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At 4:13 A.M. on January 20th, 1982, Fiddleford erased Stanford Pines from his memories.
It was not advised to use the memory gun in the way Fiddleford did. Erasing such a vast amount of memories at once results in collateral damage to surrounding memories, even if the subject was not directly involved. It would also cause mental distress as the radiation moved to older memories, and Fiddleford was aware of that risk, he built the gun himself. He didn't care. He brought the gun up to his temple, and with only a half-second of reconsideration, he pulled the trigger and blasted concentrated gamma rays into his brain.
The radiation immediately found its way to the most recent memory of Ford, the one that had driven Fiddleford to erase him—the failed portal test. Fiddleford's scalp tingled pleasingly as he was relieved from remembering anything about that test, from the sudden weightlessness as he was pulled up with the dummy and the searing heat as his head breached the swirling matter, to that horrible monster he saw on the other side and the disorientation from being in two dimensions at the same time. Within a few seconds, it was all gone. All he could remembered from that night was being in the freezing cold basement beneath the cabin with Ford.
Ford. He didn't last long once the gamma rays found him. They were ruthless, painfully shredding the memory and scrubbing away the scraps until there was nothing left. No longer would Fiddleford have to lie awake at night, terrified to close his eyes out of fear of seeing the crazed and bloodshot eyes of his former partner staring down at him, or hearing Ford's hoarse voice shout that he didn't need Fiddleford, he didn't need anyone. Fiddleford hated that that was the last memory he had of Ford and that it had even hurt to have it erased. It was a painful memory, yes, but it was the last time he saw Ford, and then it was just gone. The only remaining part Fiddleford had from their parting was the basement.
Fiddleford hated that basement.
It was so cold down there. Despite working with welders, Fiddleford always felt the biting chill through his lab coat. Ford would tell him it was because he was so thin and that he needed to wear more layers, but Fiddleford never listened. Honestly, he did it on purpose—the colder he was, the more often he could take breaks on the premise of needing to warm up and go upstairs to get away from Ford and the portal. He couldn't stand being down there, especially not in the weeks leading up to the test. That's what the gamma rays got rid of next; Fiddleford shivered as they plucked out all of the tension between him and Ford, the guilt he felt as he secretly wrote a whole damn thesis paper for Ford to publish instead of activating the portal, their last dinner together at the diner… There was one last flash of the betrayal in Ford's eyes before it was forgotten.
After that, Fiddleford's mind began to put up resistance.
The remaining memories of Ford were all good ones, like their time spent together while they worked on the portal unaware of the danger it posed, so when the gamma rays got to their last shared night before Ford devoted all of his time to the portal, Fiddleford tried to fight them. Why would he want to forget that? Why would he want to forget Ford laughing way too hard at a funny anecdote, giggly from a drink Fiddleford had convinced him to have to celebrate completing a crucial step in the project, before he leaned in and kissed Fiddleford despite them both saying they needed to stop that? Fiddleford loved Ford. He loved Ford more than… more than he'd ever admit as a married man. He wanted Ford in a way he knew he couldn't have him. These memories were the only things Fiddleford had of what they could've been, why would the gamma rays take that from him? Please don't take them, Fiddleford will stop, he won't kiss Ford ever again and he'll renew his vows, just don't make him forget—
—seeing Ford for the first time in years.
Fiddleford remembered it like it was just yesterday, though at that moment he wasn't sure if it actually was just yesterday or not. He had shown up to Ford's cabin with his bags, ready to work on that trans-universal poly-dimensional meta vortex and make history together. If Fiddleford forgot any of that, Ford would have to explain the project to him all over again, but maybe that wouldn't be so bad. Fiddleford liked to listen to Ford talk, and they hadn't seen each other since they went their separate ways after college, but… Fiddleford really didn't want to forget their reunion. He had missed Ford so much, he didn't want to forget anything about him. They were finally back together after all those years apart. Don't make him forget, don't take Ford away from him, Ford was all Fiddleford ever wanted, please—
The gamma rays ignored his plea. They barrelled right through Ford, evaporating every memory of the project and leaving Fiddleford with no knowledge of why he was in Gravity Falls. He knew that Ford lived there and was busy with his research, but why would Fiddleford be there? Was he there to visit Ford? That wasn't a good idea, he had a wife and kid at home. Tate was about to start school, and Fiddleford needed to be there. His son needed his dad. Fiddleford couldn't just drop everything and go to Gravity Falls for a man he couldn't stop thinking about.
Ah. That might be it.
It had been over five years since they last saw each other, but Fiddleford still spent a lot of his time thinking about Ford, about his face, the way he talked, his odd six-fingered hands, his face… Fiddleford thought about Ford so often, he had to be very careful not to accidentally refer to Emma-May with the wrong name whenever they were talking. Was that why he was in Gravity Falls? To see if Ford was still interested, that their time in college had meant something?
No, that definitely wasn't it. Fiddleford didn't recall thinking about Ford that much at all after they separated. Ford had a university grant and big research plans up in Oregon, and Fiddleford was moving to Palo Alto with Emma-May. They were getting married, and he had a wedding to plan. He couldn't think about Ford. He couldn't think about all those nights spent together in their dorm, working on assignments side-by-side, way too close for what was supposed to just be college roommates. They were just friends, and nothing more. Fiddleford loved Emma-May, and they were going to move to Palo Alto and get married and start a family. Fiddleford didn't think at all about how he really didn't want to move to California because it was so hot and so far away from Tennessee, but Emma-May wanted to, and he was going to because he loved her so much and he would do anything to make her happy even if it meant leaving Ford, the first and only man to help Fiddleford realize that he was—
Nothing.
Ford didn't help Fiddleford realize anything. They were very good friends in college, sure, but that was it. They were roommates and they hadn't spoken in years. It was hard to lose your memories, no one wanted to forget the good ones, but what was the harm of forgetting an old friend? Fiddleford briefly thought of checking up on Ford to see how he was doing, but… why would he? He didn't know him all that well. He barely knew the guy, even when they were sharing a dorm. Fiddleford wasn't sure if Ford stayed as his roommate the whole time, or if it was just freshman year.
Did Fiddleford even have a roommate?
Finally, the gamma rays found the first memory of Ford that Fiddleford had: the day they met. At that point, Fiddleford had forgotten why he was erasing Ford. He wasn't important, he was just some freshman that had come to Fiddleford's dorm after he made a fool of himself in a packed lecture hall by accidentally proving that the universe was a hologram. The freshman had dumped his bags on the empty bed across from Fiddleford's, quickly introduced himself as Stanford Pines ("Please, just call me Ford."), and declared that Fiddleford was a genius and that he would not sleep until he proved that Fiddleford's theory was correct.
That wasn't a bad memory at all. It was just an interesting day from college, and there were plenty of those at Backupsmore—Fiddleford once got shoved into a locker with some random kid by the school mascot! He couldn't recall who the other kid was, but it didn't matter.
It also didn't matter if Fiddleford forgot everything about Ford. What did he care if he forgot about the scattered papers on the floor that were filled with chicken scratch equations, those green shorts that were way too short even by the seventies' standards, the camera that Ford had carefully balanced atop a stack of books before he ran back to Fiddleford, and the way that Fiddleford had grinned wider for that picture than he ever had in his life? Those memories meant nothing to him. He had plenty of other good ones that didn't involve Ford.
…
Huh?
Who's Ford?
At 4:15 A.M. on January 20th, 1982, Fiddleford blinked at his reflection. He was in front of a mirror in a dingy motel bathroom, and he couldn't quite remember the reason he was there. The last he could remember was fighting with his wife on Christmas, and then driving all the way up to Oregon because there was someone else he could stay with, but… not anymore, it seemed. Whoever he thought he had was gone now, and he was never getting them back.
Deep down, he felt like they never really wanted him, anyway.