Prologue: Who Ya Gonna Call Now?

2014 – The Ghostbusters World War

            Gravity Falls, Oregon faced its share on weirdness many times in the past, at least in perspective of one Dipper Pines, a curious 13-year-old with an eye for adventure and the paranormal especially. Over the summer, he and his twin sister Mabel discovered sides of the town that no one, except for their great uncles (Stan and Ford) and resident kook Old Man McGucket, knew about.

            But the incident happening upon them that day wasn’t of the town’s making.

            The ghostly invasion was worldwide.

            According to news reports, the epicenter of it all was New York City – home of the Ghostbusters. Multiple other Ghostbuster teams were stationed there and other parts of the world, fighting against the ghoulish creatures invading their dimension.

            Unfortunately, Gravity Falls was without one.

            The townsfolk were defenseless.

            That was before Ford armed himself, Dipper, Mabel, Stan, and Soos Ramirez (an employee of the Mystery Shack, their home business) with “ghost elimination” equipment.

            “If we can’t count on Ghostbusters to save us, then we’ll just be Ghostbusters ourselves,” he defiantly declared.

            For a while, Ford’s plan worked perfectly.

            The five heroes used guns and rifles that discharged protonic energy not too dissimilar to those produced by legitimate Ghostbuster tools, annihilating every ghoul in their sights toward the town square.

            “Dude, this is so much like laser tag,” Soos reflected. “Just, you know, like, with the whole ‘ghost-killing’ thing.”

            “I totally see where you’re coming from, Soos,” Mabel acknowledged. Firing on another barrage of specters, she ferociously cried, “DIE, GHOSTS! DIE!”

            Dipper didn’t want to outwardly express it, but he was starting to feel like a real Ghostbuster himself. He had one ghost in the crosshairs of his rifle, ready to unload protonic energy, but nothing discharged.

            “What the…?!” He looked on his rifle, noticing the “Low Power” warning near the trigger, blinking in a blue LED display. “My gun’s out of power!”

            Mabel yanked on her trigger – nothing. “Mine is, too!”

            “Same here, dude,” Soos lamented.

            “Ya gave us defective weapons?!” Stan complained to his twin brother.

            “They aren’t defective,” Ford defended. “They’re just rechargeable.”

            “So, ya got any batteries on hand?” Stan questioned.

            Ford sheepishly chuckled, rubbing the back of his head. “Did I forget to mention they’re only port rechargeable?”

            “Lemme guess,” Stan miserably said. “The port’s back in the Mystery Shack.”

            Ford did not have to say anything to confirm it, but the others figured it out by the embarrassment in his demeanor.

            Powerless in more ways than one, the Pines family and Soos found themselves swarmed by countless ghosts. Hovering over them, they toyed with the mortals and reveled in their fear until deciding on the moment to pounce.

            And then…every single one of them exploded in ectoplasmic viscera splurged all over Soos and the Pines.

            “Ewwwww!” Mabel revolted. “Ghost boogers!”

            “You get used to it,” spoke the voice of a woman none of them recognized.

            They spotted her approaching them, donned in a sanitation uniform that was reconditioned as a Ghostbuster uniform. This was evident from the logo patched on the upper part of her right sleeve, as well as her nametag (“Gilbert”) above her left breast pocket and the unique Proton Pack strapped to her back.

            “Where did you come from?” Stan asked.

            The woman named Gilbert expressed a sense of uncertainty. “You know, I’m still trying to figure that out myself.”

            “Erin!”

            From around the nearest corner appeared a heavyset, bespectacled woman wearing the same type of uniform and equipment as Gilbert, her nametag reading “Yates.”

            “Thank God I found you,” she told Gilbert, whose first name apparently was Erin.

            “Abby, you alright?” Erin checked, hugging the plus-sized woman. “Where are Patty and Holtzmann?”

            GRRRRRRAAAAAAAWWWWLLLLLLL!!!!!

            The inhuman roar sounded close by.

            Erin and Abby ran to it, with the curious Pines family and Soos following after.

            A couple of blocks away from the square, they located two more women in the same style of Abby and Erin – one was a tall African American with a classy hairdo and a nametag reading “Tolan,” and the other a blonde with a maniac expression and her own nametag that read “Holtzmann.”

            They both squared off against a giant three-headed, doglike beast, firing protonic streams at two of its heads.

            “That’s a Cerberus!” An overjoyed Dipper identified. “We’ve got an actual Cerberus here in Gravity Falls!”

            Abby and Erin quickly assisted their teammates, adding two more streams that targeted the Cerberus’s third head and torso. The four women continued their volley of proton fire until the Cerberus evaporated.

            Mabel hugely smiled. “And we’ve got actual Ghostbusters here in Gravity Falls – and they’re all girls!”

            “Nice of you ladies to show,” Holtzmann jeered to Erin and Abby.

            “One of you wanna explain what happened to us,” Patty demanded. “One second, we’re celebrating a win over Rowan in New York, and then the next we’re in some jacked-up version of Mayberry.”

            “That portal must’ve given off some after effects, once we closed it,” Erin deduced. “It took us out of our dimension and into another.”

            KUR-CRACK!

            A noise bearing the same register as lightning directed their attentions skyward.

            The swirl of blood red clouds dissipated, turning into a pleasant sunny morning sky. All of the Gravity Falls residents erupted in cheers, mostly for the four Ghostbuster women that came from nowhere and saved them.

            “Why’re they cheering for us?” Abby inquired. “All we did was wipe out the monsters. We had nothing to do with the sky.”

            “Who cares,” Patty said. “This is R-E-S-P-E-C-T we’re gettin’ here. Something we don’t get much of back home.”

            Erin disconcertedly frowned. “Speaking of home…how’re we going to get back?”

            Surrounded by euphoric townspeople, none of the four women realized the entire scene was being observed by a yellow, triangular-shaped being wearing a top hat and floating at a distance in the purified skies.

            “Time to begin phase one.”