Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Hey kids!  Ki-ids !  C’mere, I have something to show you!”

Stan rolled out from under the Bob Ross-inator (“It will cover THE ENTIRE TRI-STATE AREA in paintings of happy little clouds and happy little trees, and people will be so in awe at how beautiful the artwork is they will allow themselves to be hypnotized by the subliminal messages in the paint telling them to OBEY MY EVERY COMMAND!!!!”) that he’d been working on, and glanced at Vanessa, who looked up from her copy of Festering Bites-A Gothic Vampire Love Story .

After a moment they both shrugged and got up to see what the doc wanted.

Dr. D was practically vibrating with excitement…which wasn’t exactly abnormal behavior for him, since he got excited about things like new “evil looking” vacuum cleaners being on sale, or Carlos finally making a move on Inez in one of his telenovelas.

But today he was also sitting in front of his computer, pointing eagerly at the screen so hard Stan worried that he was going to jab his finger through it.

…Again.

(Which was impressive, considering how durable the darn things were.)

“What’s all the ruckus, doc?”  Heh, that was kind of a fun word to say: ruckus.

“LOOK!!!!”  Dr. D jabbed the laptop again, and Stan resisted the urge to push it back for its own safety.  “McGucket Labs is coming to Danville!!!!”

Stan squinted at the screen, and saw a video of a big, fancy laboratory, with a spindly scarecrow in a lab coat with a nose like Cyrano de Bergerac standing in front of a table with what looked like a giant pile of metal resting on top.

If it wasn’t for the little round glasses, and the fact that his light brown hair (and beard) were streaked with gray, he could’ve been Dr. D.  As it was, Stan half expected him to start ranting about wanting to take over THE ENTIRE TRI-STATE AREA!!!!

Instead, he pulled out a banjo and grinned.

“Howdy, y’all!  I’m Fiddleford Hadron McGucket, founder and CEO of McGucket Labs!”  His fingers flew across the strings, playing a catchy bluegrass tune that got Stan tapping his foot before he even knew what was happening.  “Do you have a knack for robotics, computers or engineering?  Or, heck, do ya even like makin’ stuff blow up?”

“Yes, I do!” Dr. D cheered.

“Dad, I’m pretty sure he can’t hear you,” Vanessa pointed out.

“Ssh ssh ssh, we’re about to get to the good part!”

“Welp, iffen you’re so inclined, this weekend you can come show off your mad scientist skills at the McGucket Labs Invent-A-Palooza, hosted at the Tri-State Area’s own Danville Mall!”

The screen was suddenly filled with brief images of various kids between the ages of seven and fifteen typing at computers, mixing substances in glass beakers, and putting pieces of metal together, while quirky working music played in the background.

“It’s a chance ta work with some of our top engineers and inventors in a weekend-long program-weekend program?  Three day program?  Tater Tot, which one-” the picture crackled briefly- “ three-day program that’ll test your creativity an’ innovation, teach ya some new skills, an’ hopefully end with an army o’ giant homemade robots dukin’ it out in the streets-!”

The picture crackled out of focus for longer this time, and when it resettled Mr. McGucket was smiling sheepishly and saying, as his eyes darted back and forth in sync with his words, “I mean, uh, hopefully end with ya learnin’ some valuable life skills that are perfectly safe for your home and the general community!”

…He really is kinda like Dr. D.

“There will be prizes at the end, with a potential grand prize of a hundred thousand smackers for whoever comes up with the most original, most fascinatin’ experiment or design!  Sign up now if you’re a youngun-or, heck, even just a youngun at heart-at www.mcglabs.com!”  He froze for a moment, face set in a fixed grin, before turning his head and asking someone offscreen, “Are ya sure we can’t leave in the part about the homemade robots-”

The screen went black as the commercial ended.

As soon as it was over, Dr. D opened up a new tab and started typing feverishly.

“Um, Dad?”  Vanessa tugged the sleeve of his lab coat.  “Please tell me you’re not doing what I think you’re doing.”

“What?  He said you can sign up if you’re young at heart, and my heart is at least in its late twenties!  Besides, it’s a chance to get that prize money so I can better balance financing my evil schemes and looking after my kids without having to completely mooch off your mom’s alimony checks!”

Vanessa gave Stan a pleading look.

“...What’re you looking at me for?  Sounds like a pretty good deal to me.”

“Yeah, but have both of you forgotten that Dad’s inventions have a habit of, you know, blowing up ?!”

“...That doesn’t happen as much if nobody presses the self-destruct button.”

“AUGH!”  Vanessa groaned against the cover of her book.

“Relax, pumpkin, I-”  Dr. D’s eyes narrowed.  “ Waaaait a minute, is that one of those trashy romance novels all the teenagers have started reading?!”

The book hastily disappeared behind Vanessa’s back.  “...No.”

“It’d better not be!  I’d hate to have to sit you down for a serious discussion about growth and development!”  To Stan’s horror, Dr. D pulled a familiar copy of Why Am I Sweaty? Your body explained in horrifyingly uncomfortable detail out of his lab coat.

“UGH, DAD!”  There was a dark blur, and then Vanessa was gone.

“…How long have you been carrying that around for?” Stan asked after a second, eyeing the book like it was a poisonous snake.

Dr. D cackled shamelessly as he tucked it back into his pocket…then groaned.  “ Ugh , guess this means Charlene’s gonna get a chance to say ‘I told you so’ about using this as a deterrent against age inappropriate literature.”

Shaking his head, he turned back to the website and clicked “SUBMIT” on the application form, then did that weird little clenched hand wave thing that always seemed to happen when he was excited.

“Eeeeee, I’m finally getting a chance to meet one of my only probably-not-evil heroes!!!!”

And, Stan privately thought to himself, even if they didn’t end up earning that prize money, that sentence alone was a sign that this was gonna be entertaining.

Chapter Text

“So let me get this straight.”  Rebecca slowly folded her arms as she eyed her husband and brother-in-law.  “You both think that your dead brother Stanley has come back as a ghost.”

Shermie nodded.  “Yes.”

“And that he was responsible for destroying that one college Ford wanted to go to as a kid.”

“Yes,” Ford said this time.

“And you think he’s going to come for you next.”

“Yes,” they said in unison.

She stared at them for a long, hard moment, and then asked, “...Why would he wait all this time?”

Both of them glanced at each other, hemmed and hawed for a moment, and then ( quel surprise ) Ford spoke up.

“...Perhaps his final resting place has been disturbed.  Or his spirit was biding its time, waiting for a certain number of years to unfold before finally awakening and unleashing his curse on those who wronged him.”

Shermie nodded thoughtfully.  “Or there was some kind of alignment of the planets or something.”

“No, that’s not ghosts, that’s more likely to result in increased extraterrestrial activity.”

Oh, give me strength.

Rebecca rubbed her forehead.  “Even if any of that was the case, wouldn’t he have been more likely to show up after thirty years?  Or more likely, ten years, or, heck, a hundred years?  That’s how it works in all the ghost stories-they come back from the grave after a nice, even number of years.”

Ford gave her a look filled with an uncalled-for amount of scorn.  “Stanley wouldn’t care about following traditional sequential haunting techniques.  Besides, he’d obviously defy them because that’s just what he’d know we’d be expecting him to do!”

“You didn’t even expect him to come back and haunt you!”

The pause that followed was five seconds too long.

“...Ford?”  Rebecca narrowed her eyes.  “You weren’t expecting that, right?”

“...I didn’t have to.”

She heard too late the hollow strains of a kind of creepy rock ballad starting up in the background as Ford opened his mouth.

You’d think after more than thirty years

I’d finally feel okay

That I could wake and not feel

half of me was ripped away

But even when the pain had dulled

It never fully went away

Like a bloodstain, old and faded, on a page

But after so long spent apart, it

Almost feels somewhat cathartic

That soon I’ll see a broken-hearted

Spectral brother, still a-quivering with rage-

Ford blinked.  “Wait a minute, why am I singing?’  He looked around at the suddenly dimmed lighting in bewilderment.  “And where is that music coming from?!”

Shermie sighed and patted his shoulder.  “That happens a lot around here.  I figured out pretty quickly it’s easier to just go with it, cuz if I try to resist I get the hiccups.”

Huh; that was…oddly fascinating.  “...Does that happen to everyone around here?”

“Everyone in the Tri-State Area, far as I know.  Don’t think there’s ever been a day where someone hasn’t started a spontaneous musical number.  It actually made things a lot easier when the band was still together, cuz we never had to worry about getting stuck on lyrics-”

Rebecca cleared her throat.  “I think the guitar solo’s almost over.”

“Oh.  Right.”  Ford was both alarmed and intrigued to almost physically feel the words come bubbling up his throat.

I’ve been haaaaunted (by guilt!)

All these years,

I’ve been haaaaunted (by guilt!)

Bearing a sword of Damocles

Of responsibility unfulfilled

(Technically that was a slant rhyme at best, but the mysterious force compelling him to sing didn’t seem to care)

And I’m tired of being haunted by my guilt!

For a moment Ford thought it was over.

No such luck, as the drumbeat grew in intensity; out of the corner of his eye he actually thought he saw Shermie sitting in front of his old drum kit.  And the mysterious force had turned on a fog machine that was doing its work slowly but steadily around his ankles, and he was now surrounded by cardboard cutout images of Stanley-but a version that was deathly white, and posing in a corny ghost pose, waving his hands on either side of his head while making a “BOOOO!!!!” face, and just seeing them made his throat grow tight because Stanley would definitely have done that-

I’ve done it all-the what-ifs, the shoulds

The would-invent-time-travel-if-I-coulds

The broken crying out in the woods

The secret Ouija board under my bed

“You have a Ouija board?”

“...No.”

But now I think he’s finally here

Even as it fills me with some fear

It grants me a modicum of cheer

That this could finally be the end!

“The what?!” Shermie and Rebecca demanded in unison.

Ford glanced at them out of the corner of his eye, then gratefully jumped at the final chorus as the chords started playing, and the ghost Stan’s began swirling around him in a bizarre dance.

…Of being haaaaaunted (by guilt!)

For so long,

I’ve been haaaaunted (by guilt!)

I just want to see my twin eye to eye

Say I never wanted him to die

And maybe-finally!-say goodbye…

Ford swallowed, sinking down to his knees as the lights dimmed to a single spotlight over his head.

…Maybe then…

I won’t be haunted…

By

My

Guilt

As he sang the final line he closed his eyes.

When Ford opened them again, his brother’s kitchen was back to normal.

The part of him that couldn’t help being fascinated by the strange and unusual wondered how that had happened, and if there was a way to find the source.

But before he could dwell on it for too long, Rebecca knelt down in front of him and put her hands on his shoulders.

“If it turns out there’s no ghost, will you please go to grief counseling?”

Ford sighed, and reluctantly nodded.

She glared at Shermie.  “That goes for you too.”

“Yes dear.”

Rebecca sighed, but turned back to Ford.  “So what’s your plan for finding out if this really is Stan?”

“I would think it was obvious: we’re going to hold a séance this weekend.”

Chapter Text

“...So this McGucket guy’s the one who made all the new-fangled computers and cell phones people use now?” Stan asked.

“Oh, he’s made a lot more than that!” Dr. D said cheerfully as they pulled up in front of the Googolplex Mall (was that even a real word?).  “This guy is a technological genius!  He’s got patents for a more fuel-efficient car, and a kind of flying train powered by magnets, and like a thousand robots!  I’ve even heard people say they think he should run for president !”  He sighed.  “Even though his law-abiding-ness should be completely nauseating, he’s just so- inspirational , for some reason!”

“Remind me again how many of the robots wound up going on rampages and destroying buildings?” Vanessa asked dryly as she hopped out of the car and took the toolkit Stan held out for her.

“...I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”

Stan and Vanessa shared one of those big eyerolls that were becoming alarmingly commonplace for them.

The mall was packed with what felt like everyone in Danville.

Stan wondered how many of them were actually interested in learning science or whatever, and how many were just here to meet someone as famous as Mr. McGucket.

…Or, the most likely option, because they were excited at the chance to maybe earn that big cash prize.

“And until you make us a fortune you’re not-!”

Nope, nope, not thinking about that today.

Stan shook his head to clear it, and then began elbowing people to clear a path for his fam group to get in line for registration.

He thought he recognized some of the people ahead of them: two kids, one with red hair, one with green (was that a thing in the future?) and behind them an older redheaded girl (maybe their sister?) moaning in anguish to another one who he was gonna go out on a limb and guess was her friend.

“Aaaauuggghhh, it’s not fair !  How am I supposed to bust them for this when Mom’s okay with it?  The status quo has been completely ruined , and I can’t-!”  She suddenly brightened.  “Wait.  Mom probably thinks they’re just gonna build some cutesy little toys or something, right?”  She didn’t give her friend a chance to answer.  “Well, knowing them they’re actually going to build a ridiculous contraption that should be totally impossible for two kids who are still learning how to tie their shoes, and win first place in this contest thingy cuz the guys in charge are just as big of nerds as they are!  When Mom sees it, she’ll have to believe me!”

The other girl coughed awkwardly, before saying,  “You know, you could just accept that you’re never going to bust them and just…let it go.”

There was a long pause.  Then the redhead scoffed.

“Yeah, I was with you until you started saying words like ‘accept’ and ‘never’.”  She turned back to glaring at the boys.  “I’ve got my eyes on you little trolls!  When this contest is over, you are going down !”

“Okay!” the smaller of the two said cheerfully, before going back to looking over a set of blueprints he was holding that looked just as elaborate as anything Dr. D built on a regular basis.

The girl in blue heaved a sigh that sounded like it came from the very depths of her soul.  “I gave it my best shot.”

Stan’s attention was pulled away from this weird whatever-it-was by a rumbling overhead that he’d learned to recognize as a muffled explosion, and a frantic yell of “LOOK OUT BELOWWW!!!!”

He barely took the time to look up and see what looked like a shower of burning paper falling from the ceiling before lunging and shoving Vanessa and Dr. D out of the line of-well, out of the line of fire.

Stan felt a few sharp bursts of heat sting his back and shoulders, but he could wait to worry about them till everyone was safe.  He barely paid attention to the sound of a crash and a voice muttering an awkward, “Oh man, sorry dudes!  Just testing out Mr. M’s new fast-paced paperwork dispenser, and I think it overheated!  Hold on, lemme just-”  There was another small explosion, and a sound of frantic coughing.  “...Maybe we shouldn’t’ve gone with the nitro boosters on this thing after all.”

“You guys okay?”

He’d managed to herd them to the shelter of Retro Pharmacist Limited, where he checked them over; even though Dr. D tended to get set on fire often enough he might actually be building up a resistance to it, Vanessa was a little more fragile, and besides she hated when her clothes got messed up-

Stan let out a sigh of relief when he saw that both of them looked fine.  Even if they were staring at him in a really weird way.

“...What?”

Vanessa cleared her throat.  “You’re on fire, Stanley.”

Huh.  It wasn’t every day she gave him a blatant compliment like that; Stan couldn’t help grinning and slicking back his hair.  “Eh, it was nuthin.  Just all in a day’s work for me, keeping you knuckleheads alive-”

“No, Stanley, you are literally on fire!”

Before he knew it, she and Dr. D were both frantically smacking at his back and shoulders, right where the stinging spots were.

Oh.

“You know, Stanley, I have my umbrella-inator on me, I was gonna use it before you turned into a linebacker on us!” Dr. D scolded.

“Dad, umbrellas aren’t fireproof,” Vanessa reminded him.

“Yeah, well, maybe the umbrella- inator ’s fireproof, ever think of that?”

“Is it, though, Dad?  Is it?”

A long pause, then Dr. D cleared his throat and cupped Stan’s face in his hands (which always made Stan feel weird, cuz it was the kind of thing he usually did with Vanessa, and even though they kind of had the same last name now it wasn’t like he was his dad , cuz that would be weird , right?).

“Are you okay, Stanley?  Are you hurt anywhere else?  Do we need to steal medical supplies from this pharmacy?”

“No, doc, I’m fine.”  Stan shooed him off, and checked over his shoulder to see that people were getting back in line as if nothing had happened, even though most of them looked a little singed by now.

The people in this town are crazy.

Sixer would love it here.

“Let’s go see what kinda maniac puts nitro boosters on a paper dispenser.”  Then, rethinking that sentence, he added quickly, “Besides you.  No offense.”

“None taken.”

Chapter Text

When they finally made it into the main room where this invention thingy was apparently gonna take place, there was a chubby butterball about Vanessa’s age, wearing a stained, partially burned lab coat over a green T-shirt decorated with dinosaurs and a pair of cargo shorts, standing at the door and handing out packets of slightly singed paper to everyone who came in.

“Sorry about that, dudes!  Just a couple of technical difficulties, you know how it is with science!”  He laughed, in a kind of awkward-sounding giggle that cracked at the edges.  “Always gotta learn what not to do!”

Stan cringed; someone seriously needed to teach this kid a lesson in crowd control.

But, to his credit, the people of Danville seemed surprisingly blasé about nearly getting set on fire, just taking the packets and happily going to nearby tables to start filling them out.

Maybe Dr. D’s desensitized them to stuff like this.

Heh; probably shouldn’t tell him that, he’ll spend hours getting all bent outta shape about whether or not that counts as being a ‘good’ thing.

“Oh, dude, are you okay?”  The kid’s eyes widened when he saw Stan.  “You look a little…burned.”

“Eh, it’s fine, gumdrop, I’ve had worse.”  Stan waved it off as he took a signup packet.

“ Really ?”  If possible, his eyes got even wider.

“Oh yeah, compared to the time I had to save Dr. D from the angry herd of buffalo this was a cakewalk.”

He was pretty sure he still had hoof-shaped bruises on his ribs.

The gumdrop giggled.  “Oh man, it’s been a while since I’ve been to one of those.  Last time I kinda accidentally put my foot in one of the cakes cuz I was tryna do a fancy spin in time with the song and my foot slipped, and I got kicked out pretty quick after that.  At least I got to take the rest of it home, and it still tasted okay-except the part that was still on my shoe, Abuelita wouldn’t let me eat that.”

“Heh; sounds like a good deal.”

“Oh yeah, it was great.”

Before the weird conversation could go any further, someone behind Stan cleared his throat loudly.  “Excuse me, can you move along?  Some of us want to get in while we’re still young!”

Stan took the packet from the gumdrop and stomped forward.  “Yeah, whatever, pencil neck.”

Heh heh; one of the benefits of being ‘evil’ was being able to say things like that whenever he wanted and not get scolded for it by his-by his boss.

“Ugh, this is taking forever !”

“I know, I know, but filling out paperwork is complicated!  Especially with all these waivers and insurance stuff I gotta go through!”

“You’re an evil scientist, why do you care about any of this crap?”

“Hey, hey, hey, watch your tone, young man!  Being evil does not mean I’m gonna be careless with my kids’ lives!”

Stan’s rebuttal withered in his throat, even as he thought about pointing out that Dr. D’s definition of child safety was sometimes a little different from the rest of the world’s; instead he just groaned and leaned back in his seat until his head bonked against the table behind him.

Dr. D, unmoved, continued reading through the paperwork and meticulously filling it out, in handwriting way neater than his usual scrawl.

Stan and Vanessa decided to entertain themselves while they waited by watching the people around them and guessing secrets about their lives.

“Grave digger.”

“Grave robber .”

“Mafia boss.”

“Hitman from a rival gang.”

“Has a secret collection of ventriloquist dummies in his closet.”

“Wears pink bunny pajamas.”

“Collects garden gnomes.”

Dr. D looked up from the paperwork.  “Ooh, I’ve been meaning to do that!  Maybe if I collect all of the ones IN THE ENTIRE TRI-STATE AREA I can one day find the one that got repossessed back in Gimmelshtump, so as a consequence my father made me stand outside for hours every day in a gnome outfit to protect the garden from evil spirits!  I still have a Pavlovian response anytime I hear the words ‘ Bewegen Sie nicht !’”

What the…?

…And I thought it was rough that time Pa tried to sell me.

Stan wondered if he should try to say something, but by then Dr. D had turned back to filling out the medical history section, and the moment was lost.

He was working on the final section when a voice over their shoulders suddenly twanged, “You almost done, feller?”

“Yeah, just gimme a second to finish signing the part promising to replace accidentally amputated limbs-”

Dr. D froze, except for his hand, which jerked and accidentally drew a long zigzag across the page.  He didn’t notice, busy as he was slowly turning and looking up with wide eyes at the face (kinda literally) of McGucket Labs.

Mr. McGucket smiled at them, a little awkwardly.

“Sorry, didn’t mean ta frighten ya none.”  He glanced down at the table, and his eyebrows rose.  “Wow, you’re probably the first person here who’s had ta use all the spare space for describing both additional injuries and engineering expertise.”

Dr. D just stared at him for a moment…until an incoherent high-pitched sound escaped his mouth-and just as quickly he whirled around and buried his head in his hands with a groan.

Mr. McGucket blinked, and adjusted his glasses.  “Um…is he okay?”

“Yeah, sorry,” Stan cut in, “He’s just been really excited ta meet you, and I think he short-circuited.”

“Ah hush, I ain’t nuthin spec-”

It was kind of hilarious: the moment Mr. McGucket turned to look at Stan, his jaw actually dropped like in a cartoon, and he made a sound that, while not a squeal like the doc, was still definitely not the kinda thing you expected to hear from a guy in his forties.

Out of the corner of his eye Stan gave Vanessa a questioning look.

Her confused shrug failed to clarify whether he had become horribly disfigured by acid or something without his knowledge.

“...What’s your name, son?” Mr. McGucket finally asked.

“Um, Stan.  Stan-” he barely caught himself in time, still getting used to the name change- “Doofenshmirtz.”

The little frown was still between Mr. McGucket’s eyebrows, and he absently tugged at his beard.

“Well, kettle my corn,” he murmured, “Whoda thunk there’d be two of ‘em?”

“Two of what ?” Stan demanded.  “If ya wanna take a picture or something, it’ll last a bit longer.”

The inventor shook himself.  “S-sorry about that, it’s just-you look an awful lot like an old friend I had back in college.”  His eyes darted down, then up again.  “Almost the spittin’ image of him, actually.”

A cold feeling of… something dropped into Stan’s gut, even though it couldn’t mean what it sounded like.  There was no way even his luck could suck that badly.

“You got any relatives by the name of-”

“Dad!” a voice called.

Mr. McGucket turned to the stage, where the butterball was now standing, next to a lanky man who looked a lot like McGucket, at least as far as Stan could tell when he was wearing a cap pulled down over his face.

He beckoned impatiently.  “We got the presentation all set up, and everyone’s waiting!”

“Oh-uh-coming, Tater Tot!”  He turned back to them and grabbed the paperwork off the table.  “I’ll just-take this for ya, ‘kay?”  His eyes darted over Stan in one last, searching look, and then he hurried off, the tails of his lab coat flapping behind him.

Dr. D finally lifted his head, looking starry-eyed.  “He talked to me!  And he complimented me!”

“Yeah, if you call pointing out that you’ve gotten yourself hurt a lot a compliment ,” Vanessa said dryly.

“Just let me have this, pumpkin.”

Neither of them appeared to notice how hard Stan’s fingers were digging into the tabletop as he tried to get his breathing back under control.

Trying to figure out why he was feeling a weird mixture of terror…and something almost like joy.

Chapter Text

The gumdrop and Mr. McGucket’s beanpole son had set up a big metal robot shaped like a pterodactyl, with a wide open mouth and its wings spread behind it.  After Mr. McGucket scrambled up onto the stage, he put the packet of papers he’d taken from them into its mouth; there was a whirring sound, and the wings flapped a few times as the packet disappeared in a flash of blue-green light.

The beanpole then handed Mr. McGucket a microphone, and he tapped it a couple of times before bringing it up to his mouth.

“Can y’all in the back hear me?”

A small chorus of “yes.”

“Good, good.”  He adjusted his glasses.  “Well, howdy, it’s mighty nice to see that so many of ya showed up today.  I ain’t exactly one for speeches, so just lemme start this up.”

He pressed a button on the bot’s wing, and the whole thing started beeping and whirring and glowing like an arcade machine.

Stan took a tiny step back, juuuust in case the thing was about to explode.

But all it did, after a minute, was spit out three colored wristbands: red, blue and green.

“Okay, folks, here’s the deal: I know some of you are at different stages of knowledge in how ta handle complex machinery and stuff, and not everyone picks things up at the same rate, so I used this machine thingummy ta read the paperwork for me and then sort y’all into groups!”  Mr. McGucket picked up a wristband in each color and held them up.  “Blue’s for folks with a beginner-type understanding of machinery and engineering and stuff, green’s for folks who are basically experts, and red’s for those lucky folks somewhere in the middle!  So if y’all wanna form an orderly line, you can get your wristbands and then we can get started with some engineering!”

He pressed another button, and the robot’s eyes lit up, before it announced in a metallic voice, “PLEASE HOLD OUT YOUR HAND FOR SCANNING.  I PROMISE NOT TO BITE YOU.”

“That sounds perfectly reassuring!” chirped a boy with a red flat top and big pink glasses, before walking up to the stage and holding his hand under the light of the robot’s eyes.

Stan braced himself-but all that happened was that it spat out a blue wristband.

He wasn’t sure if he was more relieved or disappointed, but decided to just keep the crescent wrench from his toolkit in his free hand, just in case.

Thirty-one years in the future and they still haven’t figured out how to stop making people wait in line all the time.

Heck, it feels like lines take twice as long now.

Stan groaned, but began muscling his way back into line as close to the front as he could get, wondering what group he’d end up in (and hoping he wouldn’t get his hand bitten off before he could find out).

He’d learned a lot from Dr. D over the last few months about robotics and engineering and stuff (and as weird as he was, his explanations still made a lot more sense than what his teachers back at Glass Shard got so frustrated tryna drill into his head), but he was pretty sure he’d most likely end up in the-

“Red?”

Stan stared at the cherry-colored wristband with “STAN D” printed on it in disbelief.

“Ooh, way to go, Stanley!” Dr. D cheered behind him.  “I knew you had an aptitude for evil scientist…ness!”

“Since when?” Stan asked over his shoulder.

“Well, I had my suspicions when you first told me your tragic backstory, but when you throw in the talent for building stuff and the willingness to resort to petty vengeance?”  Dr. D waved his hands.  “Your only other options are probably, I dunno, construction worker who wakes up the whole neighborhood at six in the morning drilling holes in the sidewalk and fills the air with sawdust the whole day, or…one of those guys who builds the sets in Hollywood or something?”

…Still better than barnacle scraping, I guess.

But Stan couldn’t help feeling a weird warm feeling in his chest-like he’d been forced to say ‘please’ to someone, except not as painful-as he slipped it on and headed over to where all the other red-wristbanded people were.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Mr. McGucket giving him another weird, thoughtful look, but the old man quickly got distracted by the two kids with the wackjob sister being the first people under eighteen to get sorted into the “expert” group, and Stan was able to slip into the crowd of his own group.

Vanessa’s wristband turned out to be blue; she looked a little annoyed at how it clashed with her black outfit, but put it on with a resigned sigh and wandered over to where the rest of the beginners were, wearing her best “I don’t care either way” look.

Stan waved to catch her eye, then pointed to his own wristband, grinning.

For a moment she looked like she wanted to make a gesture at him that would probably get her grounded for a week-but before she could, both of them were startled by the robot making a weird noise, like it was about to throw up or something (and no, Stan had learned by now that when it came to robots in the Tri-State Area, that was not actually impossible), before it started flapping its wings wildly and chanting in an increasingly discordant tone, “TOO DIFFICULT TO CLASSIFY-INCONSISTENT VARIABLES-REBOOT-REBOOT-REBOOT-”

…That’s gotta be Dr. D.

People screamed and began scattering to the far corners of the room.

Mr. McGucket’s son dove to the floor, tackling the gumdrop and sheltering him with his body just in time for both of them to avoid getting smacked by the flailing wings.

Stan squinted in that direction-and sure enough, he could see a familiar gangly form scrambling away from the stage, waving his hands and squawking frantically, “I didn’t do anything this time!  I’m being framed-!”

“Whoa, easy, feller, no one’s accusing you of nuthin!”  Mr. McGucket rushed across the stage, dodging the bot’s gyrations with more agility than you’d expect in someone who looked that much like a broomstick with glasses, and aimed a swift karate chop at a spot on the back of the robot’s head; the light in its eyes faded out at once, and a cloud of thick smoke billowed out of its mouth as it went still.  Seconds later it was followed by a droopy, half-melted wristband that was red turning into blue turning into green, like one of those hippie tie-dye things.

“...Huh.”  Mr. McGucket picked up the wristband and turned it back and forth, frowning thoughtfully.  Then he pulled out one of those weird flat computers you could type on without a keyboard, and plugged it into the side of the robot, appearing to forget all about the chaos going on around him.

The beanpole got up with a sigh, helping the gumdrop to his feet at the same time, and pulled out a megaphone.

“OKAY, EVERYONE, PLEASE REMAIN CALM,” he announced, “WE ARE EXPERIENCING SOME SLIGHT TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES, BUT WE HAVE THE SITUATION BACK UNDER CONTROL.”  He glanced over his shoulder.  “Right, Dad?”

“Yeah, uh-huh,” Mr. McGucket murmured, tapping at the screen.

His son heaved a sigh that reminded Stan weirdly of Vanessa, and went back to regaining crowd control (which was made a little easier when his-assistant?  Little brother?  Whatever the gumdrop was-got out some complimentary baskets of pistachios for everyone).

After a minute of tapping, Mr. McGucket finally looked up at where Dr. D was still standing and looking half-paralyzed, bushy eyebrows drawing together in a frown.  “Ya sure ya answered all the questions properly?”

“Yeah.”  Dr. D flapped his hands together in front of his chest, wearing an uncertain grin.

“Huh.  Then I reckon your mind really is too complex for you ta fit into any of the pre-established categories.”

Dr. D’s shoulders slumped.  “...Is that bad?”

If he says yes, I don’t care how much Dr. D admires him, I’m punching him out.

“Psh, naw, just means I gotta reconfigure the data fer a better understanding of outliers!”  Mr. McGucket held out the wristband for him to take.  “And I guess it means that I’ll haveta give ya personal instruction during Invent-A-Palooza!”

A couple of seconds later everyone in the room cringed at the feedback from the microphone in reaction to another high-pitched screeching noise.

Mr. McGucket rubbed his ear, grimacing.  “...Is this gonna happen every time ya get excited?”

“...No,” Dr. D said from behind his mouth.

Chapter Text

Once the robot got rebooted and everyone finally finished getting their wristbands, Mr. McGucket and his assistants-who were introduced as Tate and Soos-each took charge of a group, leading them to their own corner of the mall.  Stan faintly thought he heard the redheaded tattletale, who was in the beginner’s group with Vanessa, let out a wail of anguish when she realized she wouldn’t be able to spy on her brothers during this part.

Serves you right, kid-nobody likes a stool pigeon.

Tate, who was in charge of the intermediate folks, was a lot more practical-and a lot less chatty-than his dad.  Once they were all gathered he wasted no time in going over the basics of engineering, and some safety procedures.

“Goggles and gloves are your friends anytime you’re working with fire, metal, or chemicals.  They make these things less likely to end in a trip to the emergency room,” he deadpanned as he handed out the materials.  This was news to Stan, considering Dr. D seemed to think a lab coat was all the safety equipment he needed (and since he was constantly getting set on fire and blown up and still lived to build another -inator another day, he kind of had a point), but he took them without protest.

Once everyone had a set of goggles and gloves each, Tate opened the binder he was carrying under his arm, revealing that it was stuffed to the gills with blueprints.

“Our first project for today is for you to try and build one of my dad’s old inventions.”  He spread them out across the table in front of him, and Stan’s jaw dropped when he saw the designs for an elaborate hall of booby traps, a self-tuning banjo, a mechanical hog that would try to buck you off while you rode it, and dozens of other projects that spoke of a slightly insane southern-fried genius.

“You can try and make an exact copy, or you can go off the original and make your own idea,” Tate said, waving a bony hand.  “The most important part is that you have fun.”

“Are there any robot blueprints?” someone yelled from the back.

Maybe it was his imagination, but Stan thought he saw a muscle in Tate’s jaw clench, and his hand tightening a little around some of the papers still in the binder.  “…Nope.”

“But in the commercial Mr. McGucket said-”

“Lemme rephrase: the most important part is that you have the kind of fun that doesn’t result in another lawsuit and/or major property damage.”  He gestured to the blueprints on the table and his voice took on a tone indicating that questions were done.  “Have at it, people.  Toolkits and supplies are on the stage if you need them.”

Stan had to think for a hot minute about what kind of project he wanted to do.

Because on the one hand, he knew a lot more about machinery than he used to thanks to helping out with the -inators, so maybe he could experiment a little if he wanted.  On the other hand, if he messed up too badly…the contest rules hadn’t said anything about people getting disqualified or kicked out, but he really wanted to win that prize money and show that he could keep being a valuable contributor to the household, and that wasn’t gonna happen if he made something that just exploded or blew a fuse the minute someone jarred the table it was on.  But if he wanted that hundred grand, that meant he needed to stand out from the competition, didn’t it?  The ad had said “original” and “fascinating,” after all.

From the other end of the room he faintly picked up a voice saying, “Well, Ferb and I have been talking about building a roller coaster, but we might wait a few years so we and all the neighborhood kids are tall enough to ride it safely.  For now I guess we could settle for something more child-friendly, like a submarine.”

Ugh, how’s anyone from our group or the beginners supposed to compete with the ‘experts’?  This whole thing feels rigged.

…But if there was one thing Stan was used to by now, it was trying anyway even when the odds were stacked against him.  So after a moment of looking through what blueprints were left he grabbed a set, along with a pencil, and decided to make his own middle ground.

Rebecca did not think this was going to work.

She didn’t necessarily disbelieve in the existence of ghosts, but the whole concept of séances had always felt kind of hinky to her-and not just because she’d read about people like the Fox sisters.

But if it would help bring her family any kind of closure, she was willing to do it with them.

They’d waited until after sunset on Friday night, before Ford solemnly placed a ouija board in the middle of the kitchen table (Didn’t you technically need to put your hands on the plastic thing for that to work?  But Rebecca shrugged and decided her little brother-in-law must just be trying to attract as much spiritual energy as possible, or some other pseudo-scientific explanation).

“This should be much easier than the last time I tried to hold a séance,” he mused to himself.

“Last time?” Shermie asked.

“It’s difficult to form a proper circle when you have to hold hands with yourself.  Not impossible, but decidedly difficult.”

“...You need to get out and interact with people more often, bro.”

Ford rolled his eyes as he began strategically burning incense in every corner of the room.

By evening, Stan finally had made some headway on his first prototype.

The original blueprint was for a thing that was kind of like a phone, except instead of your voice it would transmit a life-size, blue, glowing image of you (Stan wondered if the old boy had gotten the idea from Star Wars-or, heck, the other way around).  He didn’t know why Mr. McGucket had felt the need to make it, but it was cool enough-and he’d decided to see if he could fix it so it’d transmit his voice along with his face.

“Okay, take twenty-three,” Stan muttered to himself, standing in front of the projector part with the control in his hand.  He pressed the button, and said aloud, “Shababoo!”

Nothing happened.

Stan adjusted the signal on the device and tried again.  “Shababoo!”

A brief blue flicker appeared at the other end of the device that looked faintly like his form, but it didn’t last.

Stan gritted his teeth and went over the blueprint again.  What the heck was the-oh.  Maybe the problem was with the antenna?

On the other side of town, the Pines family were just joining hands around the table, with three candles and a bag of toffee peanuts placed in the middle of the ouija board in an attempt to draw Stanley’s spirit.

The light from the candles cast eerie shadows on everyone’s faces and the walls, especially when reflected in Ford’s and Shermie’s glasses, and even though Rebecca was as skeptical as ever, she couldn’t help a small chill running down her spine.  She tried not to think about how scandalized her mother would be at her doing something so “blasphemous,” as she gave Shermie’s hand a gentle squeeze and tried to smile reassuringly at him.

And then Ford cleared his throat, and murmured, “Stanley?  Are you here?”

Stan had managed to bring the projection into better focus, finally, but he was still having trouble with the sound.

“Shababoo!  Shababoo!  C’mon, you stupid-shababoo!  SHABABOOOO!!!!”

He gave the graphophone-type thing he’d installed on the side a hard smack as he yelled, noticing too late that he was making the whole thing overbalance.

As Stan frantically caught it to stop it from falling, the light of the projection was tilted at an angle so that it happened to bounce off a large sheet of corrugated iron…and then off a mirror that one of the “expert” kids was setting up on top of a makeup table that would apply the makeup for you…before bouncing its way through a bunch of crystals being used to make a collective giant prism…and out one of the windows.

Ford waited a minute, before trying again, voice sounding strained.

“Stanley…I know you’re…angry with me.  That’s why I need you to please talk to us now, so we can-”

The words had barely left his lips when the center of the table was flooded with an unearthly blue light.

Someone jostled the table, knocking over the candles.

Rebecca gasped and lurched back in her chair, but Shermie and Ford’s hands were each clamped tightly around hers, holding her in place long enough to watch the light take shape.

Into the shape of Stanley, wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, covered in ash and soot and his face twisted in an expression of rage, one of his fists raised as he yelled in a voice that seemed to be coming from a mile away, “BOOOO!!!!”

And then, as quickly as he’d appeared, he vanished.

The room was plunged into darkness, save for a small flickering from where a corner of the ouija board had caught fire.

The only sound was that of everyone’s harsh, frightened breathing.

At last Rebecca whispered, “...Okay, so maybe séances aren’t just a bunch of hokum.”