Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The moon glimmered over the Oregon forest like an unblinking eye. Stan’s 1965 El Diablo convertible charged along the road, cutting through the snow and the silence like a prayer.

“We’re low on gas again,” Ford stated.

“I know,” Stan replied, eyes fixed on the high beams illuminating the asphalt.

Ford swallowed, feeling small. He turned to the window and observed the trees extending towards the sky, like countless fingers on a monstrous hand stretching out to grab them both. His headache thumped, and he closed his eyes.

Stan darted a glance at him and sighed. “I’ll get the Stanmobile filled up at the next stop. I got some money. Just…” He paused, and sniffed. “Well, you said remote. Doesn’t get more remote than this,” he grinned, sinking back into the once familiar routine of soothing his brother’s anxiety.

Ford rewarded him with a fleeting smile. Under the harsh headlights, his brother looked older – so much older – eye bags sagging over his five o’clock shadow, hair an unkempt riot of dirt-brown curls.

The snowfall intensified, and Stan clicked his tongue. He fumbled with the radio dials, skipping over muffled synth tunes, sketchy mail order ads and static until he landed on the evening weather report. A woman with unnatural enunciation said it should clear by morning and roads were not expected to close.

“I think we better stop for a bit.” Stan craned his neck as he searched for any signs of a side road. Ford nodded and began to worry the edges of his sweater sleeves.

Eventually, they found the perfect place – a loop where a dirt path forked off their lane, shielded from view by a smattering of mountain hemlocks. Stan pulled over and turned the high beams off, swapping them for the overhead light.

Ford looked inside the glove box for a soda, or cold water, or gum, but found nothing. He settled back into the seat and pinched his thigh through his clothing until he winced.

“You should sleep,” Stan grunted after a pause.

Ford’s eyebrows rose. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” he said. “You get some rest now, it’s been a long drive.”

“Thank you, Stan.” Ford smiled as he rifled through one of the piles of clutter on the rubber mat and handed Stan a length of rope.

They began their ritual with practiced ease. Stan took the rope and helped Ford recline the passenger’s seat before tying his wrists together. Ford pulled his knees up to his chest, and lowered them when Stan had finished tying them together too. He strapped Ford down with the seat belt and secured his legs by hooking a tough rubber band from a Stan-Vac’s gasket into the loop. With a reassuring smile, Stan took his brother’s glasses for safekeeping and turned the light off.

“Thank you,” Ford repeated as Stan reached into his pocket for a spare cigarette and clambered back into the driver’s seat.

“It’s all right,” he mumbled as he lit up. He rolled down the window and turned toward it to let out the smoke. The car smelled rancid enough as it was.

After a while, Ford hummed, already half asleep. Stan frowned painfully as he looked out the window at the unspoiled snow, thinking about how tired his brother looked now, how the anxious frown that had nested between his thick eyebrows as a teenager seemed to have only deepened in the decade and a half they’d been apart. Part of him knew Ford had always had it tougher, with his deformity and his lack of social skills. Part of him knew Ford had always had it easier, with a roof over his head and a couple of warm meals a day, with his intellect and all his promise.

He took a drag, seemingly oblivious to the yellow eyes glowing behind him.

He found it hard to stay mad at Ford. He’d just been a child like himself when they were torn apart. He couldn’t have stopped it. Hell, Stan would have found a way to ruin his own life, sooner or later. Now, his brother needed help, and that was enough to reawaken his protective streak.

The inhuman snarl behind him failed to make Stan speed up his drag of the cigarette. “Hello, Bill,” he finally mumbled when he was done, not even turning to look at the demon now possessing his brother’s body in his sleep.

“You two keep driving like you’re gonna find a Quantum Destabilizer behind a pine tree,” Bill cackled. “Surprise, genius! It’s just more trees!” He cracked Ford’s vertebrae painfully as he craned his vessel’s neck to look out the window. “Still in Oregon, slick?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Stan grinned, scratching his stubble.

“Oh, oh! I’d recognize the Wallowa mountains anywhere… Wa-llo-wa...” Bill whispered, twisting each syllable into its widest shape. “They built altars to me here, y’know. Thousands of years ago…”

Stan rolled his eyes and kept smoking.

“But you don’t care about altars, do you, Stanley Pines? You care about nothing but the stack of cash in your glove box.” Bill licked his lips. Ford’s eye began to bleed. “Hey, who’s got two thumbs and his mug on the dollar bill?” he boasted. “Did you know I can see out of every drawing you humans have ever made of me? Let me tell you…” he dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, “your pocket is a lonely place to be.”

Stan huffed the last of the cigarette.

“I could change that, you know? Make you rich. Get you out of this mess. All you gotta do is shake my hand,” Bill teased him in a sing-song voice. “You think you’re better than that, right, Stan? You, the extra Stan, three dollars or better off–”

Bill hissed when Stan put out his cigarette on Ford’s arm as casually as his father had.

“Oh! Oh, Stanley Pines! Willing to hurt your own brother?” the demon twitched inside Ford so hard the car bounced. Stan ground his teeth. “Hey, I don’t blame ya! Maybe the feeling is mutual, too. After all, what has Sixer ever done for you?”

Stan knew better than to drop his poker face. Instead, he reached for the portable cassette player on the floor, some shiny newfangled device called a Walkman, and untangled the headphone cord. He hadn’t expected it to be this useful when he had pick pocketed it a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, he only had one tape for it, but even BABBA’s Eurodisco fluff was better than listening to Bill’s shrill voice tearing out of his brother’s throat. He slung the foam pads over his cauliflower ears and cranked up the volume.

Chapter Text

Stan was listening to Disco Girl when the Walkman’s batteries started to run out, warping the tape’s sound into undead moans. He kept it playing out of stubbornness, but when it finally dragged to a stop, he heard his brother’s voice calling his name and not Bill’s taunts.

“Oh, shit,” Stan cursed under his breath, and hurried to unclip Ford’s seat belt.

“No! What did I tell you? The checks!” Ford screamed, shaking. “You need to do the checks first!”

Stan groaned as he threw his head back. He reached for the flashlight and shone it uncomfortably close into his brother’s face. His eyes now human, the pupils contracted into the olive green irises. “Check one, passed,” Stan grunted when his brother looked at him expectantly. “Say the thing,” he added.

“My name is Stanford Filbrick Pines, and I am awake,” Ford recited. His voice was shaky as he half-expected Bill’s high-pitched sarcasm to burst through, no longer sure where he ended and the demon began.

“Passed. Fingers,” Stan said, and Ford touched each of his five fingers against his thumb in sequence. The movement looked fluid and natural, nothing like Bill’s amateur flesh-puppeteering.

“’K, passed,” Stan said and leaned in, taking his hand to Ford’s forehead. He traced a series of complex invisible symbols as Ford waited with eyes closed and breath shallow. “Last check, passed,” Stan confirmed when there was no adverse reaction.

“There. Happy?” Stan leaned away and slammed the flashlight on the dashboard.

Ford scowled. “I need you to take this seriously. You don’t know the things he can do, if he can…”

“I know he wouldn’t ask for the checks in the first place,” Stan defended himself as he continued undoing the knots in their restrain setup. “He’s not as smooth as you think.”

“And you weren’t listening,” Ford added to the accusation. “I know he says horrible things, but you have to listen. If he’s planning something, he might drop a hint, maybe we can predict what he’s–”

“He’s not gonna tell us the truth!” Stan snapped. It was infuriating how Ford could be that intelligent and yet that naive. “You can’t let him get to you like that.”

“Wait, what’s this?” Ford asked when he rubbed the rope marks on his wrists and discovered the cigarette burn.

“He got sassy,” Stan frowned and avoided his gaze.

“Now who’s letting him get to whom?” Ford scowled in disbelief. He ran his many fingers over reddened eyes, wiping traces of dried blood from his eyelid.

“Stop at the next gas station,” said Stan, handing Ford an awkwardly folded map and stepping out of the car. Ford scampered over to the driver’s seat as Stan walked around and sat once more beside him. The back seat had become too cluttered to use a long time ago, buried under dirty clothes and StanCo boxes. “Wake me up when we get there.”

Stan had taken to life on the road like a prey animal running from familiar pain. It astounded Ford how numb he was to living like this. Just a few days without his warm blankets and morning toast in the shack and he couldn’t get rid of the coldness that had settled inside his bones. But Stan snored soundly as the El Diablo dashed past looming mountains and dark trees, the sound of gravel against the rolling wheels like the comforting static of midnight TV back home.

Ford stole a glance at his brother. He hoped he’d made the right decision. He’d considered asking Stan to take his journals away instead, so nobody could figure out how to reactivate the portal. But the basement was secured with the ocular recognition device, so the biggest danger was that Bill was too close to it for comfort, roosting inside his brain and waiting for sleep to take over so he could break down the door. Bill had been doing this for thousands of years, tugging at the skirts of humanity, at the brains of those who felt like outsiders, begging to be let in. Ford wasn’t even sure he could be banished completely, but they had to at least get him out of his head, so he could go back to Gravity Falls safely and disassemble the portal for good.

He didn’t know what life would look like after that. He’d promised Stan he could stay in the shack with him because he felt terribly guilty that his brother was living out of his shabby old car. He’d even mentioned they could sail away on the ocean adventure they’d dreamed of as children if they could find a way to afford it. He wanted to stick to his promises, but everything felt uncertain now that the rug of his higher calling had been pulled from under his feet.

He’d convinced himself he was pursuing scientific knowledge, but the truth was he liked the power that Bill had dangled in front of him. The way it made him feel that a divine entity would rather spend time with him, listening to his theories, than doing anything else in the entire universe. Having secrets whispered in his ear. Feeling special. Chosen.

What a fool he had been.

After about an hour of driving and spiraling deeper into his thoughts, watching the gas dial crawl agonizingly downward and the sky turn cider orange, he spotted the light of a distant sign ahead. He followed it until he pulled up to the gas station parking lot, turned off the engine and nudged Stan awake.

Even now, Stan still startled when he woke up to find Ford next to him, but his disbelieving expression softened into a warm smile every time. He stepped out to stretch his legs and hear his spine crack in all the right places. Sometimes he wondered if Ford was using him, but what the hell. It was nice to be needed again.

“Fill us up. I’m gonna grab us some stuff,” Stan mumbled, throwing two $20s onto Ford’s lap as the gas station attendant approached the car.

Stan ran to the public toilets first, the walls soiled with scribbles and half-torn posters. He closed the main door before heading over to the sink and undressing, but it did nothing to soften the biting cold of the snowy day. He washed his pits and hairy chest with what little soap he could squeeze out of the dispenser, and by the time he got to shaving, he had to do it with water only.

Clean shaven, dressed again and with his mullet smelling vaguely like a wet dog, he entered the mart next to the gas station. The buzz of neon tubes always reminded him of home, of the way Ma’s fortune-telling sign hummed right outside the window of their shared childhood bedroom back in New Jersey.

Stan stalked the aisles. Food was easy enough to find if you weren’t picky, often given away for free in soup kitchens or found dumpster diving, but he could tell Ford wasn’t used to that. He grabbed a Homework candy bar as a substitute for an apology, and took a bag of toffee peanuts for himself.

Other daily items like batteries, soap or Tylenol were a bit harder to find, but easy enough to shoplift. He’d always been a bit of a brute, but his fingers had become deft at removing the packages speared on the shop hooks and sliding them into the pockets of his sheepskin jacket. He swiped one of each and made it look like he was browsing.

When it came to cigarettes, alcohol and gasoline, it was easiest to just pay for them. Stan walked up to the counter, asked for a packet of Marlboro and handed over the snacks, then changed his mind and asked for two coffees to go, too. The cashier was a pretty young thing, so young, and Stan cajoled her, cracked jokes to make her laugh and flashed genuine-looking smiles until she forgot he’d paid with a $10 bill and not a $20 like he claimed.

He walked back to the car to find Ford scribbling on his journal again. He slammed it shut when he noticed Stan looming just outside the door.

“Oh, coffee!” Ford smiled, holding the warm paper cup like a small treasure. “Thank you.”

Stan passed him the candy bar and adjusted his own cup into the holder, sticky with years of soda spills. He took the driver’s seat once more and in seconds they were back on the ever-stretching highway.

“He talked about the forest,” Stan said after a while.
“Did he?”
“Said they’d built altars to him here or something, a long time ago,” he mumbled. “And that he can see out of any drawing you make of him.”
“I knew that,” Ford said, retreating back into himself. “Nowhere is safe. He is always watching…”

Stan’s gaze lingered on Ford as he continued muttering. He thought about bringing up that he’d talked about Pa, too, but he wasn’t sure it mattered. He had never hit Ford all that much, since Ford didn’t give him many reasons to. Stan drove to the next town, watching as the dawn dyed the sky a rusty red.

Chapter Text

The town was a shell of its past self, dotted with boarded up stores. Ever since all the promising young people moved out, anyone who remained was either old or hopeless. Anyone driving in must be both and also hiding from something, Stan thought.

“Stop by the municipal park,” Ford requested once they were done getting more gas, studying the map over his glasses, “there’s a library nearby.”

They each had a different role to play. Ford’s job was of the mind: to exorcise Bill from his brain. To find out how, he haunted libraries, university campuses, small museums, bookstores and curio shops in search of threads in the tapestry of the paranormal that he could pull to unravel Bill’s grip. So far, he hadn’t been successful, and it gnawed at him, made him feel like an even bigger waste of talent than he already was.

Stan’s job was of the body: to keep them both alive and in one piece. He got them both food and enough money to last until the next town. Wherever they rolled in, he’d check out dumpsters and then pawn shops, sling the few StanCo products he had left door to door or find some sucker to buy his fraudulent lottery tickets. Sometimes he’d look for construction or farm work, sketchy operations that paid cash, took fake IDs and didn’t ask too many questions.

Stan dropped Ford off at the library steps with a stale truck stop sandwich and told him he’d pick him up later. The way his brother looked after him made Ford feel a warmth inside he hadn’t felt since he opened his mind and his dreams to Bill, but it stung a little. It was humiliating to depend on Stan – Stan, of all people. He lingered around the heavy oak door, watching his brother get back in the car, wave at him to go inside, and drive off.

Stan cruised around town, and what he found wasn’t much. It was quiet, cold and empty like a bed in the morning. However, the weather-beaten sign of a boxing gym on one of the warehouses in the outskirts caught his attention.

The heavy smell of rubber mats and sweat washed over him like a memory. He hadn’t sparred in years, but he still had a fondness for the sport. The local matches he’d won as a teen were the closest he’d ever come to success and to his father’s approval. He looked out to see kit dangling haphazardly from concrete cubicles and half a dozen athletes punctuating the air with the melody of their fists against the punching bags. He turned to the pinboard beside him, and something caught his eye. Among the ads for carpooling groups and diet supplements was a handwritten sign saying they were looking for boxers for an amateur bout, and to inquire at reception. Stan was barely literate, but he could always read between the lines. This was an underground fight club, and an opportunity he wasn’t about to pass up.

The woody vanilla scent of the library provided a welcome sanctuary from the stench of gasoline and sweat that now permeated Ford’s life. He closed his eyes for a moment and relished it before heading for the cabinet that stored the library’s catalog cards. He thumbed through them, looking for books on supernatural possession and inter dimensional travel. As expected, the small town library didn’t have any, though Ford noted a two-volume series by a local folklorist about the cryptids of the Wallowa lakes. As he kept flipping through the entries, he found one that didn’t belong, the mulberry hues on its shiny card stock contrasting against the faded textured yellow of all others. It must have been misplaced, he thought.

He picked it up, and was greeted by a child pointing at him with a mix of enthusiastic charm and yearbook-picture awkwardness. He couldn’t have been more than ten, and wore a baby blue suit and a disconcerting pompadour. Ford’s crow feet crinkled in amusement until he noticed the cameo on his bolo tie. To a casual observer, it’d have looked like any pretty stone. But Ford wasn’t a casual observer, and that was the lost mystic amulet of Coahuila.

Ford had stumbled into mentions of it during his research. It seemed to have bounced between spiritualists and private collectors near the Mexican border for about a hundred years before disappearing from the record in the 1950s. They claimed it could make any subject obey the wearer’s wishes by redirecting the electric pulses of their brainwaves. If he got his hands on it, he might be able to use it to push Bill out, or at least give control of his body to Stan while he slept. He turned the postcard and read:

Lil’ Gideon

CHILD PSYCHIC

Telepathy Ranch

Lone Star Creek, Texas 61800

See him on tour! Unlock the secrets of the mind!

Ford pressed his lips together and tucked the postcard into his journal. Just a few minutes later, he sat on a rickety dented bench, with his notes and sandwich and some books about neurology, ready to learn.

The hours ticked by, and as Ford dove deeper into the rabbithole of electromagnetic energy and brain cell pathways, Stan was descending the stairs to the basement of an abandoned shopfront. He was greeted by jeers and a single harsh spotlight that left the corners in shadow. The ring was nothing but some elastic cords hooked to the walls to keep the watchers from interfering with the match. Most of the oxygen had been breathed out of the room, so crowded he had to push his way through. Once he stepped onto the makeshift ring, he pumped his hand in the air for the audience and grinned at his opponent, a beefy twenty-something with a broken nose. Stan smacked his gloved fists together. The announcer’s yells were drowned by the crowd. The referee raised his hand, signaled down, and the two men launched at one another.

His first punch missed, but he managed to land a second straight to the shoulder. The younger man was fast, and his right hook got Stan in the eye. Another punch, blocked, and he struck his rival on the nose and made him reel. Stan wondered if he could break his nose again, and wished Bill had a nose of his very own he could break next. A split second, and the opponent landed another punch in response.

It wasn’t the hit connecting to his cheek that froze his blood. It was who he saw as his head whipped around.

In the crowd, still against a sea of grabbing hands and screaming mouths, was Montes, one of Rico’s goons. The guy even smiled at him as he got decked.

Stan recovered from the punch, but not from the fear that now twitched in his stomach. He’d managed to evade Rico’s gang since he got out of prison. Surely he wasn’t the only member of the cartel in the audience tonight. Where were the others? What were their orders? Was this a setup? Had they been trailing him?

He acted quick. He threw a weak left hook that his opponent blocked, and dropped hard with the next blow, face flush and wet against the rough concrete.

When the referee tapped the floor the first time, he let out a sour groan. On the second, he bit his lip and, ever the showman, spat a mouthful of blood. The crowd ate it up. He was soon hoisted out the ring by warm sweaty arms. He feigned being dizzy when the gym manager slipped two bills into his hand, but dropped the act real fast when he spilled out into the cold street. He got in his car and slammed the door, mind wild with fear. He had to get Ford. Did he? Maybe it’d be safer if he didn’t...

It wouldn’t matter. They were identical. If the cartel stumbled into Ford, there was no denying they were brothers. To strangers, they might as well be the same person. He pulled the stick shift as he heaved shaky breaths.

He was meant to keep them both alive and in one piece, and he was going to fail. As soon as the waters of his life stilled into some semblance of normality, he had to hurl the largest rock he could find into the pond. All he did was lie and cheat, just like his Pa said. And the worst thing was, he got caught.

He hurried into the library, scanned the benches for Ford’s mop of disheveled curls and ran to him, drawing a few glares from the locals. Stan’s heart twisted as he saw his expression fade from recognition to horror when he spotted his black eye and bloody lip.

“Stanley, what happ-”

“We’re leaving. Now.”

Ford would have liked to file the neurology books back into the shelves and rifle through the catalog drawers one last time to slot the cards back. Instead, he only took what mattered: his research, the postcard, and his brother’s hand.

Chapter Text

The steering wheel could have been a lifesaver, the way Stan clutched it with bloodied knuckles. Ford observed his injuries like a forensics expert, trying to piece together what had happened from the scrapes.

“Stop looking at me like that, will you?” Stan grunted. “It was nothing. I went boxing, saw a guy I owe money to. That’s all.”

“You went boxing?” Ford scoffed. His brother was a great liar, but he didn’t lie to him. They were twins. It was not allowed, even after more than a decade fractured apart.

Stan huffed. What did Ford know about his life? How would he know if he’d kept on boxing or not?

“Yeah. Got paid for it, too,” he mumbled sourly. “You’re welcome,” he spat.

They stewed for the next few minutes, mouths closed and thoughts boiling, staring at the road as night fell with a sallow turquoise hue. Ford was the first one to crack.

“I found something,” he passed Stan the postcard the way he’d passed him homework answers in class years ago.

His brother glanced at it, did a double take, and chortled.

“What a dork! That’s hilarious,” he grinned, taking the postcard from Ford’s six-fingered hand and propping it up on the dashboard.

Ford chuckled, barely more than an exhalation. The novelty of the picture had worn off while he obsessed over the amulet for hours. It was nice to be reminded of how funny it was. “I know it sounds crazy, but I think this kid might be legit. He could help us get rid of Bill.”

Stan squinted at the card, then at his brother. “You know that’s a scam, right? Psychics are all frauds.”

Ford deflated. He wanted to argue that there were some credible cases of psychic phenomena, but he couldn’t deny most of them were grifts. “He might be. But his amulet’s real. I’ve seen it in my research,” he reassured him. “There’s an address on the back…” he added tentatively.

“Texas?” Stan exclaimed when he flipped over the postcard to check. He suddenly realized how sweaty his palms had become. To get there, they’d have to cross New Mexico, which was crawling with Rico’s men. It’d be like tiptoeing through a snake’s nest. “We’ve been heading north all this time,” he protested instead. “That’s gonna take a few days. And we’ll need more cash,” he argued, but he could sense Ford’s fists clenching even without looking at him. “Are you absolutely sure?”

“Positive.”

Stan pressed his lips together. He hummed and started tapping his finger against the wheel. Ford observed Stan’s frown, his frightened eyes and his t-shirt, marred with tiny holes and blood-brown drops along the collar, and started to worry he wasn’t going to turn the car around. Stan was lost thinking only of his problems, he didn’t get it. He didn’t know what it was like, to have a demon always stalking at the edges of your consciousness. He would keep driving him away from his goal, with his debt and his dirty mullet and his bruises and just take, take, take from him and never give enough back.

Ford caught himself. His throat tightened when he realized he sounded just like Bill.

Stan rubbed a hand over his face and was quickly reminded of how much that hurt right now. “This is a bad idea,” he said as he pulled into a side road to loop back south. Ford steadied his breath and smiled.

The brothers kept scheming past nightfall and decided to pull an all-nighter to drive straight to Nevada. Ford hoped it’d disorient Bill, and Stan agreed, eager to put some distance between them and Rico’s gang for now.

Ford insisted that Stan get some rest and Stan eventually relented, once he felt ready to surrender the small feeling of control that driving gave him. They stopped briefly to clean up and swap seats.

Both became more annoyed at the other for the next several hours; Ford at the way Stan would turn and huff in unpredictable patterns, and Stan at the way Ford’s yawns got more and more powerful.

“It’s useless, I can’t sleep,” Stan grumbled. “C’mon, sleepyhead. You get some rest. Let’s get you strapped in.”

They usually stopped driving when Bill came, because the demon was annoyingly loud and liked to bounce on the seat to make the car shake. But if they wanted to get to Nevada fast, they had to make an exception.

Stan startled when he heard a telephone ring beside him, and wondered if he’d fallen asleep at the wheel and was dreaming. He looked over and saw the noise was coming from Ford’s mouth, Bill’s yellow eyes glaring out of his sockets.

“Aren’t you gonna pick up, big guy?” Bill asked before letting out another ring.

“Hello? Who’s there?” Stan stuttered between hitching breaths.

Bill opened Ford’s mouth again, this time to mimick a stranger’s voice. “Hello, this is Emma-May McGucket, I’m… I’m Fiddleford’s wife…” The woman’s sobs contrasted with the grin Bill had contorted Ford’s face into. “Please, Mr Pines, can you tell me where he is? He said he was coming back to California a week ago, and… he… he hasn’t turned up yet…” Bill leaned in as close as the restraints allowed. “Please! I’m so worried, please call me back… let me know if he’s with you…”

Bill let the call trail off and waited for Stan’s reaction, but he kept his eyes on the road, jaw set. “He didn’t tell you?” the demon probed.

“Tell me what?” Stan asked, wondering what else Ford was keeping from him.

“I’m gonna break this down so even you can understand,” Bill said with the enthusiasm of a game show presenter. “You see, building an interdimensional portal ain’t easy, slick, even for your brother. So he got an assistant, an old friend from college. And they were roommates!” Bill cackled at a joke only he could understand. “And for all his trouble to help out his buddy, Fiddleford received... a gift,” Bill whispered ominously and paused, waiting for Stan to take the bait.

“What kind of gift?”

“A glimpse into a reality beyond human comprehension! A taste of the surreal void where black holes collide and Weirdness floats in bubbles! My home, for now. Ah, but you see, he wasn’t made of the same stuff your brother is. His feeble little mind couldn’t take it…”

“What did you do to him?”

“Me?” Bill scoffed. “The question is, what did your brother do. And the answer is... nothing!” Bill raised Ford’s eyebrows. “He just stood there, reveling in his shiny new discovery, while he shambled out of the lab, pupils blown, brain melting into silly string. Ford never even asked if he was OK.” Bill grinned. “Why would he? He’d already gotten what he wanted. His friend could freeze in the woods, for all he cared. Little Tater never found out why his dad didn’t come home…”

Stan clenched his jaw harder.

“Wake up, Stanley. Your brother’s a terrible person. Why do you think I’m so cozy here?” Bill relaxed Ford’s body against the ropes to prove his point. “And what makes you think he won’t discard you too, once he’s done with you?”

“I’m his brother,” Stan said.

“That didn’t stop him before.”

Bill was uncharacteristically quiet after that, and drank every twitch of Stan’s sore muscles with unblinking eyes.

Chapter Text

When Ford woke up, he kept his eyes downcast and his voice small with guilt, like he always did. The first night, he’d told Stan he couldn’t remember anything Bill said, but his insistence made Stan question whether he was telling the truth.

The morning was ashen as they crossed the Nevada border. Stan resigned himself to going sleepless, even though Ford offered to take over the driving.

“Are you hungry, Sixer? I’m starving,” Stan said, scratching a bruise on his arm. “We got some cheese puffs in the back. Pass them over, will you?”

“Cheese puffs aren’t a meal,” Ford protested, but twisted in his seat to reach into the clutter at the back of the car. He passed Stan the packet and fished out a bag of pretzels for himself.

“I’ll get you a proper meal soon, princess. A warm one and everything,” Stan smirked as he held the steering wheel in place with his knee. He opened the bag and shoved a handful of puffs into his mouth. “I have a plan.”

“What do you mean?” Ford asked, trying to rub the soreness out of his right eye and only making it worse. He leaned in and pulled his eyelid down to check it in the rearview mirror, and winced at how red and inflamed it looked. Bill’s infection seemed to affect that eye specifically.

“To get us money!” Stan answered. “I’m getting you to Texas, aren’t I?” he said as he propped up the cheese puff bag by the shift stick. He drove with one hand trying to look nonchalant and in control of the situation.

“What’s your plan?” Ford asked again, and Stan clicked his tongue.

“You’re gonna have to trust me,” he said.

“That’s hard to do right now,” Ford retorted, eyeing Stan’s bruises closely.

I could say the same thing about you, Stan thought but furrowed his brow instead.

Ford pressed his lips together, wishing he hadn’t said that. He took a moment to look out the window. The cold seeped through the foggy glass into the car, and the dense forests were beginning to space out, the clearings between them becoming wider and more arid. Ford took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. Thank you for taking me to Texas. And for keeping me safe while I slept,” he rattled off.

Stan grunted in acknowledgment and let a moment pass between them with the howling of the wind as the only sound.

“You sure you wouldn’t rather get to Texas by yourself?” he said, only half-joking. “I wouldn’t mind keeping your forest shack warm for you while you go sort out the amulet thing.”

“There’s nobody else who could pull this off,” Ford nodded with a tentative smile.

Stan smiled back.

The evening light was finally warming up when Stan pulled into the casino parking lot.

“Are you going to gamble?” Ford asked, his nose wrinkled.
“Of course not. Gambling’s for suckers. I’m going to cheat,” Stan huffed as he pulled a mustard-colored shirt from one of the back seat piles and put it over his dirty t-shirt.

Ford shirked away when a couple walked by arm in arm, headed towards the main doors. Years of isolation in the Oregon woodland had made him even more wary of strangers, and even in the car he always felt watched. “I’ll wait for you here,” he said.

Stan’s brow furrowed. “I don’t want to leave you alone. Besides, you look like you could use a distraction. C’mon, I promise we won’t get into any trouble. Nobody will even notice,” he grinned and elbowed him gently.

“What are you even trying to do?” Ford tried slip back into the familiar role of the responsible brother and huff in disapproval, but it came through with a tremble.

“Just some simple game tricks. Not hard if you know how to pull them off. It’s not even illegal,” Stan said as he finished adjusting the buttons on his shirt cuffs.

Ford clicked his tongue. After a moment of hesitation, he agreed and stepped outside while Stan took one last look in the mirror. His bruises were still very obvious, but he had to play it off. They wouldn’t be in town for long, anyway. He licked his fingers, smoothed out his bushy eyebrows and left the car.

Stan strode into the casino with Ford slinking by his side. It was a modest joint, nothing like the fancy ones Stan had seen in Vegas. Sitting in the outskirts of a midsize town they'd forgotten the name of, it catered to the locals and the odd traveller passing through. It had just two floors, the top one with a lounge and some pool tables, the ground floor being the center of all the action. About half of it was covered in rows of slot machines, whooping away and flashing their hypnotizing lights. The other half was split between poker, baccarat and blackjack tables. Two roulette stations completed the array, placed off to the far side by the staircase. In an attempt to make the venue seem grander, they’d placed a champagne tower on a table beside it. Stan and Ford sauntered over and took a glass each, drinking in the inviting low lights and warm tones of the textured wallpaper before making their way to one of the blackjack tables.

When they took their seats, Ford pushed his slightly behind Stan’s to make it clear he wasn’t playing, while his brother shot the dealer a disarming smile. Surveillance in casinos was pervasive but unintrusive, and first impressions mattered. Apart from the dealer and the guards, it was good to keep an eye on the more experienced players, who could spot odd betting patterns and suspicious glances.

Next to them sat a businessman with oversized shoulderpads who’d plunked his equally oversized pager next to his drink, and Stan struck up some small talk. He cracked a joke a bit too loudly, and across the table, a young woman in sequins laughed. Stan smiled back, fully aware that her flirting was a distraction tactic. It was best to establish yourself as a friendly presence, even look a little out of your depth, to ease people into increasing their bets. Ford smiled tensely and tried his best to look normal.

Stan wasn’t even sure he could explain how he counted the cards if he tried. Once he had learnt to play, keeping track of the high and low values just came to him like breathing. That night, the felt on the table was soft, and the chip stacks dotted around looked like cautious wild rabbits. He could tell it was going to be extraordinary.

Most people would think keeping their voices low was best, but sometimes the answer was to go loud. Too calm, and the dealer would sniff he was a pro, she’d smell his time in Vegas like the cheap cologne he used to wear but could no longer afford. A certain amount of nerves were normal for people who didn’t gamble often. The key was to look like an average joe, slightly intimidated, excited by the prospect of a wild night, maybe bearing the bravado of a couple of drinks already. When he raised a chip, it was just enough to look casual, never a leap that would turn heads. He played his first win off as pure chance. He kept glancing at the sequin lady so he could watch the discard tray without raising suspicions. When you do it right, it looks like luck.

Ford appreciated that Stan was playing it slow and not drawing attention, but sitting in the sidelines of a game he didn’t understand was unbearable. His mind started to drift away.

After a sudden bout of boisterous laughter, Stan patted him in the back. “You look bored. Listen, we’re here to have fun. Why don’t you go check out the slots?”

“Because we’re here to have fun,” Ford smirked.

“My twin brother, everyone!” he chortled with another vigorous pat. “Here, go get a drink in the lounge instead. Relax a little,” he grinned, sliding him a $10 bill.

Ford smiled, tapped his shoulder in return and left him to his blackjack game.

The atmosphere in the lounge was polite, quiet except for the twinkling notes of muzak and the murmurs of conversation. Ford sat by a window, watching the cars slice through the melting snow, noticing how the lights in the houses across the street began to turn on one by one.

He had tried to make his whiskey sour last. He didn’t want to waste money here, specially if Stan’s scheme didn’t go as planned. He wished he’d brought his journal, but reading it in public felt wrong. He was considering going back to the car when a waiter walked by and placed a second glass of whiskey sour before him.

“I’m sorry…” his words came out only as the waiter walked away, making him turn. “There must have been a mistake. I didn’t order this.”
“No mistake, sir,” the waiter smiled and gestured to a distant table by the bar. “The gentlemen over at table four ordered it for you.”

He looked over and saw three men about his age chatting animatedly. When they noticed Ford staring, they nodded at him. One of them, who sported a cowboy hat, raised his glass.

Ford froze for a second, but returned the toast with a shaky hand. They must have felt bad that he was drinking alone. Strangers showing him kindness always caught him by surprise after growing up in Glass Shard Beach.

He took a sip and continued looking out the window, and didn’t notice how the men kept observing him from afar.

He could have sworn the drink tasted a little different this time, but it’s not like the bartender used proper measuring instruments. Or maybe he’d left the ice melt too much on the previous glass and watered down the dregs.

Better not make the same mistake this time, he thought as he took another sip. After a couple more, he started to feel nauseous. He stood up and the room swirled around him. To keep his balance, he gripped the table, and the men rushed over to him, slinging his arms over their shoulders.

“What’s up, friend? Can’t handle your booze?” one of them sneered into his ear as they began to lead him to the back of the room.

Ford tried to signal the waiter for help, but his limbs were heavy like lead. They’d dragged him all the way to the steel door to the fire escape when he slipped out of consciousness.

Bill opened his snake-yellow eyes to the concrete ceiling of the casino backroom.

Chapter Text

“Whoa, he’s awake already?” asked one of the men silhouetted against the cold fluorescent tube light.
A punch fell on Ford’s face, and Bill laughed riotously.
“He’s got crazy eyes,” another said with apprehension.
“Remember us, Panley Stines?” asked the man in the cowboy hat. “‘Cause we remember you. And that night in Vegas when you bled us dry,” he said before hocking wetly and spitting off to the side.
“You have no idea what you’re doing, slick,” Bill grinned, puppeteering Ford’s body into an upright position like an automaton.
The man tried to kick him, but Bill was fast enough to grip his leg instead, bringing him down to the floor beside him.
“Listen here, smart guy. I’m having a great night so far and the fun’s just beginning. You don’t wanna bring down the mood by making me turn you into a jelly bowl of skin and bone marrow in front of your buddies. So…” Bill whipped his vessel onto a crouching position and stood up as the other two men backed away, looking to each other in confusion, “...how about you just step aside and let me do my thing?”

One of the men took the chance to throw himself at Bill, and crashed into the wall hard. It was unclear if Bill had moved inhumanly fast, or if the room had somehow bent itself to get him out of the way. The light flickered, and the men changed their minds about messing with him.

Bill looked at Ford’s hands with their abnormal number of fingers and cackled to himself. He was free. It was time to remind his pet human of the good ol’ times they had together.

But first, he felt naked. He reached down, grabbed the cowboy hat and placed it on Ford’s head. The hat wasn’t quite the display of dominance he had hoped, not like his favorite one that towered over his enemies and made his angles look real acute, but beggars can’t be choosers. He patted the human’s bare head twice and stumbled out of the room.

He slammed the metal door behind him and looked around. He was in a basement, all barren grey concrete and damp smells. There was a narrow staircase off to the side that headed up to the ground floor.

Under Bill’s influence, Ford’s body was all sinew, ready to bounce like a vintage rubberhose cartoon. He spilled into the main casino floor and looked around eagerly, unnatural eyes taking in the colors, the three dimensional textures of our universe, the unsuspecting humans in the room.

He flexed Ford’s fingers gently, feeling the atoms of this reality swirly around them. As he passed the roulette table, he leaned in and whispered a number into the ear of one of the players. He left the table behind as he continued walking, and soon it erupted in jeers.

The blinding light and head-splitting noise suited him well, but casinos had rules. Security. Boring little document stacks about legal compliance. It was about time someone taught these plasma bags to stop repressing their primal need for chaos.

Bill walked up to one of the slot machines. He pressed his palms against the back and pushed, and pushed, and the supernatural strength he’d pooled behind Ford’s muscles tore the bolts securing it to the ground. The hulking mass of metal toppled over, vomiting a tsunami of silver dollars onto the hideous orange carpet like a sick birthday boy at Hoo-Ha Owl's Pizzamatronic Jamboree. In seconds, the so-called civilized humans descended on it like howling coyotes. The rest of the casino fell silent and stared, mouths contorted in surprise and horror.

Only one of these faces caught Bill’s attention. Stan looked right at him from the blackjack table at the other end of the room. He went pale, still and quiet as the people around him started to scream and panic. Bill returned an angular smile and tipped his cowboy hat.

More and more people crawled around the corpse of the fallen slot machine, reaching for coins as if they were religious relics. As much as Bill appreciated the sight of humans scrambling to their knees before him, they ruined it when the alarms started sounding and the security guards burst onto the floor. He turned to the next roulette table with a hungry look and climbed on it for a good vantage point to admire his handiwork.

The atmosphere grew madder by the second, and Stan pleaded and tried to reason with the dealer to exchange his winnings as she hid beneath the table. For a second, hue after hue of color pulsed through the airwaves like the aurora. The businessman began to dial long cryptic messages in code using the numbers on his pager.

Bill grabbed a handful of gambling chips on the table and brought them close to his good eye, marvelling at how sturdy they felt even in Ford’s strong large hands, before being interrupted by a security guard.

“Sir, please get down from the table,” he called.

“No, I don’t think I will, Jonathan.” Bill said casually. “How’s that embarrassing bladder infection treating ya’?”

“Y-you know... about that?”

“I know lots of things! Like that! Or how the fire sprinklers are gonna go off in three, two, one–” Bill counted with his free hand, holding the fingers up high, until the water droplets started falling down on command. A few people screeched and scattered around, but most continued their destructive spree unabated.

“How did–”

“Relax, Johnny boy! The hows and whys aren’t important right now,” Bill squatted to be level with the guard’s face, and gripped him by the chin to look into his eyes directly. “What matters is that I have big plans for tonight, and I want you to give me and my vessel here a little space! Chip?” he said, offering the fistful of plastic disks to the guard.

“Don’t mind if I do,” Jonathan replied. After picking one out, he took it to his mouth and bit hard.

“Bon appetit,” Bill laughed, taking a bite of one himself until he heard a crack in Ford’s mouth and spit it out. He jumped off the table, readjusted his hat and scurried past the guards.

Over at the blackjack table, Stan gave up trying to reason with the terrified dealer, and instead pocketed what he could, ready to put an end to this. He had always been baffled by how scared his brother was of this demon who, though creepy, had always seemed like he had more bark than bite. Now, seeing his brother’s body twisting unrestrained, seeing the power he could wield over those caught off guard, he wasn’t so sure.

The walls seemed to grow, pushing out of their wallpaper like an insect breaking out of its cocoon. Stan made his way toward Ford, dodging a small bonfire that had appeared by the baccarat table, and the odd person that just stood staring at the ceiling, broken-minded and laughing. A few people had begun to gamble using their teeth as dice.

It was then that Bill had an idea. The champagne tower by the staircase. His grand finale.

Bill stepped back and flexed his arms to get momentum. Then, he ran. He tripped over someone lying on the floor. He laughed. He ran faster. He jumped and dove, Soviet-gymnast-style, into the tower.

The crash was deafening, a glittering shower of glass and splatters of champagne falling everywhere. Bill stood up, stretched out his arms and took a little bow as the crowd applauded. When he straightened up, he looked at Stan as he advanced towards him, fear and determination woven into his frown.

Bill blinked. Time seemed to freeze. And as the next five seconds blended into one like a tape on fast forward, he bolted.

Stan turned and managed to keep up, running at his heels until they both exited through the main door. Bill cut in a straight line through the parking lot, over the bushes, and across the intersection causing a flurry of beeping cars to brake around him. Finally, he disappeared into the distant forest.

Stan stood at the door, frozen with fear. He started towards the street and stopped. Like a lost child, he looked around in every which direction for answers. The crowd in the casino was starting to wake up from whatever madness had seized them, and to search for someone to blame. His survival instinct finally kicked in. Stan jumped into the El Diablo and floored the pedal.

He followed the direction Ford had run in and spotted his tracks in the snow. The road rounded around the hill he’d climbed, and Stan followed it while studying the ground, headlights bright and eyes wild, until he lost track of Ford’s footsteps. He drove around it fast, hoping to see the tracks come out the other side. He continued for a few agonising minutes, but couldn’t find anything, so he cursed under his breath and pulled the car off the road and up the hill. He didn’t get far before the forest became too dense to continue.

He got out of the car, breath freezing in front of him.

“Ford!” he called out with a voice that cracked. “Ford!”

He stumbled through the trees calling his name, not caring about how the falling snow was melting into his hair and clothes. He had to get Ford back, not just for his brother’s safety, but because he needed him. He couldn’t bear to be left behind again, to lose his one shot at a family. At not being alone.

Stan trudged through the snow for hours, making little progress, combing the woods for any traces of his brother. The snow quickly buried his footprints, and the one time that his shrill screeching would have been useful, Bill decided to be silent. Stan screamed and punched a tree, adding fresh splinters to the wounds on his knuckles.

Eventually he skulked back to the car and tried to convince himself he wasn’t giving up, just being strategic in case Ford returned. He spent the night hovering around the El Diablo, furious and frightened, until the snowfall became too heavy and he sat inside. He fell asleep to the horrible thought of Ford out there by himself, cold and hurt, and alone with Bill.

Chapter Text

Ford woke up to cold air, the smell of pines and the feeling of gravity. Something rough and damp was pressed against his palms, and he realized it was the bark of a tree. Somehow he was up high on a branch, arms wrapped around he trunk. A startled cry tore from his throat before the pain hit him. Pain all across his body, pain pooling in his muscles, pain poking at the small cuts from glass and splinters on his skin. Pain stabbing at his right eye, crusted with blood.

It took him a while to climb down from the tree, limbs seizing from the chills and the soreness and the fear. Once he did, it took him a bit longer to start moving. He lingered, gasping for air while struggling to think rationally. And once he did, he wasn’t sure where to go.

He wandered through the forest for hours. He tried crying out for Stan, but his throat was raw with the rasps of Bill’s maniacal laughter. As he stumbled through the snow, the knots in the tree trunks were slitted eyes watching every move.

The cold was digging its claws into him, deeper and deeper, past his stiff muscles until even his bones felt frozen. Every shadow was a monster, every glint of the snow was following him. His heartbeat resonated through his whole body, but his head was stuffed full of cotton, dull and congested. Stopping himself from spiralling was a challenge, specially when he thought about what he must have done to Stan and the other bystanders at the casino. Ford noticed his trousers had holes torn open at the knees, and his skin was scraped and caked with mud. He wasn’t sure if Bill had intended to punish or warn him, maybe even to kill him. He had started to wonder if he was a ghost when he spotted the El Diablo, laying red on the snow like roadkill.

Stan had been staring blankly ahead, sitting in the passenger’s seat where he had slept. At first he didn’t notice the shape coming out of the treeline and shambling toward the car. But when he saw his brother, he flung the door open and ran to him.

“Ford! Ford…” Stan cried out. He threw his arms around him and pulled him close, patting his back as if to confirm he was truly there.

Ford didn’t return the hug. Instead, he mumbled something Stan didn’t quite hear.
“What? What did you say?” he asked, pulling back to gaze into his brother’s face, brow furrowed.
“The checks,” Ford whispered. “Stanley… is he still here?”
“No,” Stan replied and pulled him close again. “No, he’s not.”

Ford’s hands were cold when Stan held them to guide him back to the car. He’d never seen anyone this disoriented and slow to respond. It was painful to see. He wanted so badly to know what Bill had done to him, but there was no point in asking.

A small part of him had always wondered if Bill was really as dangerous as his brother claimed. The demon wasn’t a great liar and hungered for the adoration of humans. It was unbelievable that anyone could fall for his shtick, let alone someone as smart as Ford. Besides, Sixer had always been fussy, a bit obsessive, and often worried over nothing. Now, Stan was determined to do anything to get that monster out of his brother.

Once he got Ford into the El Diablo safely, Stan drove straight on south, not even checking the map. The wounds on his knuckles had started to scab, and itched as he gripped the steering wheel. Soon the forest was behind them as they drove into the plains. Ford was quiet except for the odd unintelligible moan, little ragged gasp and shivering. Stan noticed his pupils were quite blown for the mild afternoon sun that reflected off the snow. He had to warm him up immediately. They couldn’t afford to go to the hospital.

The first roadside diner they found was a quiet joint, decorated in sunfaded red and white, where a few couples and truckers were having early lunches of burgers or scrambled eggs. They headed to the toilet first, and Stan had Ford towel-dried and changed into clean clothes – at least, as clean as they got, coming from the hoard in the car. He then sat him in a booth by a radiator. He ordered hot coffee, and let his grow cold as he watched the way Ford cradled the cup in his six-fingered hands. When he had drunk it all, Stan ordered another two. By the time Ford finished that second cup, his cheeks were recovering their normal color, and the shivers became more infrequent. Stan’s two cups sat abandoned, no longer steaming in the sunbeam that stretched across the table.

“Do you wanna eat?” Stan asked, furrowing his brow. “You should get something warm.”
“Did… did you get the money?” Ford said.
“Enough for this, yeah,” Stan reassured him. He hadn’t gotten as much from the casino as he expected since Bill interrupted him, but they would worry about that later. Now, the most important thing was getting Ford’s strength back up.

Ford got the warm soup, mild enough that his stomach wouldn’t reject it, while Stan got hash browns. Now that Ford was feeling better, he allowed himself to relax and eat too. When their food was brought over, Stan dug in, but Ford just pressed his lips together as he stared down at his bowl.

“I am so sorry, Stan,” he mumbled.
“Don’t,” Stan warned him through a mouthful of food. “You’re OK. That’s all that matters now.”
“That one was particularly violent. He’s only left me outside like that a couple of times,” Ford explained, and regretted saying anything as soon as the words came out. It felt strange to admit it out loud, even to his brother. Stan observed him and nodded, but Ford fell silent.
“Well,” Stan said after a few moments, once Ford went back to his soup, “it’s all over now. Listen,” he placed his fork down, sat back and ran a hand over his eyes, “I know you’re tired. Just try to not fall asleep by yourself. Tell me if you think you’re dozing off,” he grumbled.

There was a pause. Ford’s eyes darted over the cutlery and crumpled napkin as he replayed his last memories before Bill took over.
“Who were those men?” he asked.
Another pause.
“What men?” Stan replied, color draining from his face.
“They called me ‘Panley Stines’ and said you had scammed them in Vegas. I didn’t know you’d been to Vegas.”
“Just some suckers,” Stan said as he turned to look out the window at the row of neatly parked cars outside the diner. It upset Ford to see recognition dawning on his brother’s face and still be denied answers.
“They drugged my drink, Stanley. That’s how Bill took over,” he huffed. Did he really think he was careless enough to fall asleep in public like that? Did he not understand how terrified he felt every night?
But Stan didn’t say anything.

“How many people do you owe money to?” Ford pressed.
“A few,” Stan answered. He suddenly remembered his cup of cold coffee, took a long sip and went back to studying the parking lot outside.
“How many?”
Stan didn’t reply, and Ford took in a deep breath, trying to calm down.
“Stan, these men are dangerous. If I don’t know…”
“Just stick with me,” Stan said, and it came out like begging. “I can keep us safe. Just–”
“Stan, will you just tell me who else is after you?”

Ford watched as his brother ran his hand over his dirty long hair, sighed and started to pick at the food left on his plate.
“Listen, I needed the money. Really badly,” he scoffed.
Ford watched him, waiting for more.
“And… well, I used to run with some guys when I was in prison in Colombia. Turns out they were in some kind of gang,” he mumbled, and averted his gaze again to not see Ford’s eyes go wide.
“A gang?!” Ford yelled, and Stan was quick to shush him.

“Stanley, do you mean to tell me we have a Colombian cartel after us right now? How could you do that? You could get us both killed!” he started hyperventilating.
“Sixer, it’ll be fine. They won’t find us, I’ll–”
“Stop lying!” Ford said, planting his large hands on the table. “What else aren’t you telling me?!”
“What aren’t you telling me, Stanford?” Stan snapped back.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you’re the one who–” Stan stopped and lowered his voice to a whisper. “You’re the one who got a demon… creature stuck inside your head. How did that even happen? All that brain, and you didn’t think that was a bad idea?”
“I was researching!”
“What kind of research is that, Sixer? The kind that drives people mad?” he hissed. “What happened to your friend?”
Now it was Ford’s face which drained of color.
“What friend?”
“You know what friend. Your friend from college. Fiddle-what’s-his-name. What happened to him?”
“How do you know about that? Did Bill tell you?”
“So it’s true?”
The silence was enough of an answer.
“What happened, Sixer?”
Ford pressed his fingers against his sore eyes. “It was an accident…” he whispered.

Stan’s stomach twisted. He pressed his lips together and tried hard to not avert his eyes from Ford this time as his brother drew in a trembling breath.
“This is what he does!” Ford said, looking around as if they were being watched. “He wants to stop us. He’s trying to tear us apart…”

Stan considered his brother for a moment, then awkwardly scratched behind his ear. He pulled out a cigarette from his pocket and lit up. After a deep exhale, he looked back at Ford. He still wasn’t sure about his brother’s true intentions, and it felt like his ability to know what he was thinking had dissipated long ago, maybe even before he left home. But he had to trust him. The hope that came with that trust, even if it ended up being misguided, was better than being alone.

“Well, tough shit,” he grunted, propping up his cigarette on the ashtray and stabbing a chunk of hash brown with his fork. Ford’s eyes widened. “For him, I mean. ‘Cause I’m not leaving you that easy, Pointdexter. We’re gonna get you to Texas, and then we’re gonna kick Bill’s ass,” he grinned before taking a bite.

Ford smiled, and noticed his bones didn’t feel frozen any more. He took another sip of his soup, and wiped his stubble meticulously with a napkin. Eventually, he’d ask Stan about his time in Vegas, and, over a second helping of hash browns, he’d be told everything about the wild nights, about the beautiful Marilyn Fakenamé, and about that one time he almost hit the jackpot. But for now, just sitting across his brother in silence was enough.

After driving for a few more hours and stopping for gas again, they both realized they were too exhausted for another all-nighter. Nevada was ample and bare, and it was far easier to pull onto the side of the road into a quiet spot for the night.

Ford got strapped in, but he dreaded another visit from Bill, so he resisted going to sleep. He pretended to at first, closing his eyes and slowing his breathing, which did calm him down and made him feel a bit more rested. When he opened them again, he noticed Stan had fallen asleep instead of keeping guard like he said he would. Of all the things he’d blamed Stan for that day, that wasn’t one of them. He imagined what it must have been like, waiting for him to come back from the forest and shuddered. When it truly mattered, Stan didn’t seem to act as reckless as he expected. Ford bit his lip and turned his head enough to gaze at the clear dark sky through the dashboard glass. It was all his fault, having to leave Gravity Falls, ruining Fiddleford’s life, putting Stan in danger. All because he’d been tricked into trusting Bill. He looked at the stars, and his brain arranged them into little triangular constellations. He shook his head. Nighttime was perfect to study and come up with a hypothesis on how to use the amulet, but he couldn’t check his notes tied up in the dark. Instead, he decided to just think about it. It was better than letting his mind wander.