Wendy and Pacifica ran to investigate what Candy and Grenda had found, only to see the dreaded abomination emerge from its makeshift tomb. It might have been a fascinating sight for the likes of Dipper, but all present were horrified at the creature's four glazed-over eyes and its green and gray skin that appeared to be flaking or rotting off its skull.

Soon more emerged from these ancient, rusted tubes, and the girls realized it was a futile effort to try and stand and fight.

"We better run," Wendy said, brandishing her axe, "But I'm ready to kick some monster butt if it comes to it."

"SURE WE CAN'T FIGHT OUR WAY THROUGH THIS?" Grenda asked, raising her clenched fists, "I'M READY TO SMASH!"

"Can't risk it!" Wendy shouted, "We gotta find another way out of here." She looked around and found there was another darkened tunnel. "That way! There's gotta be another entrance down that way!"

"Allow me," Pacifica took out her phone and powered the flashlight on it, illuminating the tunnel ahead.

"That's a pretty powerful flash," Candy stated, ignoring the fact that the undead extraterrestrials were getting closer, "Would love to examine the hardware."

"There's an old movie about dinosaurs that really sums up how my family operates," Pacifica responded, "We spare no expense."

The creatures had now reached the ground level, having oozed their disgusting, rotting tentacles down from their tubes to the floor, ready to lumber over to our heroines.

"We need to go," Wendy began to emphasize, "NOW!"

With that, the girls began to run down the corridor, Pacifica in the front to illuminate the way, Candy in the center and ready to hack or run a bypass on any mechanical door she found, and Wendy and Grenda in the rear to fight off any of the zombie aliens that got too close.

Sure enough, some of the creatures were closing in on them. Their tentacled forms could easily scale the rocks and lumbered slobberingly forward, some crawling along the ceiling above Wendy and Grenda's heads. One reached down, moaning in a gelatinous, guttural howl. Fortunately, Wendy was quick to react and sliced off two of the monster's tendrils, causing it to screech louder but not fazing its pursuit.

Two more hopped up from behind a rock, howling and gnashing their hideous needle-sharp teeth. Grenda quickly gave both of them a jab in their cataract-ridden eyes. Before she could celebrate once more how strong she was, a third leapt forward from its revolting, ropey limbs.

Just as quickly, Wendy whacked the thing in the face with the blunt part of her axe, sending the creature flying across the cave. Grenda gave a thankful smile, and Wendy acknowledged with a playful wink.

Pacifica and Candy watched horrified as they felt defenseless. They were, however, at least thankful their friends could put up a good fight and keep them safe.

Paz for one had yet another reason to envy Wendy. She could fake the tough attitude but knew dang well she couldn't fight like her. This was another facet she decided she would improve, provided Wendy gave her fighting lessons and of course that they survived this encounter.

Candy, on the other hand, pulled out her dusty map and found sure enough that they were indeed headed in the right direction. She was, however, worried that she would be letting everyone down when she began doubting her ability to hotwire electrical panels, despite electronics being her newfound passion. How could she possibly hope to build BMO when she knew nothing? No, she told herself; she had studied enough and could wing it. Black wire, red wire, she knew where they went, what to ground and what to short circuit.

It felt like they had run down this tunnel for a mile; each time a creature would get close to them, Wendy and Grenda were quick to fight it off, but still the horde progressed. Finally, they found a massive iron door, with blue LED lights indicating an electronic seal.

"FINALLY!" Grenda shouted, "MY KNUCKLES ARE GETTING TIRED FROM PUNCHING UNDEAD CALAMARI!"

"Hmm," Candy looked around, "now where is the control mechanism?"

"Will you hurry up and find it already!?" Pacifica barked watching the horde of ET zombies approaching, but she paused and corrected herself, "...Sorry. I'll try and help with the light." She shined her phone's light around the door frame until finally the found the panel near the floor.

Immediately, Candy hopped down and pried it open. Pacifica shined the light within it so Candy could see what she was doing as she unplugged the wires and began attempting to run her bypass on it.

Wendy took another swing at an approaching monster, while Grenda threw an uppercut at another.

"Think you're okay with that stuff?" Wendy sounded over her shoulder.

"I think," Candy answered. She grabbed two more wires she didn't recognize but had some idea that these could be right. Pacifica wanted to express her panic but knew it would come out as a coarse remark. As they looked at the panel again, both of the non-fighter girls held their breath. Candy closed her eyes and connected the two wires. There was a light, pleasant beep sound, followed by the LED lights turning green and the sound of a large clunk.

The door had unlocked.

Pacifica shined the light on the wheel of the door as Candy quickly reached for it and twisted it to the left, opening it to reveal another dimly lit office. Both fortunately and unfortunately, it seemed that this one did not have the same security measures as the previous room. The four girls made their way inside as the monsters advanced and immediately closed and attempted to seal the door behind them with the wheel crank on the opposite side.

The first thing that Candy and Pacifica at least noticed (while Grenda and Wendy locked the door) was the aspect of the room. There was very little dust here, and it didn't take an IT genius to notice the new technology established and fully installed in this room. The security monitors were in 1080p HD, and the OS on the server monitor displayed Windows Server 2012, waiting for a login.

It was no consolation to any of them as they all looked at the security camera outside the door and found more of the beasts accumulating there. Despite it being reinforced steel, the creatures were clearly putting a lot of weight against it. How many of these things had Ford and McGucket created?

Wendy and Grenda made their way back to the door and put their own weight against it, attempting to hold them back in some vain effort. Really, it was all they could think to do, not that two teenage girls could really hold a reinforced steel door very well against the weight of a horde of undead tentacled monstrosities.

The scene on the monitors showing them gathering around the door didn't help matters.

Thankfully, there was another door at the far end of the room, and Candy immediately ran over to it and opened the panel. This one, however, looked far more advanced, and given that she was a novice at this from the start, this was going to be very complicated.

"I do not think I can hack this one," she muttered.

"Can't you at least try?" Pacifica stammered, "Our lives are on the line!"

"IT'S WORTH A SHOT!" Grenda shouted from the other side of the room.

"Okay..." Candy hesitated, but began attempting to disable and bypass the wiring.

Panic set in as Pacifica examined the monitors. It seemed like a hopeless situation, and she couldn't help but think that this could be it. She took a deep breath, pulled out her phone, and called Mabel via video chat.

"Hel-lo!" Mabel pleasantly chimed, though her image on the screen was choppy here and there, "What...up, Pac…?"

"Hi...Mabel," Pacifica awkwardly muttered, "Could you please put your brother on?"

"HEY, DIP…!" Mabel shouted before cutting out again, "Yo...girlfri...on the pho..."

"I'm not his..."

"Hi, Pacifica," Dipper smiled equally awkward, "Everything ok?"

"Not really, Dipper," Pacifica sighed, "I'm kinda in a bad situation."

"Can I he…?" Dipper asked before the image became choppy.

"Wish you could," Pacifica responded, "We could've used a bit of paranormal nerdiness on this one. But I need to you let you know something, and you better pay close attention, dork."

"I am," Dipper raised an eyebrow, slightly agitated and expecting a crass remark from her.

"I've been trying to be nicer," Pacifica continued, "but it's still really hard for me. Being coarse with people is almost second nature to me, and I'm trying to break that habit. Not necessarily for anyone else but because it's something I want to do for myself. I want to be better than my parents. But I know why I'm doing this in the first place is partially thanks to you. You've inspired me and gave me a newfound confidence in myself that I didn't know I needed, and it all started with that night at the mansion when you told me I didn't have to be like my horrible family. What I'm trying to say is...Dipper, my nerd of nerds, I think I've been secretly in love with you! And I needed you to know that before anything else happened tonight."

The girls in the room heard it, and her statement confirmed exactly what they were already thinking.

"What was tha…?" Dipper asked through pauses, "You're cutting o...I couldn't hea..."

"Dipper?" Pacifica frantically asked, "Are you still there? Dipper!"

The signal completely died, and the phone conversation ended.

Pacifica growled and almost threw the phone to the ground, when suddenly, she noticed something on the control boards of the monitors. It was marked in big, bold red letters, and it immediately frustrated her that none of them saw it earlier.

It read "PLASMA CANNONS" with a small skull and crossbones symbol next to it.

"How did I miss that!?" Pacifica shrieked. But she didn't waste time and immediately pressed it. In an instant, on the video monitor, Pacifica could see two very large cannons emerge from the ceiling above the opposite end of the door. They began firing enormous blue plasma blasts in rapid succession and vaporizing the relentless undead extraterrestrials, the boom from each blast reverberating against the steel door and forcing Wendy and Grenda to back away from it. After two minutes, there was dead silence.

On the monitors, the cannons had stopped, and the monsters had been reduced to dust.

"Well," Wendy finally broke the silence, "that's one way of doing it."

"Makes me wonder why it was turned off," Candy said.

"MAYBE FORD DIDN'T THINK HE NEEDED IT!" Grenda responded.

"I don't think this was Ford's work," Pacifica followed, "All this junk looks too new." She looked at the control console and found the lock for the door Candy was still trying to open. "Here, let me help you out, fork girl."

"Uh, thanks..." Candy replied, but then remembered the forks she used to put on her fingers as some sort of transhumanizing gesture. (These turned out to be impractical, especially when Candy started to think of new improvements she could make)

Pacifica pressed the button, and the door opened. What they found on the other side, Pacifica immediately recognized as her old mansion's kitchen, though she almost didn't without any staff present. Instead, there was McGuckett stirring a pot of rank-smelling soup as his raccoon ran between his legs and through the opened door past them to the MRE rations that were in one of the lockers.

"Hey ther', youngins," McGuckett shouted and paused his stirring, "I think ya dun gon' an' startled mah wife!"

"I think she was just hungry for some real food, dude," Wendy answered, "however bland it might be."

"There was a tunnel here the whole time?!" Pacifica stammered in frustration.

"Nah," McGuckett answered, "I had the thing dug up shortly after y'all skedaddled. Then, with that thar grand money, I constructed mah own security system in case them aliens Ford and I made decided to come lookin' for me."

"I can just imagine," Wendy vocalized her thoughts, "had you said aliens from underground were about to attack you at any given day, that might have either added to your 'local cook' reputation or became Toby Determined's next tabloid headline."

"I actually did tell that feller about it," McGuckett responded, "but he just laughed and said it was too far-fetched a headline even fer me. Instead, he ran with some story about weird people from Mewner or Mewmah or some such dimension I hadn't seen."

"I'm impressed with the technical workings you put together here," Candy stated.

"THOSE LASER CANNONS WERE PRETTY DOPE!" Grenda added.

"I may be good with tech thingamagiggers," McGuckett followed, "but I sure can't quite cook this old boot stew." Pacifica walked over and looked in the pot. It was a green and brown color, with what looked like small bones, a lizard tail, and a large muddy old boot floating in it. The sight and smell of it caused her to swoon so much she wasn't sure if she would pass out or puke; it smelled worse than the zombie aliens they just encountered. It was as if someone had blended rotten eggs with ammonia and then escalated its pungent odor to eleven.

She couldn't stand that such a vile atrocity of a 'dinner' would be cooked in the kitchen of her formal ancestral home.

"Mr Hillbilly," Pacifica uncovered her nose and spoke as politely as she possibly could muster, "I know some people who have probably recently been disenfranchised and would probably love their old jobs back if you'd hire them on to cook your meals for you. Now...if you would be so kind as to leave this kitchen and never reenter it, they'll make sure your meals are never, ever this bad again."

"So this is how our night ends," Wendy stated as the four of them sat on the steps of McGuckett Manor.

"THAT WAS INTENSE, EVEN FOR ME!" Grenda followed, "AND WE DEALT WITH THE SUMMERWEEN TRICKSTER!"

"But at least old crazy McGuckett agreed to work with me on my technical knowledge," Candy sweetly said with a smile, "That's a positive and a win in my book."

"I really don't know how you all do it," Pacifica sighed, "Maybe I wasn't cut out for all this."

"What are you talking about, girl?" Wendy laughed, "You held your own pretty dang well back there. And actually, you're the one who spotted those laser blasters that ended up saving the day."

"THE PINES TWINS WOULD BE PROUD!" Grenda continued.

"Plus," Candy added, "you live in Gravity Falls. You kind of don't have much of a choice but to deal with this sort of thing on occasion. But I think you're adapting pretty good."

"Thanks, weirdos," Pacifica reached out her arms and grabbed the three of them in a sitting group hug, "I did all this to try and grow as a person, to show that I could face the kind of insanity that Dipper and Mabel faced on a daily basis. Really, all this is humiliating and showing that I've got a lot to learn when it comes down to it. But I've still got to show my tough front; I've got to show my confidence to the world, even if I'm faking it. But...I'm glad I can open up around you all at least."

"Anytime, woman," Wendy smiled back, "We'll do what we can to build you up and show you how awesome you are. Feel free to vent to us any time; we've got your back."

"And..." Pacifica stammered softly, "About Dipper...I said some things back there on the phone...but I don't think he actually heard me." Her tone returned to its usual coarseness. "If any of you breathe a word about it, I swear..."

"Your secret's safe with us," Candy said.

"It's cool, girl," Wendy raised her hands defensively, "But I gotta say, though...Next summer, I want you to do yourself a favor. I want you to go up to him, look him in the eye, and tell him how you really feel about him. I think he might be more receptive to it than you might think."

"...Okay," Pacifica hesitated at first but sighed in resolve, "Will do. But why do you think he'll be okay with it? I was so terrible to his sister this past summer."

"Welllll," Wendy rolled her eyes, "considering what I saw that he had crossed out in his Journal on the page regarding my ancestor's ghost about you...I think he really liked that hug you gave him and how you smelled that night..."

"What?"

"Nevermind," Wendy laughed again and patted Pacifica hard on the back.

Pacifica then decided to change the subject before her face turned even more red.

"So, have any of you ridden in a limo before?" she asked.

"Can't say I have," Candy replied.

"NOT EVEN WITH MARIUS!" Grenda followed.

"A bit to fancy for my family," Wendy smiled and winked.

"Well, we're closing out our night in one," Pacifica smile, "And my offer still stands about the Disney Club 33 visit. Maybe I can pull some strings and add a couple more reservations for it."

The girls laughed and cheered together after the limo arrived. They drank Pitt Cola while listening to a combination of Sev'ral Timez and whatever mixed album Wendy had picked up from Edgy on Purpose. And as the hours continued to roll on towards the 1st of November, All Saints Day, they continued to make merry in their proper, hysterical way. It was befitting of teenage girls without any direction of who they might one day be or without the worry or care one might have of facing the future immediately. Tonight they would enjoy themselves and discover that they were not alone in this, that no matter what unknown horrors they might face in this town, they still had each other and their many other friends in Gravity Falls.

After Pacifica had gone to sleep, her phone vibrated in her costume's pocket. It was a message from Mabel that of course she wouldn't see until the following morning.

Mabel: Hi Pacifica! I got a call from Ford; he says he wants you to call him back at 555-9432 and tell him everything you found down there, whatever that means. But I also got a pocket dial from Candy when you called for Dipper. Since her phone gets better reception...I think you know what I'm saying. Heehee. Don't worry, I won't tell him. But you should. Otherwise, I'll bug you all next summer with my silliness. Do not underestimate the power of Mabel!