucket turned around, and for the first time, noticed the huge dinosaur that was towering over him from behind.
The pterodactyl turned its head, and leaned in close to the seven of them.
"Nobody make any sudden movements or loud noises" whispered McGucket.
For a brief moment, there was complete silence and stillness...
"Yee haw!" exclaimed McGucket excitedly, leaping up into the air and starting to do a happy little jig. "We found a pterodactyl!"
The dinosaur roared ferociously, and started to chase them.
Everyone screamed, and ran into the closest tunnel.
They ran all the way to the other end, and found that it was completely lit.
They were now standing at the edge of a cliff, and there was an old railway track that was going across the cliff to a huge standing rock pillar in the center of the huge room that was separate from everything else, where the pterodactyl's nest was.
There was also a huge hole in the ceiling where the sunlight was peering through and lighting up the entire room.
The seven of caught sight of some rocks that were conveniently shaped like them, and they hurried over to them, ducking behind them as the pterodactyl flew through the tunnel exit.
It flew right past them, over the ledge and past its nest, and onto the other side of the room, out of sight.
Dipper turned towards the rest of them.
"Guys, we need a plan to get out of here" he said.
"Ok ok" said Stan. "How's about Mabel knits Soos a pig costume"
"I like it" said Soos.
"And we use Soos as a human sacrifice!"
"I like it!" said Soos.
"What do you say, Mabel?" said Stan, turning towards Mabel, who only humphed and turned away from her uncle.
"Aw, come on, you can't stop talking to me forever!"
"How about we think of a new plan?" offered Wendy. "One that doesn't involve any of us becoming human sacrifices."
"Oh, so now you care about us?" snapped Mara. "I thought all you cared about was your other, cooler, more important friends."
"Guys! We have to work together here!" said Dipper, feeling the rising tension amongst all of them.
"Oh what, you want to work with them, but not your buddy, Soos?" said Soos.
Mara, Wendy, Stan, Dipper, and Soos all started bickering amongst each other, and Mabel just sat there in stubborn silence, arms crossed over her chest.
Suddenly, she heard the sound of an oink echoing throughout the entire room, and her eyes widened in shock.
"Wait, did you hear that?" she exclaimed, turning towards the nest where the oink had come from. Sitting inside the nest right next to the giant egg was Waddles.
"Waddles!" exclaimed Mabel excitedly, and before anyone could stop her, she started to run onto the rusty old track, using it as a bridge to get to Waddles in the nest.
Everyone hurried out from their hiding spots after her, but stopped when they reached the edge of the cliff.
"Are you nuts?" exclaimed Stan.
Mabel stopped and turned back towards them.
"Oh, is someone speaking, because I can't hear anything!" she shouted, before turning and continuing to run towards the nest, covering her ears so that she couldn't hear them.
"Oh no!" exclaimed McGucket. "She's gone deaf with fear!"
"Mabel! Come back here!" exclaimed Dipper.
"Mabel! You could fall!" yelled Mara.
The six of them all finally started to run across the rusty track after Mabel.
However, Mabel made it to the nest before any of them caught up to her. She climbed into it, and held out her arms excitedly.
"Waddles!"
Waddles raised his head up towards her, oinking before running towards her.
Mabel picked him excitedly off the ground and held him up into the air.
"I'll never lose you again!" she said, bringing the pig into a hug and squeezing him just like she had done before.
The rest of them, except for Stan, had finally made it to the nest, and were looking around at the nest warily.
"Uh, Mabel?" said Dipper with a scared voice, gesturing towards the human skulls that had been used to build the nest.
"Shh, you're safe!" said Mabel, taking out the huggy wuvvy tummy bundle from her bag, and slipping it around Waddles.
Mara walked up to her sister hurriedly.
"Mabel, hurry up!" she hissed. "We've got to get out of here before-"
Before she could finish her sentence, the pterodactyl flew over their heads, and Waddles squealed in fright, jumping out of Mabel's arms and running across the old railway track above the gorge away from the nest.
"Waddles, wait!" exclaimed Mabel.
Waddles pounced right into Stan, knocking him flat onto his back on the rusty track. Stan growled and held the pig up with his hands off of him.
"Get off me, you dumb pig!" he yelled.
Suddenly, the pterodactyl started to dive towards them.
"Look out!" exclaimed Dipper, and the six of them that were in the nest ducked and took cover.
Stan, who was still on his back, couldn't get up in time.
He screamed as the pterodactyl came charging right at him.
Fortunately, the pterodactyl had missed him.
Unfortunately, its claws hit the railway track, causing it to get lurched upward. Stan was thrown off of the trailway track, still clutching Waddles in his hands, and he screamed as he plummeted down into the gorge.
"Oh no!" screamed Mabel.
"Stan!" screamed Dipper and Wendy.
"Mr. Pines!" screamed Soos.
"Well on the bright side, at least I don't have to worry about someone yelling at me if I accidentally blow up the Mystery Shack" said Mara, which earned glares from all of them.
Mara paused.
"I mean, 'Oh no! What ever will we do?'"
Stan was still screaming as he continued to fall downward with Waddles, and fortunately a giant mushroom near the ground cushioned his fall. Stan bounced off of it, and landed in a puddle of mud on the ground.
He sat upright, and groaned in pain as he started to rub his head.
He turned to see Waddles oinking happily as he rolled around in the mud.
"Yeah, you would enjoy this" said Stan grumpily.
Suddenly, the pterodactyl came diving towards them, and Stan ducked as it swooped right over his head. Fortunately, the flying dinosaur only took his fez.
Stan felt his now bare head, the presence of his usual hat gone.
"Huh?"
The pterodactyl dropped the hat into the nest, right in front of Mara, Mabel, Dipper, Wendy, Soos, and McGucket.
They all gasped, and Mabel picked up the fez.
"Guys, we've gotta save them!" she said urgently.
Dipper turned towards Mara.
"Mara, do you have an invention that will distract the pterodactyl?"
"Hmm, let me see..." said Mara, opening her bag and searching through it. She pulled out a huge contraption from her backpack, though how she had managed to get it to fit in the tiny bag was beyond any of their comprehension.
"I've got an interdimensional doomsday weapon with the capability of generating a black hole which will suck the entire universe."
She smiled sheepishly, realizing that this invention probably wasn't the best one that she could have brought on the mission, and also wondering why she had even created this thing in the first place.
Everyone just stared at her, for no one knew exactly how to respond to this.
"Ok..." said Dipper awkwardly, turning towards McGucket. "McGucket, how about you?"
"Do I?" said McGucket, taking his hat off of his head and reaching into it. Unfortunately, the hat was empty.
"Nope!"
Suddenly, the huge egg in the center of the nest started to crack, and everyone gasped as they watched.
It tipped over, and suddenly the head of a baby pterodactyl popped out of it.
Everyone screamed in fear, but it was short lived.
The baby pterodactyl turned towards them with its huge eyes, and chirped.
It was actually kind of cute.
"Aw!" said Mabel.
McGucket approached the baby dinosaur, which was still bigger than all of them.
"Welcome to the world little feller-"
Suddenly, the baby pterodactyl chomped down on McGucket, and swallowed him whole.
Soos, Wendy, Mara, Mabel, and Dipper screamed in terror.
Meanwhile, Stan and Waddles were hiding underneath the mushroom that had cushioned their fall from earlier. The pterodactyl was swooping overhead, searching for them, so they had decided to take cover.
"The dumb thing must be hungry" said Stan as it swooped over their hiding spot. "I guess it's you or me, pig."
He stood up, looked around to see if anyone was watching-not like anyone really was-then kicked Waddles out into the open, leaving him vulnerable to the pterodactyl.
Stan then sat down and watched from the safety of the mushroom.
But Waddles turned around and looked at Stan.
Stan frowned.
"What are you looking at?"
Waddles continued to stare at Stan.
"Aw, come on, don't give me that look!" said Stan. "What am I supposed to do, let it eat me?"
Waddles was still staring at Stan, his gaze unblinking.
Stan growled in frustration from that stare, and stood up.
"Oh I get it, you're trying to guilt me!" he accused, pointing at the pig from the safety of the mushroom. "Well it ain't working, pal!" he said, starting to pace back and forth underneath the mushroom while he ranted. "Who cares if you're Mabel's favorite thing in the world? I can live without the kid talking to me all the time...telling me her jokes...making me laugh."
He bent over in guilt as he said that last part, now starting to regret what he'd done. It was that moment that he realized how much he missed Mabel.
He turned back towards Waddles, who cocked his head to one side.
Stan chuckled.
Suddenly, there was a loud roar as the pterodactyl had finally seen Waddles, and Stan looked up to see it diving towards the pig.
"Aw, dang it!"
The pterodactyl swooped downward, and started to soar towards the pig.
"Well" said Stan, as he picked up the huggy wuvvy tummy bundle and put it on, using it to strap Waddles to his back. "This is about the dumbest thing I've ever done."
He turned towards the pterodactyl, and glared at it fiercely.
"You want this pig?"
He buckled the last strap around his chest, restraining Waddles to his back.
"Then you're gonna have to get through me, you flying devil!" He shouted ferociously. "Come and get me!"
He bent downwards in a position, clearly ready to fight, and growled angrily.
The pterodactyl flew right towards Stan, and opened its mouth, and as it did so, Stan leapt up into the air and charged right at the pterodactyl's head, screaming a war cry.
Soos, Wendy, Mabel, Mara, and Dipper were still in the nest, watching the baby pterodactyl, who had just eaten McGucket in horror.
"Aw, dude, did he really just eat the prospector guy?" said Soos with a disturbed tone. "That is messed up."
Suddenly, the baby pterodactyl barfed up McGucket's hat, and McGucket himself appeared from inside the little dinosaur's mouth.
He waved cheerfully.
"I'm ok!"
The baby dinosaur chomped down on him again and swallowed him.
Everyone started to back up further into the nest away from the baby.
"What do we do what do we do?" exclaimed Dipper.
Suddenly, Soos had an idea.
"We have to get in a straight line" he said determinedly.
"What?" said Dipper.
"The pterodactyl's eyes are so far apart that if you stand right in front of it, it can't see you."
"Soos, you've been wrong about stuff all day" said Dipper. "How can we-"
"Dude" said Soos, putting his hand on Dipper's shoulder. "I know I've messed up a lot. I know I can be sort of clumsy and now always as lovable as I think, but please as my friend, just trust me on this one."
Dipper looked back at the baby pterodactyl, who was chewing the remains of something unidentifiable, and then turned back towards Soos.
Soos nodded at Dipper.
Dipper nodded trustingly back.
The five of them stood up.
"Get behind me, dudes" said Soos, and they all got in a straight line behind Soos, Wendy was behind Soos, Mara was behind Wendy, Dipper was behind Mara, and Mabel was behind Dipper.
They slowly started to walk back towards the rusty railway track bridge, and they managed to even make it to the front of it.
Suddenly, the baby looked up, and the five of them froze, desperately hoping that Soos was right.
The little dinosaur stared at them for a moment, before finally it had decided that there was nothing there.
However, it was still looking at them as they started to walk sideways in a straight line across the rusty track.
"It's working!" said Mabel, as they hopped onto the other side of the track and then back again to stay in the direction line of blindness of the baby pterodactyl's vision.
Mabel almost fell when the wood underneath her foot gave way, but she got back up again and they continued to walk until they made it to the end.
At this point, the little dinosaur in the nest had lost interest, and turned back around away from them.
The five of them sat down behind the conveniently shaped rocks that they had hid behind earlier, and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Soos, you did it!" said Dipper.
Suddenly, there was the sound of a roar of an adult pterodactyl, and they all looked up into the air.
There was the winged creature, flying in an irregular pattern, and it appeared that there was someone riding on it.
"Was that-" said Dipper, squinting in disbelief.
The creature flew into the light, revealing Stan riding on the pterodactyl's neck with Waddles strapped in the huggy wuvvy tummy bundle to his chest.
"Stan?" said Mara with surprise.
Stan was punching the pterodactyl in the face as he directed it to fly towards them.
Mabel's eyes widened in excitement.
"Waddles!" she cried joyfully.
"I can't believe it" said Wendy. "He's actually punching it in the face!"
Stan was continuously punching the pterodactyl in the face, directing it so that it was diving right down towards the ledge that they were standing on.
"FROM HECK'S HEART, I STAB AT THEE!" Stan cried, putting his hands together in one huge fist, then bringing it down onto the dinosaur's head.
The pterodactyl screeched in pain as it fell and crashed right onto the edge of the cliff, and Stan managed to jump off the pterodactyl and grab onto the ledge just as the dinosaur was plummeting down into the gorge.
Stan then climbed up and stood on the edge of the cliff, panting in exhaustion, as Waddles was still strapped to his chest.
Everyone ran up to him excitedly, applauding Stan's courageous deed and telling him how excited they were that he was alive.
Mabel stood a distance away from them, wearing his fez on her head and looking at him with a hopeful expression.
Stan walked towards her with a smile on his face.
"He's your pig, kiddo" he said, using his hand to make Waddles's arm wave to Mabel as he oinked.
Mabel squealed in excitement as Stan slid Waddles out of the huggy wuvvy tummy bundle, and handed him to her.
"Waddles!" exclaimed Mabel excitedly, hugging her pig close to her as Stan took his fez off of her head. "You saved him for me."
"Yeah" said Stan. "Well sometimes, you've just gotta...LOOK OUT!!!!"
The pterodactyl was climbing up the cliff, and it looked as angry as ever. However, not everyone had reacted quickly enough, for the pterodactyl suddenly reached out with its claws and grabbed Dipper and Mabel, each of them was in one of its claws.
"Aaaaahhh!"
"Mabel! Dipper!" Mara screamed.
Wendy glared at the pterodactyl, and growled furiously as she stormed right up to the large dinosaur.
"No one messes with my friends" she growled. "Let go of them, you over-sized lizard!"
The pterodactyl snapped at her, but she leapt upwards and landed right on the dinosaur's head. It clawed at her with its wing, but Wendy dove right off of its head and landed on the ground, close to the claws that were holding Dipper and Mabel.
Without hesitation, she held up an axe, and swung it at its claws.
Even though she had not hit any of the dinosaur's skin, the pterodactyl still roared in pain and dropped Dipper and Mabel onto the ground.
The three of them then started to bolt into the cave where they had come from.
"Run!" shouted Wendy.
The rest of them ran after them as the pterodactyl started to pursue them from behind, flying a few feet above the ground.
They ran right through the section of the cave with all the tree-sapped dinosaurs, and the pterodactyl's wing struck the tree sap containing the t-rex. It didn't break free, but its arms started to move.
The six of them ran right into the first section of the cave where they had come from, the hole where they had dropped out of several miles above them. The snapped rope was hanging from the edge of the hole, but it was too high up for them to reach.
"We're trapped!" Stan exclaimed.
"Why did I already use my portal device today?" said Mara.
Dipper looked around hurriedly for any means of escape, and caught sight of a water geyser that had a huge rock inside it.
The geyser suddenly went off, and the water shot the rock upwards into the air.
Dipper got an idea.
"Quick!" he yelled, pointing towards the geyser. "The geyser can shoot us back up!"
Without hesitation, all six of them hurried over towards the geyser, and jumped into it.
"Wait, don't geysers spew water that's about 200 degrees fahrenheit?" questioned Mara as they all stood up to their knees in the geyser's water. "We'll all get cooked!"
"Do you have any other ideas?"
Just then, the pterodactyl appeared, and it was flying right at them.
"Come on, go go!" yelled Dipper at the geyser.
The pterodactyl was now only a few yards away from them.
They all screamed, except for Wendy, who glared at the pterodactyl with a fierce expression.
"Keep away from my friends!" she yelled, balling her hands into fists, and then bringing them down against the side of the geyser.
The geyser finally went off, shooting them up into the air and through the hole.
They all screamed as they were shot upwards so high that they even broke right through the ceiling of the church.
The geyser finally stopped spewing water, and the six of them tumbled downward into the church.
They were all soaking wet.
Mabel and Waddles had landed on an old chandelier, which was swinging from side to side.
Dipper and Soos lifted the lid of the piano that they had landed in.
Wendy was hanging by an overhead light that was dangling from the ceiling.
Stan was laying in an open coffin, panting heavily from the traumatic experience.
"Whoever is on top of me, GET OFF OF ME!!" Mara yelled from underneath Stan.
"Hmm?" said Stan, looking down and finally realizing that he was lying right on top of Mara. "Oh, sorry kid!"
He quickly got up out of the coffin, and Mara sat up, rubbing the back of her neck painfully.
"Why is it that everyone always lands on me?" she said.
Suddenly, the roof of the church collapsed, and fell right over the hole, covering it up for good so that none of the dinosaurs could find their way to the surface.
The six of them then walked out of the church, talking happily amongst themselves.
"I can't believe you did all that for Waddles!" said Mabel to Stan.
"Ah, well I can't have my favorite niece not talking to me" he said.
Mara turned on him with a playfully offensive look on her face.
"Hey!" she said, though it was more in a playful manner. She knew Stan didn't have any favorites, even if he often claimed his favorite was Mabel. "I'm here too, you know."
Stan chuckled, and put his hand against a tree and leaned against it.
"Anyways, if I've gotta leap onto a pterodactyl and punch it in the face, then that's what I've gotta do."
Mabel smiled.
"That's kinda sappy."
"What? That's how I feel!" said Stan.
"No, I mean..." said Mabel, pointing at the tree sap that Stan's hand had actually touched against the tree.
Stan pulled his hand from the sap, but his hand was still covered in the sticky substance.
"Oh yeah" he said, examining it for a minute, before pressing it onto Mabel's face.
"Gotcha!" he started to laugh joyfully, until he tried to pull free and found that his hand was stuck to Mabel's face.
"Uh oh."
He picked up Mabel off the ground and tried to shake her off his sapped hand, but she was still stuck.
Both of them started to scream.
"Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!"
A few minutes later, Stan, Mabel, and Waddles were in the back of the truck, asleep and leaning against each other. All of them were covered in sap.
Dipper and Soos were in the front seats, Dipper in the passenger seat, and Soos in the driver's seat.
Dipper held up the remains of his mangled blue vest.
There was a huge hole in it, and cotton spilling out of it.
"Check it out, that thing totally destroyed my vest" he said.
Dipper then noticed that there was something stuck in his vest, and he pulled it out.
It was a dinosaur claw.
Dipper held it up excitedly to Soos.
"Soos, check it out!"
Soos turned and looked at it.
"A real dinosaur tooth? That's awesome!"
"Actually, I think that this one of its claws" said Dipper, remembering how Wendy had chopped at the claws with her axe to get it to let go of him and Mabel.
"But that's not as awesome as you saving us back there" he said, holding up his fist to Soos for him to bump.
"Pterodactyl bros?"
Soos looked at his fist for a few seconds, before finally bumping it cheerfully.
"Pterodactyl bros" he confirmed.
"Boosh!"
"Hey, I pronounced it right that time!" said Soos.
Wendy and Mara were sitting in the back of the truck with the cage. There wasn't enough room in the truck, so they had both volunteered to sit outside in the back of the truck.
"Hey, Wendy?" said Mara.
"Yeah?" said Wendy, turning towards her.
"That was really great what you did back there, saving my siblings" she said. "Thank you."
"It was no big" said Wendy. "I guess that I did kind of owe both of them."
Mara chuckled.
"I'm really sorry, man" she said. This time, it was in a sincere voice.
"It's alright" said Mara.
"But I still owe you one, dude" said Wendy.
"Oh, it's not a big deal" said Mara.
"No, it is" said Wendy. "I promised you that we'd go hang out today, and I didn't do it. So what do you say when we get back to the Mystery Shack, you and I go into the woods and have a tree-climbing contest?"
Mara grinned.
"Now? But it's getting dark."
Wendy smirked.
"All the more challenging then."
Mara smiled confirmedly.
"Let's do it, dude!" she said, and she and Wendy high-fived each other.
They laughed as the truck drove off into the distance.
"Hey, do you think we need to worry about those other dinosaurs?" asked Mara.
"Nah" said Wendy. "I doubt it."
Back in the church, the pile of old roof remains started to rustle, as something underneath it was trying to break free.
Suddenly, McGucket emerged from the rubble, holding his musical spoons in his casted hand.
"I ate my way through a dinosaur!" he said cheerfully, as he stared to laugh maniacally and play with his musical spoons.