#('wait you are a nurse aren't you exploited to no end and expected to do 24hr shifts two weeks in a row?')

[respondedinkind]

@oceansfirst asked: “ it’s just my job five days a week . ” -> Linda

"Five days a week?"

Khan sounds genuinely surprised, at least for a fraction of a moment; The tone of his voice is accompanied by him lifting his head to properly look at her, his bright blue eyes taking in the sight of the woman in front of him.

She's a nurse, obviously so, currently taking his vitals while running a few other checks on his physique. Khan hasn't met her before; It's usually the doctor himself, McCoy, who treats him whenever something needs to be done on him. Perhaps he's busy, or perhaps McCoy gets bored by needing to work on him, who knows.

"---I didn't expect Starfleet to offer their medical staff a two-day-weekend."

In fact, he expected her to get one day off every two weeks - maybe every week if things went slow within medbay for once. Having two days off almost sounds humane to him; And yes, surprising as well.

[ckret2]

would you say Ford is overall happier in the Evil Ford AU? Strangely, it seems he's more fulfilled as Bill's weird little pet rather than trying to destroy him, but then he gets the trade off of the people who actually love him hating him forever

(I guess Bill cares in his own way? But, it's not the same)

I'd say he frontloads more happiness, but ends up unhappier overall.

There comes a time in every Gifted Kid's life that they hit adulthood and discover they aren't, as they'd been told, an intellectual superhero who will change the world, and that they've let down everyone who thought they were.

In canon, Ford had that realization after Bill exploited him, and then spent the next thirty years trying to live up to that high expectation anyway just to try to undo the damage he'd caused while he was being manipulated. But by the end, he makes peace with being Part Of A Family rather than a lone hero who must do it all himself.

By joining Bill, Evil Ford didn't have that realization. He got to spend the next thirty years telling himself yes, he IS that great, he WILL change the world—already HAS changed the world, he's already done the magnum opus that will (figuratively AND literally) immortalize him. All he has to do is wait—while being preemptively hailed a hero by Bill—until somebody repairs the portal.

So instead of being 30-something when he has his great disappointment—you're not the Great Scientist you were promised you would be, you let your family and friends and yourself down—he's in his 60s.

And he comes out of Weirdmageddon alone. As soon as Bill's destroyed, he runs.

His muse, partner, and longest friend is dead. He's sure his niece and nephew hate him now. His brother lost most of his memories, without Ford's help he still doesn't remember half his childhood, the family had to hire a nurse to look after him, and now Ford's estranged from him again.

(In truth Stan's doing okay—he regained most of his memories, and anyway his mind is sharp and he's functioning fine. But the family outside Gravity Falls heard he's losing his memory, went "oh, dementia," and decided a nurse was necessary. However—Ford doesn't know that. He thinks Stan is much worse off than he really is.)

Ford's too ashamed and angry to face his family now. So he finds one of the mini-rifts that opens in Gravity Falls after Weirdmageddon, jumps back into the Nightmare Realm, and goes to rejoin the Henchmaniacs. He doubts they'll be excited to welcome him back, after Bill hyped him up for 30 years and it all came to naught, but where else can he go? Maybe there's a way to resurrect Bill, or maybe he's not really dead. It's the only thing he can think of to do.

And at the end of it all—he still doesn't think assisting in Weirdmageddon was the "wrong" or "bad" decision. If they'd been allowed to finish—if Stan hadn't interfered and ruined everything he'd worked for, for the third time—then he'd be ruling the galaxy like a god and he could have elevated his family with him.

He's not ashamed because he's realized he was wrong; he's ashamed because he's a failure, and everyone he cares about has suffered for it.