#I know the “burn down a small town in PA” thing is suspiciously specific

[freelanceexorcist]

Ooookay. I watched the demo. Still can't get my hands on a PS5, so just watching is how it has to be.

Spoilers under the cut.

Sane Sephiroth is giving me so many Superman and Lois vibes that I don't know where I can store them all. Specifically "Clark Kent is just a dad trying to do the best for his family and those he needs to protect." You're doing a great job, Tyler Hoechlin.

If seeing them turn Sephiroth from "just a guy who suffered a complete and catastrophic mental breakdown after finding he was lied to his entire life" into a bog-standard cartoon villain that went Insane Equals Violent doesn't make me want to burn down a small, 3000-person town in Pennsylvania, nothing will. Mental illness is real and you don't get to turn someone with that illness into a violent psychopath just because.

You don't get to turn someone obviously suffering from serious PTSD into a world killer. You don't get to do that. Do him justice, god damn it.

And people who are mentally ill don't become violent psychopaths once the illness manifests. People dealing with mental illness are more likely to harm themselves. People dealing with mental illness are more likely to harm others in self-defense.

It's time to stop saying that mentally ill people are of course violent. Our illnesses are not our fault any more than your diabetes or high blood pressure is your fault.

I hope that you'll all recognize that mental illness is an ILLNESS. We can't control it on our own. But we can manage it with medications and supplements. Me taking Ashwagandha and St. John's Wort does wonders for me. But if it stops working, you better fucking believe I'll be telling my doctor I need that Lexapro.

[as-be-low]

He Himself

He’d make damn sure the mistakes he’d inflicted on them all would never happen. He’d do it all himself. Stanley gets a hold of the time tape.

Warnings: Graphic violence, blood, suicide/suicide ideation, character death.

≈

He’d taken it from the kids.

It didn’t make much sense to him that they’d fight over a dumb, beat-up tape measure, but he remembered being that age, and he knew that it was best if he got rid of the Object of Contention, in an if-you-can’t-share-then-no-one-gets-it kind of way. He remembered his own childish arguments over the dumbest little things that neither he nor Ford actually wanted. It was the Principle of the Matter that made them important. Many useless trinkets from Pa’s shop downstairs had gone into the trash thanks to the Principle of the Matter.

He just didn’t get what was so special about a beat-up tape measure. Doesn’t matter. He shrugged. The workday was over and the fair packed up and gone, meaning he had time to laze around until the kids went to sleep and he could head downstairs. Mabel had won herself some little piglet at the fair earlier and had been fawning over it all day. He’d have the rest of the evening to himself.

He turned the tape measure over in his hands. It had a funny design on it, reminiscent of an hourglass. Kind of a strange thing to put on something that doesn’t measure time, but whatever. Who was he to judge? Maybe that was why the kids liked it. Probably not, though. He fiddled with the thing as he stared at the TV. There wasn’t much of anything on, not that there ever was, really, but he tried to focus on the screen all the same.

He let the tape pop back into the roll with a snap, a yelp escaping him as the tool warmed up with a soft halo of light. What in the hell? He glanced around the room. Everything looked the same. The TV was still playing that stupid owl commercial.

…No, that commercial should’ve gone off by now. It was just starting. He looked down at the tape in his hands, and pulled it again, wrapping himself in another faint white light. His show had gone back to the tail end, right before the commercial break.

“Oh, kids, what’ve you been messin’ with?” he sighed.

He was tired. He was delirious. That was the only rationale he could come up with for all this. Time travel didn’t exist, and if it did, it wouldn’t come in the form of a three-dollar tool from the hardware store. That would just be ridiculous. Maybe things’re a lot different in the future. Stanley jerked upright. He had this thing in his hands that probably came from the future. That meant someone had used it to come here to the past.

That meant he could use it to go to the past.

It meant he’d have to work fast, before whoever owned this thing came looking for it.

He rubbed the flat of his hand against his face, scratching his five-o’clock shadow. Fuck. What should he do? Going back in time was the obvious answer, but where when? He could stop everything before he pushed his brother through that portal and sent everything to Hell. No. Better yet, he could stop himself from ever ruining Ford’s project and save them all the grief. A rush of relief flooded his chest. It was a feeling he hadn’t felt anything close to in years. He let out a shaky laugh into his hand. This was real. He was getting a chance to fix his mistakes, or better yet, stop himself before he could make them. Before he could ruin his family.

It would be his luck that this thing wouldn’t go back that far.

The thought hit him like a train, all at once and with a force of presence that knocked the wind out of him. Maybe he could do it in baby steps. Go back a little, and a little, and then a little more still. It might take some time, but he’d waited thirty years. However long it would take to go thirty-plus back would be the time of his life. He just… He just needed to practice, that was all.

He pulled the tape out as far as he was comfortable and let it snap back, the glow surrounding him once again. He shut his eyes against the glare and let one creep open to gauge his surroundings. The shack was gone. Completely, entirely gone. The trees were gone. There was only grass around him, and a few tall weeds that might become trees. A laugh bubbled out of his throat. He did it. He did it. He had actually gone back in time. This was amazing, Ford would—

He was doing this for Ford, not for fun. He didn’t have time to waste on this nonsense. Or maybe, yes he did. It didn’t matter. It didn’t feel right goofing off when he should be bringing his brother back, even though time really was irrelevant now.

Tears began to prickle and burn his eyes. He could do this. The past thirty years were about to be for nothing, yet absolutely everything at the same time. If he had his way, the time he’d spent hunched over that damn desk in the basement would end up as time wasted. Though the prospect excited him, he couldn’t help but feel an aching loss. The past thirty years would mean nothing.

His ten-odd years of life before his biggest mistake also meant nothing. The feeling shouldn’t be new to him. As long as Ford wouldn’t hate him anymore, it didn’t matter, did it?

A distant rumble sent Stanley fumbling with the contraption in his hands. All the time in the world wouldn’t help him if some weird-ass thing came along and ate him.

“Agh, fuck. How do I go back? No, forward. Shit!” Come on, come on, come on, come on! He snapped the tape again and fiddled with a few buttons, immediately relieved to find himself standing a few feet away from his favorite armchair. He glanced around the shack. He’d missed his show, but he couldn’t bring himself to mind. He allowed himself to go back and forth a few more times, just to make sure he had the concept down. Given a few weeks’ time, he was certain he’d be a pro at this thing. He figured the thing could pick locations, too, but he’d only fiddled with it briefly. He found himself checking specific dates. He might need those. This thing would be great for winning the lottery.

But that wasn’t important. Stan had bigger fish to fry. He found himself once again in the living room and stood in the center with his eyes closed. “Okay.” He was fairly confident he had this thing down now. He could figure out when he wanted to go. All he needed to do now was get there.

He was finally gonna fix this mess, right from the start.

After two weeks of practice he felt comfortable enough going backwards and forwards to try actually moving. Surely a thing that could go through time could move you around to different places, too. No use time traveling if you’re stuck in the same spot you were in when you left.

It took another fretful month before he managed to send himself to what he thought looked suspiciously like Cincinnati. He was banned in Ohio. That wouldn’t matter for much longer.

That, he could promise.

After another week or three of fiddling with jumping around (he made sure to visit places he’d always dreamed of, like Rome and Athens and Tokyo. When else was he likely to get the chance?), he felt comfortable enough to send himself backwards in time and across the country. Tomorrow. He’d do it tomorrow, and in baby steps, to be safe.

The following night, with the kids tucked securely into bed and sufficiently good-night-smooched (Dipper found it suspect, though Mabel of course had been thrilled), Stanley closed his eyes and jerked the tape out of the device, sending himself back to the late sixties. The forest around him was undisturbed. There was nothing to hint to him that there’d be a shack there in twenty-odd years. Thirty? Time didn’t matter. A little laugh bubbled up from his center before he stamped it down. Get back to business. He fumbled with the tape again. His hands were shaking. He was close, he was so close, if he fucked this up again like he always did he’d never forgive himself.

Stanley held his breath as he snapped the tape one more time, opening his eyes in time to see the sun rising over the Atlantic. He spun around. He was on the beach. He did it. He did it, this was it! He took a few stumbling steps as he scrambled towards the boardwalk. This was it, this was Glass Shard Beach, a place he’d never thought he’d see again and wasn’t sure he wanted to. If it meant making sure everything would go right just this once, he’d have scraped taffy day and night, and would’ve stared into the sun until he went blind. But that didn’t matter.

He bumbled his way off towards the town proper. It was still early, he had time to kill; it wouldn’t hurt to get a good look at things the way they used to be. He was in a nostalgic mood. Maybe he’d swing by that bakery off Front Street, they were probably opening soon. Dessert for breakfast sounded nice. Just this once, he smiled to himself.

Having commandeered his thick slice chocolate cake, Stanley felt his heart soar. He’d missed this stupid cake. Being back reminded him of a lot of stupid things he hadn’t realized he’d missed before. “Figures. Don’t know whatcha got ‘til y’ get it back. Or have it dangled in front of you. Whatever works.” He chuckled at his own little joke.

This would be a very good day.

He alternated between his old haunts, not minding that he looked out of place in his Mr. Mystery suit and his dotage. School was still in session, so there weren’t that many people to ogle at him. He didn’t particularly care, either way. He let people stare and laugh at him for a living. What was this but another show?

He kept that smile of his in place, though the folks around him didn’t seem to know what to make of him or his grin. That was fine by him. As far as he was concerned, he was just another stranger passing on through, soon to be on his way. He glanced up at the wall clock in the small diner. School would be letting out soon enough. It was time he got this show on the road.

He meandered his way through the streets and side alleys, letting his feet carry him along a route they hadn’t touched in decades. He was surprised he still knew the way to the school, even though he took the less-savory, scenic route there. He had to wait until boxing practice let out, after all.

He let himself inside the school and headed to the gym. The lights were off; it made it easier to hide by standing still. He was too old to try and crouch under tables or anything stupid like that. He needed to save his energy for more worthwhile pursuits.

He didn’t have to wait long.

He watched himself shuffle his way into the gym with a rising sense of alarm. He’d been so young. He’d had such a baby face.

He didn’t have time to waste on this shit.

Stanley let his younger self weave through the displays and tables, easing in behind the boy as he drew nearer. Just an inch closer…

He pounced.

Stanley wrapped an arm around the boy’s neck and pulled him into a chokehold, his other fist delivering a quick, hard punch to the base of his neck. He felt his counterpart’s weight drop in his grip. Good. The rabbit punch was likely enough, but he brought his knee up to slam into the teenager’s kidney for good measure. His younger self let out a strangled cry and Stanley jostled him, tightening his arm around his neck as the boy gurgled. “Shut up. Nobody wants to hear you.” He hissed into the boy’s ear as he fell limp. “And I do mean nobody.”

He dragged himself—what a strange thing to say, he mused—out of the school and across the football field towards the deserted lot a ways behind the school. A sub shop had once stood there, until it caught fire the summer before. He remembered hearing that the owners never scraped up enough to rebuild, so into foreclosure the lot went, and the city boarded the leveled land up with a slapdash fence. It wasn’t hard to make a weak point to drag himself through, ha! and he dropped himself down onto the dusty, gravelly ground. Finally. Lugging that dead weight was getting heavy. Now he knew how the rest of the family felt.

For once, he could sympathize.

Stanley crouched down in front of his unconscious self, watching the still kid for a moment before checking for a pulse. He wasn’t sure why he felt the need to do it, the kid had to be alive if he was, too. “Keep on sleepin’. I figure it’ll be easier on you ‘n me both that way.” He raised a hand to bring it back down, slapping himself hard enough to split a lip.

He slapped him again.

And again.

His palms balled into fists as he continued to sprinkle down blows across that stupid face, faster and harder until he began to tire and he heard a groan from the fool pinned underneath him. “Stupid. You just had to wake up, didn’t ya?” The boy’s eyes fluttered open, dazed and unfocused. He made no inkling of wanting to move. Had he paralyzed him? He felt a little bit of concern well up inside of him, but he quickly smothered it. Who cared if he paralyzed himself? The whole purpose of this trip was to make sure he never got the chance to make his many mistakes, by any means necessary. Could he still move if he paralyzed his younger idiot self? It didn’t matter. He’d find out soon enough.

The boy stirred, trying to gain enough purchase on the ground below to sit up and shove Stanley off. Nope, not paralyzed, though his movements seemed difficult. “No, you don’t.” He bore his weight down, pinning himself down by the shoulder. “Neither of us is going anywhere.” His younger self scowled, scrunching his face up before spitting. A glob of frothy, pink-tinged saliva ran down Stanley’s stubble. He didn’t bother to wipe it away. “Ohh. It’s like that, huh? I don’t blame you.” He chuckled. “Don’t worry, we’ll both get payback for all ‘a this.” He gripped the adolescent by the hair and lifted his head to bring it back down with as much force as he could muster, pleased to notice the red that began to stain the ground underneath them. “Fuck you. Fuck you, and fuck your stupid face, and your stupid, stupid—” he trailed of into an animalistic scream before slapping at the hands that scratched and gouged at his arm. “That shit won’t help you, kid.” He growled. “You’re makin’ this harder on the both of us. Now, hold still so we can get this all over with.” The idiot whimpered.

Stanley’s heart was racing. Panic clawed at his throat and twined itself around the resigned determination he’d started out with. Was he having second thoughts? Those could fuck right off. He’d fantasized about something like this for years. His fears could catch the next Speedy Beaver bus straight to Hell.

No, those weren’t his fears.

They belonged to his younger self, mixing with his own certainty. The kid was clueless, he realized with a spark of glee. He didn’t know why this was happening to him, and if this turned out how he wanted, he never would.

This is why this had to happen. “You’re gonna fuck up everything, ‘n I do mean everything. You’re gonna fuck it up for your brother ‘n for yourself, ‘n for the rest of the family!” Stanley paused to wipe his mouth, a bit alarmed as his own blood trailed along his wrist. All of it was his own blood. He didn’t remember the boy landing a punch on him. He couldn’t have. He scowled down. He was bleeding from a gash he’d left across his younger self’s face.

“So that’s how this goes.” He was gradually getting everything he gave. Ford probably would've found this poetic. “Remember that you did this to yourself, kiddo.” He let out a hysterical cackle.

“Stop it!” a panicked voice rang out. Gravel crunched under what sounded like heavy boots moments before he was ripped off of his younger self. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck, he’d been found out. He’d have to fight two folks now and win, he’d—

“Why? Why are you doing this?” the voice cracked as hands shook him. He wrenched himself free and spun around, ready to throw his fist into another face. He should’ve had his brass knuckles on, he—

He paused just shy of swinging, fist hanging in the air. The face he’d impersonated for the past three decades stared back at him with a mixture of rage and anguish.

“…Stanley? Stanley, is that you?” Ford had found him. His arm dropped to the side. Unbelievable. He’d done it. He’d brought his brother back. He’d brought his brother back, and he hadn’t even needed to get that godforsaken portal started back up. Oh, God, he’d never thought he’d see that face again. He could’ve cried right then and there.

“Look at that! You must be Ford, all grown up. You’re lookin’ good. Real good. A lot better than I remember.” Stanford was clean-cut and and frantic, though significantly less harrowed than he had been when he’d called Stanley up to Oregon. Life without me’s done him good. His chuckle turned into full-blown, high pitched laughter and he stooped to grab himself by the hair, roughly lifting it to turn the boy towards his fully-grown brother. “See? Look at him. Look!” he jostled the boy’s head, earning himself a low, whimpering moan of pain. “Look at how much better he turns out without you.”

“S-Staff’r..!” he tried to wail until Stanley let his head drop back against the hard, blood-soaked ground with an agonizing thud. “Hell..!”

“He’s not gonna help you. Why would he do that? Huh?” Stanley spat. “You’re the one who went and fucked everything up. You deserve this.”

“No, he doesn’t!” Ford snapped, grabbing the old man once again to pull him away from himself. “Y-you don’t either, Stan! Stop this! Please!” Stanley shoved the man off of him with a snarl.

“You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.” He snorted, inching away from the man. “The fact that you’re here to try ‘n argue with me means I made the right choice. Now, go home.”

“You must be insane if you think I’m going to just sit here and let you kill this boy.”

“Hey, this boy is me. Technically it’s my body, so I should be able to do what I want to it.”

“You can’t just kill yourself!”

“Why not? Lotsa people do! They do it all the time!”

“He’s—you’re so young, Stanley, there’s no way—”

“No, that me’s young. I’m old and know what’s good for me now, ‘n I’m tellin’ you, this is the best thing for you—and me—both.” He punctuated his words with another fist to the teen’s face. Blood spluttered from the boy’s broken nose and teeth as he cried out. Stanley vaguely felt the throbbing ache in his own gums.

“How can this be a good thing? I had to grow up without my brother!” He yanked Stanley away from the teenager again, giving him a rough shake.

“You’re seventeen! What do you know? You’re almost grown now, anyway! Not much growin’ up left for you, at this point!”

“I’m not a child anymore!” Stanford bellowed. “I’m a grown man in my sixties, meaning I spent the past fifty years wondering what happened to my brother, and wondering who could be sick enough to murder a child in cold blood.”

“Oh, so he’s a child now.” Funny. Nobody thought of him as a child the last go around. Stanford rushed forward to grab him by the lapel. “Let me go, Ford. I’ve gotta do this, you don’t understand.”

“You’re damn right I don’t! Why the hell are you trying to… to kill yourself as a child?”

“This little shitstain is gonna fuck everything up to Hell and back if I don’t! He needs to go! I need to go!”

“You can’t possibly mean that!”

“I absolutely do! Trust me, I’ve been wishin’ for the opportunity t’ do somethin’ like this for forty years. You ‘n I both know it’s the best for both of us!”

“No I don’t! All I know is that my brother was brutally murdered when we were seventeen and it broke Ma’s heart and we never figured out who did it! All I know is that I had to go on without my twin! I got to graduate, but Stanley didn’t! I had no one to share the important milestones with! Stanley should’ve been there for all of it!”

“Stanley didn’t either! If this piece ‘a shit lives, you’ll still end up without a twin, ’n without any of the things you want, and then I ruin your life twice! How’s that for milestones? You want that?”

“What I want is my brother!”

“No you fuckin’ don’t! You fuckin’ don’t! Trust me, you said it to my face how worthless I’ve always been, we both know you meant it!”

“I NEVER SAID THAT!”

“Yeah? Well you did to me! This me, the one who got old ’n went on ’n fucked everything up! Trust me, I know for a fact this is better for ‘im in the long run! Just… Just go home, Ford.” his voice cracked as he sobbed. The younger version of him let out a similar keening noise, blood from his broken nose and teeth staining his face and neck and trailing to puddle in the dirt below him. “I’m not givin’ ‘im anything he won’t get in the future, just it’s all at the same time.” he spat, wiping his own bloody mouth. He landed a weak punch to the boy’s collarbone, more for sentiment than anything as the other man leaned forward to grab his arm. “Just go home.”

“Why? Why do you feel the need to do this?”

“Because it needs doing!” he snapped back. “You say you grew up without a brother. Good. That’s the point! If I don’t do this, you’ll have no brother anyway, ‘n you won’t have any of the things you dreamed of, either! I’m doing you a favor, Stanford, ‘n you’re too naïve to realize it!” He punched the man in the chest, his breath coming out in angry, ragged puffs as the scientist stumbled back. “Baby Face Nelson here is gonna take everything you ever worked for and steal it all away from you if you don’t let me do this!”

“That can’t be true.” Stanford wheezed.

“It is, and I’m glad you don’t know it.” Stanley hissed. “Trust me. The… The you I saw last would say ‘good riddance’ ‘n thank me for doin’ the right thing here, but you’re here instead of him, and that’s a good thing. Means I’m doing somethin’ right, for once.”

“There has to be another way. There—”

“Damnit, Ford! If I die now, then nobody has to get stuck with all my bad choices! You get t’ go on and follow your dreams without me hangin’ behind ’n draggin’ you down! I won’t hafta… hafta leave, or be so worthless, ’n nobody’ll hafta be ashamed of me.”

“I could never—”

“You’re ashamed of me now, goddamnit! the here now, and my now!” a thick, muddy rivulet trickled down the back of his neck where he slammed the boy’s head against the gravel.

“I spent decades trying to figure out what happened to you. I went to school and got one of my PhDs in forensic anthropology just to do what the police wouldn’t. I built… I inadvertently built a doomsday device trying to find a way to bring you back, Stanley! And why? To find a note and a bloody tape measure one day, just to find out that you did this to yourself?” He’d reached into his pocket during his diatribe and waved the offending items in his fists before throwing the tape measure at Stanley’s head in his anger. The man ducked with an unnerving cackle.

“Note to self: don’t go back ’n leave that note like you planned to.”

“I broke into government records to try to crack your cold case. My failure hung over my head like a stain. And you did this? You’re the one who… You’re the one who broke Ma’s heart completely?”

“It was gonna get broken anyway. Better to get it out and over with ‘fore the disappointment could set in first.”

“The police were at the house almost every day for ages. All of us were suspects. They asked so many questions. Ma cried daily—”

“Well, then, you’d better back away ’n let me finish this. Alone. Don’t wanna incriminate yourself.”

“Our DNA is a match, that wouldn’t prove anything—”

“Fingerprints.”

“I haven’t touched you. That you. Not yet.”

“Good. See that you don’t.”

Stanford let out a choked, wheezing sob behind him. “Stanley, please. Please don’t do this, I’m sorry. We can figure this out, just step away—”

“No, we can’t.”

“Stanley—”

“Save it, Stanford. This kid is dead, and the dead don’t need your self-absolving apologies.” The boy keened, though Stanley chose to ignore it.

The man bristled. “This isn’t about—”

“Of course it’s about you. It’s always about you.” He clamped a hand over the boy’s mouth as they argued. He could see him working himself up to scream. Stanford was audience enough. “You’re the son they wanted, I’m the spare. It’s fine. I accepted that a while back.”

“Get off of him.”

“I will when we’re both good and dead.”

“Get off of him!”

“Tell me, what school did you end up goin’ to?”

“What? What in the fuck does that have to do with—”

“Answer the question, damnit, ‘fore I crush his windpipe right here.”

“…West Coast Tech.”

Stanley began to laugh. He tossed his head back and let out a loud, throaty, full-bodied laugh. He was laughing, honest-to-god, real laughter. He hadn’t been able to do that in years. He was laughing—for real, for once—and he couldn’t stop.

His shoulders began to rack with sobs. He wasn’t sure if he was laughing or crying anymore, but he was certain he couldn’t stop the tears running down his broken nose.

“G-Good. You got into your dre-eam s-school. Th-this is why this needs t’ happen.” He licked his cracked and bloodied lips, ignoring the added sting. “I’m proud’a you, Sixer. I always knew you could do it, if it weren’t for the likes’a me. What…What smart kid things didja study?”

Stanford looked horrified. “What the fuck is happening here?”

“We’re havin’ a conversation, Ford. Forgot what those are? I wouldn’t blame ya, this is the best conversation I’ve had with you in about fifty years.”

“That can’t be true.”

“It is. It is, and I hope you’ll never have to know that for yourself.” He slammed his fist into his younger self’s face once again, as hard as he could before swerving off of him to miss Ford’s hands. “Quit it. I came here to make sure this egghead can never fuck up anything else, and I plan on seein’ that through.” He rose to his feet on unsteady legs.

“Stanley, please! You…you don’t know what I went through without you.” The man’s voice broke as he pleaded and Stan paused for a moment before shaking his head.

“And you don’t know what you went through on account ‘a me. We’re gonna keep it that way.” He stared at the distraught man in front of him for a moment, his fingers twitching as a pensive scowl darkened his bloodied face. “You don’t know what I went through without you.”

Stanley lurched forward and wrapped his arms around his brother, and was caught off guard as he felt the man squeeze him back. He could feel tears soak into his collar. Stanley was surprised to note that the tears weren't his own. All too soon, Stanley made himself pull away, nudging the man away from him. “Close your eyes, Ford.” The better man shook his head in panic, scrabbling for him as he stepped away.

“Stanley, no, don’t—”

“Close your eyes, Stanford.” Stanford took a defiant step forward and Stanley swung, using Ford’s freshly-broken nose as a distraction to position his foot where he wanted. The toe of his wingtip nudged the boy’s cheek. “Open your mouth, kid.” His voice was toneless and his face almost sympathetic as he watched the boy struggle, his breath coming out in rapid, bubbling heaves.

“No, no no, Stanley, NO!”

His foot slammed down and Stanley himself soon dropped. His body was stuck, swaying in place. The air was too thick to move through. His vision swam. His target’s hand scrabbled at his leg, but he found he couldn’t feel anything from the body underneath him. It was hard to see it, too. The earth slid sideways and he landed against it with a thump he could imagine more than feel.

“Sta––y! ST––Y!” he was hearing underwater now. That was fine. Everything was going to be fine now. He imagined he was smiling now. Everything felt warm, like the hugs his Ma used to give him when he was little. She wouldn’t hug him now, though. Hadn’t hugged him in fifty years, but that was fine. It was all the same in that way, wasn’t it? He didn’t need hugs at this point; wouldn’t need much of anything anymore. He’d absolved himself. That was all he’d wanted for the majority of his life. He turned his hazy eyes to the side to see a lump hunched over what he could assume was his idiot self. Ford. Ford was helping his idiot self. It wouldn’t do any good, though. He was certain of that. Anything to make him not hate me again.

Much like he’d expected for decades now, Stanley Pines effectively died alone.

It was with a heavy heart that Stanford Pines swept the crime scene clean. He had to, lest his teenaged self be incriminated. He hated that he knew what to do. Stanford made himself sick. Sick with the dreadful awareness that he himself was the reason he’d never find the answers his younger self so desperately needed for closure.

The last time he’d seen his brother, he’d blown him off from boat duty in favor of finishing the final touches on his perpetual motion machine. If he had known, he never would have brushed him off. If he had known today he would be forced to relive the worst day of his life from a firsthand perspective, he never would’ve gotten up that morning.

That morning had been hell. He’d woken up, hunched over his desk to alarms sounding throughout the whole Institute compound. Someone unauthorized had broken into his living quarters. It was a Sunday. No one was supposed to be there but Stanford himself. He’d hopped up, heart racing, and grabbed the nearest makeshift weapon he could. He didn’t have to wait long before running across the intruder. He first worried that he’d run into alternate version of himself until the man made contact with him and the fabric of reality hadn’t dissolved. Instead, the man bled on him. A tape measure and a crumpled piece of paper had fallen from his grasp and he’d laughed while Ford tried to perform a rough assessment. He was unnerved by the stranger wearing a battered version of his face, mumbling to about how it’d all ‘get better soon’ and other such nonsense.

That had given him a headache.

It was an awful nightmare, he’d realized, once he saw his bloodshot eyes in the mirror. It was the anniversary of Stan’s death. No wonder he’d woken up in such a state. He’d have to make sure he got his sleep schedule back on track. The nightmares were always worse around this time if he didn’t watch himself. His face stared back at him in the mirror, mocking him. This was what his brother would never get to look like. He figured he should be lucky; some people never got to see their lost loved ones ever again. He got to see Stanley every time he looked in the mirror.

He hated mirrors.

If he'd known he'd never see his brother again, he wouldn't have brushed him off for something so trivial. He would've promised him the world and a thousand boats if he’d only known.

He’d spent the rest of his life determined to figure out who the sick fuck was who decided to take his baby brother away from him. He’d spent his years in school trying to live up to his full potential. He knew that was what Stanley would have wanted. He couldn’t let his death go unsolved, though. The police had proven useless. Said the tissue underneath his brother’s nails was his own, and the fingerprints and marks all over his body matched those of his own hands. That somehow it was self-inflicted. Stanley’s death had been ruled a suicide.

They were wrong. Stanley would never. He couldn’t have mauled his own self like that. There was no way Stanley, lying on his back, could have caved his own face in so thoroughly. He’d prove it to everyone, every single one of them once he got one of his PhDs in forensic anthropology.

He never proved it, though he did his damnedest. Even with the clearance levels he’d earned himself, with the government records he’d broken his way into, all the evidence he tested himself came to the same conclusion. It was all so wrong. He just needed more proof, more information, that was all. He studied every cadaver he could. He went on any hands-on experience opportunities he could find. After finishing his schooling, he even moved to Tennessee of all places for a few years to work with the Anthropological Research Facility, hoping for any little bit of insight he could glean. He was good at the work. Research was research, he supposed, and this research held the biggest incentive, even though that incentive hurt more than it helped sometimes. Each rotting body reminded him of how much he’d failed his brother and carried a smell he’d never forget.

Ford sometimes wondered if their loved ones knew how they smelled now. He wondered if Stanley had smelled the same when they found him.

Ford himself couldn’t remember the smell, or much of anything else when he’d gone with his mother to identify the body. He remembered feeling nothing. He had been so numb. Numb when his mother fainted and collapsed to the floor, pulling him down with her and slamming his arm against the examination table in the process. Numb as they sat Shivah. Numb, as he had to go back to school, only for the seat beside him to always be empty. Numb when he woke to an empty bunk below him, and numb when he went to sleep the same way. Everything was as empty as he was. If Crampelter had ever said anything to him after Stanley died, he didn’t even notice.

The only good thing that came out of that stint at the research facility was his roommate, the only friend he’d ever come to make aside from Stanley. Fiddleford was a local, and a brilliant mechanical engineer at that, working in Oak Ridge of all places despite the fact that he’d gone to Backupsmore University. He was relieved to have found someone to talk to about his more theoretical academic pursuits. Fiddleford seemed happy enough to discuss his astrophysical theories and his blueprints and ideas for miniature personal computers (he’d laughed at the man at the time), though the man refused to talk about Ford’s own work, insisting that “the body farm was not polite dinner table discussion,” and “God, Lee Moses, will you please? That place gives me the heebie jeebies,” and “oh, Lord ha’mercy, you stink. Go shower and then we can look over these numbers you got here, just ugh! God Lee.”

Ford never mentioned that he used to call his brother Lee.

Though he wouldn’t admit it to it, not even to himself, the man might have helped Ford move on from his obsession, if only slightly.

The energy Ford had poured specifically into forensics had turned into a fervor for his childhood fascination with anomalies and physics, fueled by Fiddleford’s superstitious nature and intelligent mind. Perhaps something of a more supernatural nature was to blame for Stanley’s death. He left Knoxville with a grant secured, heading to Roadkill County, Oregon to settle and study the unusual creatures that all seemed to congregate in the area.

He’d made a grave mistake when he ran into Bill Cipher.

He’d fallen for the demon’s sweet tongue and syrupy lies and had agreed to build a portal, one he’d believed would give him the answers to Stanley’s death and maybe even the means to bring him back, whole and sound. His only friend had agreed to come along for the ride, having left Oak Ridge for Palo Alto in a harebrained move a few years prior.

It wasn’t until well after Fiddleford had briefly fallen in and left the project that Stanford began to realize his mistake. He’d fucked up royally, and he was alone because of it.

He was lucky Fiddleford was a forgiving man and had agreed to come back to help him put an end to the devastation he’d so nearly caused. Ford found himself opening up to the man about his motivations and learning about the man himself in the process. Fiddleford had also lost a younger sibling, albeit in a freak accident. Ford now understood Fiddleford's outright refusal to go outside or use the phone in the rain. Likewise, his only confidante understood his need to know and had lessened the burden of a weight Ford had never imagined could be lifted. He’d helped him get back on track, and together, they’d founded the Institute of Oddology.

Which was how Stanford found himself that morning in his hallway, staring into the face of an identical, bleeding stranger.

No, that had been a nightmare. Hadn’t it? The man was gone without a trace, surely it hadn’t been real. Maybe he’d started sleepwalking. He’d have to set an alarm of some sort for that. His shoulders slumped and he let out a sigh, his eyes falling towards the floor.

Stanford froze.

That paper was still there. The dream was already beginning to fade from memory and the man sure enough had faded along with it, but he remembered the bloodied, crumpled paper in front of him. How was it here?

He eased down to pick it up, fingers shaking as he smoothed it out and began to read. The note was hastily scrawled out, certainly by someone who didn’t believe they had much time left. Is that why it was covered in blood? Who had even managed to get inside? They knew his name. Ford found it all quite disconcerting on several levels.

He scanned the note. The handwriting was distantly familiar. It had a familiar tone. He scowled at the paper, holding it with only the tips of his fingers to avoid the messiest, still-damp parts of it. Who was apologizing to him? He hadn’t quarreled with anyone, not recently, and if he had, he didn’t see why it would lead to something as drastic as this.

“Who in the fuck are Dipper and Mabel?” what kind of a name was Dipper?

‘Tell the little rascals I love em, even if I won’t meet em.’ Whose children were these? He scanned the note further down. “Oh, God.” This was…This was Stanley’s writing. This was Stan. Whose children was he talking about? “Oh, fuck.” It was Stanley who had stumbled into his home.

How? How did he get in? Oh, fuck, fuck fuck. His brother was here and hurt, and he’d let him disappear. Where had the man gone? I can’t lose him again. I just got him back. His hands trembled as he pored over the note again and again. He said he was sorry. What for? Stanley hadn’t done anything. Had…whatever creature that hurt him convinced him he had done something wrong? Stanford shook his head, a hysterical laugh bubbling up to choke him.

Stanley was dead. How was any of this happening?

Stanford slid down along the wall to sit on the floor, stopping short of the cold surface as he landed on something hard. He slipped a hand underneath him and retrieved a measuring tape, of all things.

“What in the fuck.” He had to be losing his mind. Had to be. Nothing that was happening made sense. Either he was losing his mind, or this was a dream within a dream. For once, he found himself hoping for his dreams to torment him. He turned the warm, heavy metal over in his hand with a burgeoning scowl. This wasn’t a tape measure. It was a goddamn time tape. He’d seen one of these before, held it for a few brief moments before the Time Police had come to retrieve it. He couldn’t help but spare a look around the empty hallway before glancing back at the note. ‘Had to do it, Ford. Hope u understand.’ the writing here became more scrawling and rushed. ‘Finally made up 4 my mistakes.’

And then came the kicker. ‘Please don’t hate me anymore.’

“Dear God.” Stanley had done this to himself. Because of him. He’d rejected his twin, his first and closest friend. It sounded too horrible to be even remotely true. This was bullshit. It had to be. The time tape clattered out of his hand with a small thud. Hours passed before Stanford could work up energy enough to retrieve it.

He knew what he had to do.

4/24/17: Tweaked! Lost some formatting when pasting, so I added that back in.

Uh, sorry? I did that to all of us WHOOPS.

Time travel is messy and this seems like one of those things that would cause them all to get locked into a never-ending loop of a clusterfuck.

Fun facts!

•The Anthropological Research Facility Ford works at here is an actual place, and yes, folks really do call it the body farm. There are several body farms dedicated to studying the decomposition of bodies under different circumstances. The first one was the one in Knoxville, TN, and there’s several stories based in/off/around it. My dad was going to work for one and was pretty excited about it and went through the application process and everything (both my parents used to work in the medical field so it wasn’t THAT big of an OH, WELL THAT’S WEIRD), but he NOPE’D the fuck on out of there after his first day. I think it was the smell.

•Oak Ridge was the main site for the Manhattan Project research and whatnot (yikes). Nuclear weaponry aside, it’s still a really science-y place, and I can see Ford being super excited about living with an Oak Ridge scientist™ AND IN SUCH CLOSE PROXIMITY WOAH COOL LET ME INTO ALL OF YOUR LABS SO WE CAN DO THE SCIENCE.