#I spent forever trying to find a stupid calculus problem but gave up

[wren-fell]

Stuck in Borderland

Chapter 2.2: Six of Diamonds Part 2

Warnings: language, weapons, violence, talk of death

All characters are ocs except for Kuzuryu who belongs to Haro Aso, thanks for reading!

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“Who the fuck would be able to solve this!?” Kaoru yelled pulling on his hair.

“It’s not unsolvable, but with how long it is. It’ll be time consuming,” Kuzuryu muttered as he approached the board.

Sayaka watched the equation before approaching the board, “I know this was meant for me,” she paused to glance at Kuzuryu, “but I think that the best way to approach this is that Akiko, you, and me each take a portion of the problem and work it through.”

Kuzuryu watched her for a second before nodding, “that would be the smartest solution.”

Sayaka looked over her shoulder to call over to Akiko, but she was already approaching the board, “okay, I’ll take this portion, Kuzuryu you do this one, and Sayaka you do that one,” she delegated.

Sayaka nodded saluting her, “yes ma’am!”

The three of them picked up a piece of chalk and started working. It seemed like it was forever before Sayaka took a step back as she circled the number, “that’s what I got.” Akiko and Kuzuryu paused as they analyzed the board.

“That seems correct…” Akiko muttered.

“That answer is…” the voice paused and they all held their breath, “INCORRECT.”

The ceiling began lowering and Kaoru rounded on them, “what the fuck did you do wrong?!”

“I don’t know! I don’t know!” Akiko turned to the board scanning over everyone’s work.

“There’s got to be something we did wrong,” she whispered.

“What about here?” Kuzuryu pointed.

“Yes, that doesn’t look right,” Akiko agreed erasing it and fixing the rest of the work before circling a new number, “there. That’s the answer.”

“That answer is…” they all stared at the ceiling as it continued to get closer and closer, “INCORRECT!” There was a loud bang as the ceiling dropped two feet and continued to slide down.

“Oh my god!” Sayaka screamed flattening herself against the wall.

“What did we do wrong?! I don’t understand!!” Akiko called turning the board.

“Fix it! Fix it!” Daichi screamed as him and Kaoru tried to hold the ceiling up by stacking the desks.

“There are 15 minutes remaining.”

“Here!” Kuzuryu erased a line of Sayaka’s work and redid it, “the answer is square root 5.”

“That answer is…” they all stared at the spikes in the ceiling as they got closer and closer, “correct! Please proceed to the next room.”

The door next to the board slid opened, and they all scrambled over the desk to get to it. One of the spikes caught the desk tower Kaoru and Daichi had been making causing it to collapse knocking Sayaka and Akiko over as they ran towards the door. Sayaka looked over her shoulder at Akiko who was pulling on her leg frantically, “I’m stuck!” she screeched.

Sayaka pulled herself onto her hands and knees and crawled over to Akiko shoving her shoulder into the desks, but they wouldn’t budge. The spikes were getting closer and closer leaving only three quarters of the door out visible.

“Don’t leave me,” Akiko whimpered.

“I’m not,” Sayaka slammed her weight against the desk pile, but it wouldn’t budge. She leaned back on her hands breathing heavily. Gritting her teeth Sayaka laid on her back and pushed her feet against the pile.

“It’s moving!” Akiko called.

“Great get crawling,” Sayaka grunted as she struggled to keep herself from slipping on the linoleum floor. Akiko groaned as she struggled to get her legs free, but managed to wiggle out of the pile, as the spikes in the ceiling collided with the pile again causing it to shift all the weight onto Sayaka’s legs.

“Fuck!”

“Sayaka!” Akiko screamed.

“Just go!” Akiko hesitated, but turned and army crawled towards the door.

Sayaka gritted her teeth, this was so stupid, had Kuzuryu not wasted all that time arguing with her in the 4th room they wouldn’t be in this mess. She wouldn’t be in this mess. Everyone else had already made it out of the room.

“ARGH!” She let out a frustrated scream, “I’m not going to die here. I’ve come too far to die in a stupid diamonds game!” She brought her knees towards her chest a little bit before slamming her feet into the desk pile causing it to shift back just enough that she was able to roll to the side as they fell forward.

“Sayaka come on!” Akiko called from the half disappeared doorway. Sayaka pulled herself forward with her hands, and pushed with her bare toes as she kicked off her flip flops.

“Stupid fucking beach rules,” she cursed as she crawled. She made it to the doorway where Akiko and Daichi grabbed her by her arms yanking her through, and the door slammed shut behind them.

Sayaka laid on her stomach breathing heavily letting her forehead rest against the cool floor. “Sayaka you’re the chemist what’s the answer?” Kuzuryu spoke making her raise her head slowly to glare at the board, “What substance that is commonly found in houses will form a precipitate with an aqueous solution of barium chloride?”. That’s right, she thought to herself, there are still four more rooms.

“Baking soda,” she wheezed pushing herself up onto her hand and knees.

Kuzuryu scribbled the answer onto the board and they all waited for the voice, “that answer is… correct! Please proceed to the next room.”

“Ugh,” Sayaka forced herself to her feet and trudged towards the door as it swung open.

“Sayaka,” Akiko said as they walked into the next room, “thank you.”

Sayaka laughed, “don’t thank me yet, we’ve got 3 more.”

Kuzuryu was already scribbling an answer onto the board in room seven as they walked in. “I was a lawyer this is an easy question for me,” he stated as the voice chimed overhead that the answer was correct, and the door leading out opened up.

“Fine by me,” Sayaka shrugged as she followed him through the next doorway, “if it’s right, it’s right.”

The question on the board in room eight was once again difficult, “they must be alternating. Even rooms are hard and odd rooms are easier questions,” Sayaka muttered.

“Seems like a reasonable explanation, but doesn’t help us,” Kuzuryu agreed as they looked at the board, “What year was Rome founded in?” It was a simple question, but obscure enough that it would take a very specific person to be able to answer it.

“There are 10 minutes remaining.”

Sayaka sighed and ran a hand through her hair, “where to begin…”

“It was in early 750 BC.” They snapped their heads around to Daichi as he took a hesitant step towards the board, “but I can’t remember the exact date,” he admitted sheepishly.

“How do you know?” Kaoru sneered.

Daichi sighed, “I was studying history when I was younger,” he paused, “I had to drop out when my dad died, and we needed someone to work and pay the bills.”

Sayaka watched Daichi for a second really looking at him for the first time. He was probably in his late 20s to early 30s, the oldest out of her group of five, with his black hair cropped close to his head, and lines around his eyes making him look older than he probably was. Daichi walked up to the board and began writing “75” in chalk.

“It’s great that you know that, but I don’t think the game makers will take early 750 BC as the answer…” Sayaka muttered.

“I know…” Daichi replied as he held the chalk over the third number.

“We just have to pick one,” Kuzuryu said.

Sayaka watched the board before turning to Kaoru and Akiko, “get over to the door now. If we get this wrong we need to get out as fast as possible when we redo it,” she ordered. Kaoru glared at her, but rushed over to the door regardless with Akiko close behind.

“Alright Daichi,” Sayaka said turning to him, “take your guess.”

He nodded and wrote the number 0 on the board, and set the chalk back down, “that answer is…” The silence seemed to stretch on as they waited, “INCORRECT.”

The telltale grinding sound began and the spikes slid out as the ceiling began to drop, “try again!” Akiko yelled.

“Alright 751 BC!” Daichi yelled scribbling it onto the board.

“That answer is incorrect!” The ceiling dropped two feet and they all winced.

“Again!”

“752 BC!”

“That answer is incorrect!” The ceiling dropped again now beginning to cover the top of the doorway out.

“Again!” She snapped.

“But, if it’s wrong we’ll die!” Daichi said looking over his shoulder at her.

“If you don’t answer we’ll die anyway!” Kuzuryu replied.

“Okay,” Daichi drew in a deep breath as he picked the chalk back up and wiped the 2 away with the side of his hand, “Rome was built in 753 BC.”

“That answer is… correct! Please proceed to the next room.” The door slid open. Sayaka grabbed Daichi and shoved him through the doorway as the spikes barely grazed their heads.

“There are 5 minutes remaining.” The voice echoed overhead as the door slid shut.

“Alright two more to go we can do this,” Sayaka muttered to herself as she walked towards the board. “To the nearest meter how long is the human small intestine?”

“I got this one,” Sayaka declared as she wrote “2 m” on the board.

“That answer is correct! Please proceed to the next room.”

They all ran into the final room with Sayaka being the last to enter as the voice chimed overhead again, “there are 3 minutes remaining.”

“It’s another electrical engineering question,” Akiko said as she approached the board. “An electric motor that runs at 3/4 of its full-load potential of 200 amperes is operating at how many amps?” She hesitated staring at it for a moment with her eyebrows drawn together and her lips pursed.

“Just answer it then Akiko!” Kaoru snapped.

“I have to think this is something that was new to me at school too,” she replied.

“Well we don’t have time!” Kaoru snarled. Sayaka glared at him. Not that she liked the militants much before, but Kaoru had done literally nothing to contribute to their success so far in the game.

“Let her think!” Sayaka yelled. Kaoru rounded on her.

“Why don’t you shut your mouth! We’ve already determined you’re not executive material,” Kaoru replied acting like he would’ve even been remotely apart of that decision.

“I don’t give a damn about being an executive. I just want to survive. More than I can say for you. What have you done to help us through this so far!?” Sayaka snapped at him rage bubbling in her chest.

“Me?! What have you done?” Kaoru screeched tossing a desk to the side as he approached her, “besides acting like you’re the fucking leader around here! I’m the one with the gun. I’m in charge!” He snapped waving the hand gun in the air before pointing it towards Sayaka.

“Why don’t I just get rid of you?” He growled baring his teeth.

“Oh yea? Because that’s going to make you feel so much fucking better!” Sayaka waved her hands in the air, “about being a goddamn waste of spa—“ she was cut off by the voice overhead.

“That answer is INCORRECT!” The ceiling started dropping, and Sayaka and Kaoru snapped around the Akiko.

“What the fuck Akiko!?” Kaoru called.

“I’m trying!” She snapped frantically erasing her work on the board with the back of her hand.

“Two minutes remaining.”

“Akiko come on!”

“Shut the fuck up for once!” Sayaka screamed.

Kaoru turned around and tossed more desks aside so he could jam the handgun into Sayaka’s chest, “tell me to shut up again, I fucking dare you!” He snarled baring his teeth.

“Go for it,” she dared.

“For someone who says they’re trying to survive. You’ve got a real fucking death wish,” he hissed.

“Maybe I’m just calling your bluff,” she replied staring at him. She could see the hesitation in his eyes. No one wanted to be here, and no one certainly wanted to kill anyone. Well, at least they didn’.

“That answer is correct! Please proceed out of the building.” They both snapped out of their stare down to the door as it slid open.

“There are 30 seconds remaining.”

Akiko and Kuzuryu scrambled out the door, followed closely by Daichi and Kaoru was close behind. Sayaka ran towards the door jumping over the desk Kaoru had flung to the side, and vaulting herself over the next one. She ran a few paces before dropping onto her side sliding through the half blocked doorway.

The door slammed shut behind her and Sayaka laid on the cold pavement of the parking lot with a sigh as her phone lit up and chimed. “Congratulations! Game cleared. A 6 day visa has been issued to all participants.” Sayaka looked at the phone before tossing it across the lot.

“Fuck off,” she muttered letting her head rest back against the pavement.

“Are you alright Sayaka?” Akiko asked from where she was sitting.

“Yea, I’m okay,” she breathed before laughing and throwing her arm over her eyes, “fuck. They took the name Trivia Crush way too seriously.”

“That’s for sure,” Akiko chuckled.

“Hey!” They both glanced over at the boys, “let’s get going!” Kuzuryu said.

“Alright, alright, we’re coming,” Sayaka grumbled as she sat up.

Akiko smiled and held a hand out to her helping her to her feet. Kaoru came up behind her and smacked her ass before leaning down towards her ear, “great job in there kitten. What do you say we celebrate in my room when we get back?” he cooed.

“Uh, yea we could,” she mumbled putting a hand to his chest.

“Sounds good to me kitten,” he smacked her ass again before heading to the car ahead of them.

Sayaka frowned looking at Akiko, “charming.”

She gave her a sheepish look, “yea…”

“You could do better,” Sayaka mumbled watching Kaoru talk with Daichi at the car, “even here.”

“I guess…”

“Let’s get going!” Kaoru called.

“Let’s go home,” Akiko said looking at Sayaka before heading to the car.

Sayaka hesitated, “if that’s what you want to call it.”

[rmjagonshi]

Visions of HeartBreak Past

On AO3

It was almost done, Soos was finishing up the last few stitches before they let the thing into the air. If he could pull this off, he might actually get more customers into the Mystery Shack. There might actually be an upside to this ‘Woodstick’ Festival yet. He’d seen the way these kids spent money – heck, some of them were adults not that much younger than him – and with any luck, he might just be able to top off the budget for this month. He was short on the utilities payment by a good three-hundred-bucks. If there was one thing he never counted on, was that his brother’s dumb sci-fi portal mess drove the electricity bills further up the ‘dear god why’ charts. He does kinda feel bad for the kids; he’d had to come up with some lame-ass old man excuse for never turning on the lights or air conditioner during the day. He’d make it up to them…somehow…maybe. He sighed.

If he was gonna pull this off, he was really gonna need to prepare the kids for the eventuality of their entire world upending. But for now, he just needed to advertise. And the balloon was…abso-fucking-lutely not like he had anticipated. It was a fucking horror show, looked nothing like the blueprints and very much like what he saw in the mirror every morning. Although, Soos’s comment that the nose looked like a sausage and that it reminded him of the story that his Abuelita told him about a couple who find a genie and they fight over the wishes and one ends up with a sausage for a nose, kinda made it better. Soos was a good kid – er, man. Man-kid. Stan was sure he didn’t deserve the kindness and loyalty that the man gave him. He was honest enough with himself to admit that he’d used that unwavering loyalty to his advantage a few times.

Stan gritted his teeth in frustration at his own mind. Everything came back around to that, didn’t it? Everything he did, every time he felt even the tiniest bit of happiness, it all had to circle back and remind him that he was a sad, tired and despicable old man that didn’t deserve the friends and family he had. Hell, until the kids came, he didn’t have any family to call his own. But…maybe, just maybe, after all these years, he could do something right. Be less of a fuck-up. Which brought everything back to the hideous hot-air balloon that he was beginning to doubt was a great idea. He took another look at the blue prints and tried to make sense of the horrid scribbles he had jotted down in the margins when the sound of a lot of hot air being released into the night sky caught his attention.

“Wuh-oh. Mr. Pines. Think we got a problem.” Soos gestured to the ripped seam up near the balloon’s fez. Sure enough, the patchwork fabric they’d used to make the fez was flapping wildly as the hot air trapped in the misshapen balloon escaped with force, threatening to burst adjacent seams with every second. Well, shit. It would take a good hour for Soos to deflate the balloon, repair the damage and get it back up and running. Why is it that everything always had to go wrong? Why couldn’t one of his plans go off without a hitch? Just one? Oy!

“I’m on it Mr. Pines! I’ll have this balloon fixed in a jiffy. Now, what lever turned off the do-hicky again?” Make it two hours until Soos figured out how to fix this. He should probably scope out the venders and see what the young people were spending their money on. I couldn’t hurt to expand the gift shop merchandise to include things his new customers were actually interested in buying.

“Hey, Soos, I’m gonna go walk around, scope out the competition, ya’know. Figure out what these kids are into.” Or he really just needed to walk around and think and didn’t need Soos to pick up on it. As oblivious as the kid was, he always had a knack for knowing when Stan was moping around. It seemed every time, without fail, that he was feeling particularly depressed, he would open the door to see Soos standing there with cookies, or breakfast, or something sweet his grandma had made, or some kind of ‘Boss Appreciation’ gift. While he adored the boy, sometimes, he just needed to stew. He was sixty for Pete’s sake, he was entitled to a few days where he could just be a sad and grumpy old man. He’d earned it.

“Sure, Mr. Pines.” Soos had already started flicking levers and pushing buttons on the engine. Stan shrugged, Soos was the better of the two at figuring out how it worked anyhow. What harm could it do? He turned and walked back to the rows of venders all in pavilion style tents. All the venders were shouting and trying to attract customers, showing off their products and…what was that? Giving out free samples!? And the kids were eating it up! How the heck can they make any money by just giving stuff away? Oh sure, keep the t-shirt and caps for full charge, but give the stickers away for free.

Stickers are where he made most of his money! People were rubes, but some of them were pretty price savvy. Show’em a t-shirt with cheap cloth that will fall apart after five washes and tell’em it’s twenty-five bucks, they’ll laugh in your face and keep their wallets tightly closed. But show them a cheap key chain or sticker and tell them it’s a buck or two, they eat it up. They buy five, one of each variety. Paint one shipment gold and call it “special edition” and charge an extra buck, they buy the whole stock. Have a stack of postcards that got wet and the ink warped during the last storm because the roof leaked? Sell them as prints of a hand painted scape of Gravity Falls and double the price. People were absolutely stupid when it came to money if you just nickel and dimed them with special editions and ‘one of a kinds’.

But he wasn't here to boat to himself about how much better a con-artist he was. He was here to figure out what the young people of today were spending their money on. The further he walked, the more food and drink stalls he came across. Okay, so having a food truck on site might be a good idea. He’d done that with the fair he’d put on at the beginning of the summer. Didn’t he make a lot of money that day? Honestly he can’t remember much – he does the fair every year to replace the county fair that the town can’t pay for anymore, and it breaks even most years – all he remembers is sitting in a dunk tank for the afternoon and bleeding the suckers dry as rube after rube tried their hand at dunking the old creep from the Mystery Shack.

Okay, food truck. He could do that. Have a tiny kitchen where he sold drinks and shitty hot dogs and icecream to the families that come from miles around. Might even call up Susan and see if she had a spare cook and the Greasy Diner can share in the profits.

Or…not. He’d not too keen on calling the resident Crazy Cat Lady again. Especially since she still seemed to want to date him. That was a total disaster. And poor Mabel. She meant well, but he was just, as Wendy had put it, ‘un-fixable’. Heck, Soos had been trying for over a decade and hadn’t gotten anywhere. He was doomed to be alone forever, he supposed. Not that he didn’t deserve it. He’d pushed everyone in his life away. He creeped most women out – most men too for that matter – with his really tired and used pick-up lines. His six hour marriage to Marylin ended with her ducking out of the El Diablo at 75 mph with their ill-gotten casino winnings. He’d really thought he’d been in love. Then again, he’d thought he’d been in love with Carla too. He’d dated her through high-school and when he’d gotten kicked out, they’d tried to go steady for a while. But his constant moping over living in his car and losing his family had pushed her into the arms of a musician. And Ford…

Well, he’d pushed Ford into a swirling vortex of Hell in a fit of rage. His guilt hadn’t let him get a full night’s sleep in thirty years.

And now he was avoiding his feelings by wandering the tents at the Woodstick Festival. Dang it! He really needed to go see a therapist like Soos said. But what was he gonna say; ‘Hey, yeah, so I pushed my brother into a sci-fi portal and have spent the last thirty years trying to teach himself quantum physics and calculus, so he could get him back. Oh, and I may or may not have romantic feelings about said brother.’ Yeah, that would go over well.

Stan sighed. He really was hopeless wasn’t he?

A yell and the sound of a cart of beads being turned over caught his attention as he saw a telltale mop of brown hair and a rainbow sweater dart around the corner. He watched as both Mabel and Dipper cut and weaved through the crowd, a rather pudgy blond man in moderate pursuit. At least, until the prop wings on his back started flapping and Stan got a nagging prickling at the back of his head whenever he encountered something supernatural. His gut reaction, the same one that had kept him from going insane in the last thirty years was to turn around and ignore, repress, and feign ignorance. A slightly more pressing gut reaction was to chase down the offender with a baseball bat for endangering his kids.

I really wasn't even a debate as he found himself darting after the three, watching in only slight horror as he saw the absolutely not supernatural man fly overhead to cut off the kids at the fenceline. Stan caught up just a moment after, quick and practiced fingers taking the bottle of black powder from Mabel’s hand as he came up behind her and tucking it in his jacket. He was braced to punch a hippie in the face to protect his children. Heck, he’d probably punch the hippie anyway.      

“Sorry, kids, but you’ve left me now choice. Visions of Heartbreak Past!”

As the blond hippie raised his bottles of creepy hippy powder to throw at Mable, Stan darted in front of her, grabbing her shoulder and pushing her back to fall to the grass and was coated in the pink and purple smoky haze instead. He inhaled and immediately regretted his need to breathe as he doubled over, hacking so hard he was surprised his dentures hadn’t fallen out. Whatever this guy was using to drug people, it was doing a number on Stan’s lungs. He really was lucky to have quit smoking when the kids showed up. He’d probably have passed out by now if he hadn’t. The residual powder coated his mouth and throat. It tasted of bittersweet hope, and…was that jelly beans? God, he hadn’t had jelly beans since…

“Stan?”

Stan froze. He knew that voice. Knew it better than anything else. That voice, that scream that haunted his nightmares.

“Wait, wah?”

“Why is there a pink flavored Grunkle Stan? Hey Love God, what was that supposed to do?”

The ‘Love God’ gaged.

“Ewwww, Man! I knew this bozo was weird. I didn’t think it was this bad.” The twisted face of disgust on the Love Gods face confused the twins, but was completely lost on Stan.

As the smoke cleared, a pink tinged hand extended out to him. A six-fingered hand, wreathed in pink light reaching out to him. When he looked up, it was like looking into a mirror, one that reflected only his best features. His tired, half-blind eyes meet soft pink ones, ones he knew were supposed to be blue so his mind filled in the correct color.

“It’s supposed to show you romances you’ve had and lost. It gets people off my back when they get too suspicious.” Spat ‘Love God’, momentarily recovering from his aborted retching.

Stan heard none of it. Eyes fixated on the phantom in front of him.

“Himself? Huh? Guess it’s not that surprising.”

“But, why would he have ‘lost’ himself? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Man, you kids have one freaky family.” The ‘Love God’ gulped down something from his belt of potions.

The six fingered hand reached for his own, tugging gently at first before pulling Stan to his feet and interlacing their fingers. A shy smile pulled at that lips he used to catch himself staring at. He knew, logically, that he wasn’t looking into the face of his brother. Stanford was likely older now than his memory allowed. And Stanford wasn’t pink, he knew that. Logically he knew that. But his heart couldn’t take it. The phantom embraced him, twelve fingers digging into his suit jacket.  

“Please…” God, he wanted to. Whatever it was, he would do it. But his mind clouded, his eyes clouded and all he could do was cry.  

He gripped the phantom tightly, the twins watched, even more confused but thankfully silent. The ‘Love God’, true to his name, showed somewhat of a heart and stopped gagging and even frowned in empathy. He barely noticed when the phantom pickpocketed him. The phial was tossed to the ‘Love God’ and the phantom Stanford shot a wicked smile at Stan. One that, while it was supposed to look like betrayal, only shot a bolt of heat down his spine. The ‘Love God’ was right, he was a freak.  

Panicked screams echoed as the night sky lit up orange and red. Stan turned in time to see his would-be advertisement scheme in flames and headed directly for them. Through residual tears, he launched forwards and scooped the twins up and out of the range of the fall out. The ‘Love God’ was not so lucky.  

When the dust cleared and the fire crew crowded in to put out the flames, the kids squirmed their way out of Stan’s grasp and raced back to the spot where the pudgy aspiring musician stood.

“Love God? Are you ok?”

“Please be immortal, please be immortal.”

It was just Stan’s luck that Cupid was invulnerable. He still got a good punch in before the freak got to the stage.

*~*~*~*~*

When they found the portal in the hidden basement and everything literally almost turned upside-down, it made sense. When the author of the journals walked out from the glowing blue light and introduced himself, they understood. When Stan told them the stranger was his brother, everything fell into place.

Mostly.

Mable was still struggling to understand what had happened at the Woodstick Festival. Climbing out of bed, Mabel made her way downstairs and out the back door, hearing muttering from the open door to the gift shop.  

She found Stan leaning back into the couch on the back porch, glass bottle in one hand, lit cigar in the other. Eyes red rimmed and blinking slowly at the treeline like he was a million, billion miles away. He was letting he cigar burn down, the ash dropping off the end to land in the ashtray he’d absently left on the side table. She tentatively took the cigar from between his fingers, squashed the lit end into the ashtray to put it out, and climbed up on the couch beside him.

He startled when she took his cigar, but just watched her as she put it out and sat down; not speaking, not accusing, not asking. He knew why she was up, why she’d come looking for him. Ford was still in the basement working on something or other; the clang of metal occasionally reverberating enough to be heard through the floorboards. He settled back, moving to set the bottle down before wrapping an arm around her. She curled up into his side, fingers picking at stray hairs on his dress-shirt – the suit jacket left somewhere inside. She knew they hadn’t hugged, and that Stan would need one. She liked her new Grunkle, he was cool, and super smart, he just, had some anger issues to deal with. But as mad at Stan as he was, he couldn’t hate him, could he? They were twins, like her and Dipper. They could never hate eachother. She felt her Grunkle slump further into the couch.

He really didn’t want to talk. But like pulling out a loose tooth or a splinter, it was the best thing for him.  

“So…the Woodstick Festival?”

Stan flinched. He tilted his head so that the glare from the open door blocked his eyes and withdrew his arm. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, but his voice caught in his throat and no sound escaped. After a few seconds, he just gave up, closing his mouth with a click and turning away from her.

The ‘Love God’s’ words had stuck in her head. Not love, ‘romance’. As in, crush, as in stay awake all night thinking about them. But, Grunkle Ford was Stan’s brother. Love God had to have been wrong, maybe he used the wrong powder, or maybe it applied to familial love too. Her head jerked up when she heard Stan’s ragged voice.  

“I…I…understand…if you want to…go home early. I won’t ask you to stay. It wouldn’t be right. Just…all I’m askin’ is that you not tell your parents about that. I don’t care what they think of me, but Ford deserves a chance to know his family. He never got the chance to meet your dad. Shermie told me that they are a lot alike. Probably where Dipper gets it.”

He chuckled to himself. Voice dry and lacking any sense of real warmth. He reached down and took a swig from his bottle, draining it and staring at the label as if it held the cure to his every ailment.

“But he didn’t know. Nothing ever happened. I was all me. I’m the freak. Ford didn’t know, still probably doesn’t know.” His movements were jerky, bottle dropping to the porch as he turned and grasped Mabel by her hand. “Oh God, please…please don’t tell him! I’ll do anything!” He had clasped her hand in both of his. He was pleading with her, just like he’d done back in the basement. Begging her to trust him, begging her to not do this.

She felt scared. Why on Earth would she not tell Grunkle Ford that his brother loved him enough that their falling out broke Stan’s heart? Why would she not tell her parents that, either? Why would it even need to be a secret? Why would Stan call himself a fre…unless……oh. OH! He meant, as in, oh wow! That changed things, didn’t it? He meant it like, he ‘loved’ his brother. He loved Stanford.

Something in her expression must have showed recognition because his eyes filled with shame and he turned away, letting go of her hands and picking at the tear in the couch cushion.  

“You love him. And I mean, like, love love, like lay awake at night thinking about them, love.” It wasn't a question. But all the same, Stan nodded.

She didn’t know what to say. Usually, she’d tell Stan to go tell him, go confess your feelings. They either liked you back, or didn’t. But this was way different than everyday romances. This wasn't even just forbidden love between a snake and a badger or like between Dipper and Wendy. This was taboo. This was all kinds of wrong. What could she say to that? ‘Oh, hey. Grunkle Ford, I know that we just met and all, but did you know your brother is in love with you? No? Well he is, and spent the last thirty years trying to get you back because of it.’ She shook her head. There was no real way to talk this through.

She tried to imagine feeling about Dipper like that. Like, tried to picture Mermando and the feelings she got when thinking about him and tried to put Dipper there. But, she just couldn’t. Every time she pictures his face, all she felt was good natured affection for her bro-bro. He was cute…she guessed. But he didn’t make her heart beat fast like Mermando did.

Grunkle Stan had called himself a ‘freak’, maybe he was right. Loving your brother, wanting to smooch your brother was weird. She understands now why the Love God got so grossed-out when he saw the phantom Grunkle Ford. It was kinda weird and gross, but…well, Stan was a weird, gross, old man, maybe it was ok. He looked so lost now, like he wanted to jump into the Bottomless Pit and not come back.

She would be sad if he did. He would cry and cry and cry until the whole of Gravity Falls was under water. Dipper would cry too, though he would never admit it. And she doesn’t know Grunkle Ford very well, but she’s sure he would cry too.

They had sat in silence for several minutes as Mabel processed what had to be her Grunkle’s greatest secret. With a small smile, she flopped into Stan’s side and did her best to wrap him in the biggest Mabel hug she could.

Stan flinched, jarred by the contact he thought he would never feel again. He shifted his weight on the couch, turning just enough to gather Mabel into his lap and squeeze as tight as she would let him. He buried his face into her soft hair, brown strands absorbing the tears he couldn’t stop.

“I’m sorry.” He mumbled into her scalp, gravel voice hardly a whisper. “I’m sorry your uncle is a freak.”

She wanted to tell him that is was going to ok, that he wasn't a freak, and that he wasn't a bad person. But, she just couldn’t…not yet, and maybe not ever. She didn’t know how to feel about this. She loved Stan, yes, and nothing he would ever do would change that, but, this was something she didn’t know how to handle. She just squeezed tighter.

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Upstairs, the triangular window was propped open, and a microphone dangled from a string from its ledge. Dipper’s – with oversized headphones over his ears – face was contorted, brows furrowed and chewing nervously on his thumbnail.

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Ford leaned against the wall beside the back door just outside of view of anyone looking in from the outside. He’d left his boots downstairs to muffle the sound of his steps. His was was grim, tired, and despondent. Hand absently trailing to the inner pocket of his jacket where he kept the one photo that had kept him going the past three decades. He wondered if it would still carry the same meaning now.