Archive of Our Own

For a moment, the portal shimmers pure blue-white in the darkness of the Mystery Shack’s basement, a flawless disc of light. Then there’s a flicker, a shadow at the center—a person stepping through—and then all Stan can think with dizzying relief is, I did it.

I did it!

After thirty long years, he’s finally fulfilled the desperate bargain that Ford had yelled at him as he vanished through the portal—Stanley, do something!—and now in return, he has his brother back.

He’s supposed to have his brother back.

Turns out Ford has other ideas.

It’s not the punch that gets to him. It’s the way Ford glares at him with a cold loathing that Stan’s never seen before and yet feels wretchedly familiar. As if he’s some kind of insane monstrosity for wanting his own brother back, for doing what Ford literally begged him to.

You asked for this, Sixer, he thinks furiously as he tries to return Ford’s punch. A deal’s a deal.

There’s something weird about that thought—it sends a trickle of dread through him even as he struggles against Ford’s hold and snarls, “Don’t expect me to go easy on you just because you’re—”

my old p u p p e t

the words echo through his head and he shudders and remembers and KNOWS what’s h a p p e n n i n g to me

Then his brain goes crackle-pop like a TV switching off. What he knew a moment ago is gone, along with the thought that triggered it in the first place.

“—family,” he finishes weakly, the word like ash in his mouth.

All he knows now is that something’s wrong, and of course it’s obvious enough what: Ford, who’s being a wretchedly ungrateful excuse for a brother.

But later that evening, when they’re standing in front of the mirror together, a little of the strangeness comes back. Ford says, “Okay, Stanley, here's the deal,” and Stan’s heart gives a lurch.

Sixer wants a deal.

The thought thrills him on levels he hadn’t known existed. It’s finally happening. Ford realizes what he owes him, is gonna take his hand and be his brother, the brother that Stan spent thirty years earning back.

“Yeah?” he says, feeling hope flicker to life inside him like a fire.

Ford sighs. “You can stay here the rest of the summer to watch the kids. I'll stay down in the basement and try to contain any remaining damage.” Then his voice gets harder. “But when the summer's over, you give me my house back, you give me my name back, and this Mystery Shack junk is over forever.”

Stan feels like he can’t breathe. Okay, he knew Ford was mad at him—that’s fine, it’s fine, what else is new?—but hadn’t expected this . . . exorcism. As if he’s something inhuman and unclean that needs to be surgically removed from Ford’s life.

“You got it?” Ford asks sternly, and Stan feels his spine stiffen in reply.

Stanley Pines is a whole lot of worthless things, but he’s not a weakling. Pop made sure of that much.

“Oh, I hear you,” he growls. “But you didn’t say what’s in it for me.”

Ford does an extremely visible double-take. “What’s in it for—”

“Here’s the deal, Brainiac. I’ll give you everything back at the end of the summer, after the kids go home.” It’s not like he had any plans anyway. If Stan’s gotta sleep under a bridge and die of pneumonia, that still leaves him a lot more successful than his old man ever thought he’d be.

Some people, however, are worth something, and that’s how Stan finds the fire in himself to glare at his brother. “But until then, you stay away from the kids. Because as far as I’m concerned, they’re the only family I have left.”

He shoves his open hand forward like a challenge. “Shake on it?”

Ford actually flinches, and isn’t that a delicious sight.

“I—”

“You aren’t gonna get a better offer,” Stan says, half growl, half sing-song.

Ford grimaces and takes his hand. “It’s a deal.”

#

Pop hadn’t done Stan many favors even before kicking him out, but he did teach him the most important part of a scam: a good handshake.

Look ’em in the eye. Shake their hands firmly, like a man. Stand up straight and lie until what you want to be true becomes true, whether it’s this watch is solid 24k gold or the Rip Off won’t give you rashes or I choose one brilliant mind a century.

Lie until you aren’t lying anymore, because if people pay for something, then it’s real. That’s how Filbrick Pines ran his pawn shop, and that’s how Stan made himself into Stanford Pines, Mr. Mystery. It’s even how he made himself Grunkle Stan: he lied and he punched pterodactyls and he lied until those dumb kids believed him. Until Mabel even trusted him to open the portal, and then suddenly Stan could believe it too.

Ford is the exception. Ford refuses to buy absolutely anything that Stan is selling, and hasn’t it always been that way? It never mattered how confidently Stan explained that everything would be golden once this dimension learned how to party they sailed away for a life of beaches, babes, and international treasure hunting. Ford wouldn’t believe him.

Not even when Stan was telling the truth about not meaning to break Ford’s science project. When he was begging.

The art of a successful con involves knowing when to walk away. When to cut your losses and find a sucker who won’t punch you for saving his life.

Stan’s never been very good at that part, but he’s trying.

#

After Stan has safely stowed away the unicorn treasure (buying gold is great, but stealing it is priceless), he goes to find his brother.

Ford is down in the lab where Stan spent wasted so many years of his life trying to bring back the ungrateful know-it-all who’s gonna get them all killed. He’s bent over the console, scribbling in his journal, and doesn’t even notice Stan’s presence until he slams a fist down beside the book.

“Seriously, Ford? First Dipper, now Mabel?”

“Actually, I believe Mabel was born first,” says Ford, not looking up from his notes.

“I mean, you really gotta drag these kids into your spooky weirdness? Bad enough that Dipper spent all summer rotting his brain with your stupid journals, now Mabel’s arm-wrestling unicorns!”

“Yes, she was rather impressive, wasn’t she?” Ford beams up at him.

“. . . okay, fine, I’m really proud of her for beating them up and taking all their money,” Stan admits. He does have his principles. “But that’s no excuse for dragging Dipper into your ‘epic wizard quest’—”

“That was your fault for throwing my infinity-sided die!”

“—or for letting them keep reading your journals and filling their heads with this spooky nonsense. It’s not gonna help them.”

Ford huffs, looking like an annoyed owl. “Nonsense! Scientific study of weird anomalies is like violence: if it doesn’t solve your problems, you aren’t using enough of it.”

Stan groans. Only Ford could make punching people sound so nerdy.

“But somehow I’m the ex-convict,” he grumbles.

Ford coughs. “Yes, well. I might have been . . . temporarily detained on some occasions . . .”

His stomach twists. Ford is the worst brother of all time, but the thought of him ending up in a cell with people like Carlos and Rico is just—

It doesn’t matter.

“The point is, we had a deal,” Stans says, trying to stay on target. “And you broke it. So start staying away from the kids, or you won’t be able to kick me out at the end of the summer.”

“What?” Ford blinks at him.

“Did you damage your brain in that portal? We shook on it, Sixer. You stay away from the kids, and you get to throw me out after they go home.”

“I never said I was going to evict you,” Ford replies indignantly. “I simply said that I wanted you to stop using my house and my name to make a mockery of my life’s work.”

“Well, the Mystery Shack is MY life’s work!” Stan roars. “What do you expect me to do when it’s shut down, stay here twiddling my thumbs and accepting your hand-outs?”

Ford surges to his feet. “Do you really expect me to let you keep on using my house and identity to do whatever you want, as if I’m no more than some kind of puppet—”

YOU SHOOK MY H A N D, SIXER.

NO TAKE BACKSIES.

FROM NOW UNTIL THE END OF T҉͡Į̛͜͠M̢͘E̢̕͟͡

Stan blinks. His ears are ringing, and his thoughts are fuzzy, scattered—goddamn the feedback on these hearing aids—and meanwhile Ford is still ranting, relentless as an oncoming train.

“—honestly think that doing something I never wanted is going to make me owe you? Let you control my life again?”

“HEY.” Stan stabs a finger at his brother, fury clearing his brain. “Let’s get one thing clear. I didn’t spend thirty years working on that portal so you’d owe me. I already knew you were an ungrateful son of a monkey’s uncle! I just—” and he has to draw a breath before he can say the words without his voice going needy “—wanted my brother back.”

Ford crosses his arms. “Well, then why not just have Mabel make you another wax statue?”

Stan flinches, embarrassed, and silently curses himself for not acting more normal in front of the kids. Sure, they had thought it was just their Grunkle being vain, but of course Ford would see right to the heart of Stan’s pathetic, wrenching loneliness.

“Mabel told me all about the frankly neurotic attachment you had to that thing.” Ford’s voice grows stiffer and more precise with each syllable, like he’s a world-famous professor giving a lecture. “It’s obvious that’s the kind of brother you would actually prefer—”

“What?” Stan gapes, embarrassment forgotten.

“—silent, easily molded, always doing what you want.” Ford is leaning forward now, fists clenched. “Did you really think I never noticed, Stanley? That I didn’t look back and see the signs written across our whole childhood? The way your dreams were always supposed to be my dreams, and the tantrums you threw when you didn’t get your way, and how much you were like—”

Ford suddenly chokes to a halt, his face going pale.

Stan stares at him, feeling like the oncoming train has stopped two inches from his face, and it doesn’t matter because he already feels like shit. Of course knew his brother hated him, but so much? Like this?

He realizes that he’d still hoped Ford at least looked back on their childhood fondly. That at least they still had that.

Good job twisting the knife, Sixer, he thinks with a bitter numbness.

“I . . .” Ford himself seems kind of shocked, as if he knows how far he’s gone. “Stan, I didn’t mean . . . you’re not anything like . . .”

“Nah, it’s fine. I get it.” Stan grins, wide and painful and vicious. “Can’t let your family get in the way of genius happening.” Ford flinches at that, and Stan feels a perverse satisfaction. He presses on, “So here’s a new deal for ya, Fordsy. I’ll stay away from you, and you stay the fuck away from my kids.”

He doesn’t try to make Ford shake on it. He turns and stomps away into the elevator.

Only when the doors have closed behind him does he let himself be weak enough to press shaking hands to his face.

#

He dreams, that night.

The first part is weird and confused and flat, like he’s pressed between two sheets of glass, in a world that wants him to be as mindless and compliant as all the dumb tourists that he fleeces.

Then he’s sitting on the porch of the Mystery Shack, legs stretched out and a Pitt Cola in his hands, watching the kids rake leaves in the yard.

“WELL well wellwellwellwellwell. Look who’s M E!”

Some kind of Dorito in a top hat floats down to look at him. Stan rolls his eyes. The thing feels vaguely familiar, probably because he’s eaten brown meat this far past its expiration date before.

“Yeah, whatever,” he grunts.

“Oh, ‘whatever’ is a great word, Stanley Knucklehead Pines! Because this ‘person’ you’ve made yourself into is suuuuper fake, but also pretty convincing!”

Stan growls. “Look, I don’t know who you are—”

“Ha-HAH!”

“—but get out of here! You’re not welcome!”

“Don’t worry, Stanford! I’m not really here! Lil’ ol’ ME is still outside this dimension, making deals, laying plans. Prepping to eat both mice and men! It’s a blast, I tell ya.” The Dorito clasps its hands and stares into Stan’s eyes. “This image of me that you’re seeing right now? THAT’S

A L L

Y̵̛̜͗̒̂͌͊̒̍̓̄͘͘͠ O̸̧̥͉̲̥̱̔̌͗͐̀̆̓̕͠͝ Ư̷̼̥̰͈̮̬̯̦͇̖̰̿̏͋̋̈́̚͜͠

#

Stan wakes up with a start, his heart pounding, his mouth tasting like nightmares and self-loathing.

That’s nothing new.

What is new comes two days later, while Stan’s in the middle of yelling at the goat: the sky suddenly cracks open and starts vomiting nightmares.

Stan isn’t dumb. Also, he’s kind of a coward. He high-tails it back inside the shack, because he knows on some deeper-than-bone level that it will protect him.

It does.

And then he’s alone, as the world turns into literal hell outside.

Yeah, whatever. His life has always sucked.

But then hell starts opening up inside his head.

At first it’s subtle. Stan looks out the window, sees a monstrosity with a hundred arms and no eyes, and thinks, Oh hey, that’s Ted. It wouldn’t be the first time he named something horrifying beyond normal human comprehension. Mr. Tummy is right there, after all, enjoying his share of Stan’s recent stress-eating.

That night he dreams about sitting on a throne made of all the petrified townsfolk. It’s a little freaky, but “someday they’ll all grovel at my feet” is a very familiar fantasy for Stan Pines.

The morning after, Stan feels shaky and lonely, so he decides to distract himself by going through his collection of fake IDs and remembering his best cons. Only somehow, now there are more memories than IDs, more suckers than Stan can name. He remembers shaking hand after hand, sealing deal after deal, and thrilling at the way people listened to him, gave themselves up to him, and made him-and-only-him more powerful in the process.

—for one moment he remembers shaking hands with a six-fingered FOOL who eagerly accepted all his lies, but then Stan cringes and gags and forgets—

A pyramid scheme: that’s what the rational, calculating part of Stan’s brain calls his new (?) memories. Everything’s still vague, but he knows that at some point in his past, all his power rested on how he made bargains with the people who were nothing, so that when he made bargains with the people above him (Carlos? Rico? Axolotl and Time Baby and the Nezperdian Hivemind?) he had the capital and the power to hold up his end.

Alone in the Mystery Shack and gravely confused about context, Stan is still able to glory in those memories.

Towards evening, Old Man McGucket turns up on his doorstep, a line of shivering refugees straggling behind him. Stan lets them in because he’s not a monster, okay, and he also likes the thought of being their chief. Being the mayor never quite fit right, even when he so badly wanted it, but now that the whole world is insane, there’s something profoundly right about having a gang of henchmen.

But that night—

Stan dreams again, but this time it’s fire and screaming. There’s a whole dimension world burning around him, and he knows somehow that he set it on fire. That’s why he’s soaring above all his mindless flat family, swelling into a perfect equilateral triangle big enough to blot out the sun as he laughs and he laughs and he has to laugh, or everyone will know how his heart is breaking—

A soft, tiny voice sings above the chaos:

Saw his own dimension burn.
Misses home and can’t return.
Says he’s happy. He’s a liar.
Blame the arson for the fire.

Stan wakes up choking on snot and tears, and he immediately shoves the dream out of his mind so he can focus on being Chief and counting the cans of brown meat they have left.

The dreams keep coming though, a dozen of them every night. It’s that strange flat world, and then it’s screaming and destruction, and then it’s Ford blinking stupidly at him while Stan laughs and laughs and laughs.

Twice, he dreams about the axolotl that used to live in his aquarium. It’s looking at him with insufferable smugness, waiting for him to give up and admit he can’t make it on his own.

In the real world, the creature’s gone. Stan finds himself staring at the tank the next morning, trying to remember when it disappeared.

#

Then—just when he’d started to give up hope he’d ever see them again—Dipper and Mabel turn up at his door.

“Kids!” he yells, and then chokes on his own tongue, because he wants to yell out, Pine Tree! Shooting Star! But he knows something’s wrong with those nicknames, wrong like I think I’ll kill one of them just for the heck of it—

When he gets his breath back, Wendy and Soos have invited themselves to the group hug. He doesn’t want to admit it, but it’s actually a relief to feel them (alive) hugging his (very human) body.

But then Dipper pipes up, “Grunkle Stan, we can't all just hide inside the Shack. There's a town in need of saving. Me and Ford tried to do it, but he got captured by Bill.”

Stan’s heart thuds inside his chest. Truth be told, he’s barely thought about Ford since the world went crazy. Hasn’t wanted to. There’s just something incredibly wrong about Ford being part of this nightmare realm that Gravity Falls has turned into.

To distract himself, Stan cracks open a can of brown meat. “Serves that jerk right,” he says, trying to forget the way that Ford looks when he’s in pain, when he’s alone, when he’s hilariously betrayed. “My brother's had some stupid plans, but going up against an all-powerful space demon was his worst one yet.” He sinks into the chair that’s become his throne since he declared himself your new lord and master Chief. “Trust me, we have everything we need right here. Besides, I'm sure wherever the rest of the townsfolk are, they're fine.”

But he’s forgotten that the remote is sitting on the arm of the chair. When he slams his hand down to emphasize the point, the TV flickers on.

“This is Shandra Jimenez, reporting live from the inside of Bill's castle. Here for the first time are images of what's happened to the captured townsfolk. Viewers are advised to look away if they don't want to see their friends turned into a twisted throne of human agony.”

It’s just like the throne in his dreams.

Stan can’t breathe. He can’t speak. He doesn’t even twitch when Shandra is turned to stone on onscreen; he feels like stone himself.

“Is there no one who will save the people of this town? I'm Shandra Jimenez, and I'm being turned into stone by a flying eyeball.”

Why is this so familiar? Why does some part of him feel p r o u d ?

what ã̵̢̧̫̣̭m̶̮͈̹̘̈͆ ̶̙͊̌̎İ̶̡̞͎͓?̶̡̧̹͉̭̀̇̃̉͝

#

The next few days are a blur. The kids build the Shacktron, and Stan complains, but his heart isn’t exactly in it. He knows there’s something wrong about what they’re doing. Something wrong wrong wrong about leaving their refuge and going to confront Bill’s weirdness. Especially with the kids. Please, not the kids, because every time he thinks about them meeting Bill, his heart starts pounding, and he can’t—he won’t—

Anyway. It’s all wrong, and mostly Stan tells himself that’s because Ford doesn’t deserve it.

That’s the easiest answer, the cleanest and most convenient way to make all the fearful jagged edges in himself make sense. Ford is an ungrateful son-of-a-bitch, he ASKED for trouble when he went to fight Bill, it’s absolutely REVOLTING that everyone’s calling him the hero and Stan the screw-up when Stan is the one who ran the numbers of their supplies vs. the caloric requirements of Manotaurs/humans/gnomes and came up with a meal-plan that didn’t have them eating the gnomes until Day 45. (Or maybe even later, because that Celestabellebethabelle has a lot of meat on her, and Stan’s starting to think he’d rather butcher her than the gnomes.)

But he can’t seem to make the kids see it that way. No matter what he says, they won’t listen, won’t stop trying to “Save Ford” as if his brother is both some kind of innocent daisy that needs protecting and also a mighty hero who’s going to save them all by . . . what, researching Weirdmageddon?

On the last evening, when the Shacktron is all but finished, Stan can’t bring himself to sit with the others around the campfire. Mabel knitted him an apocalypse sweater, but he doesn’t want to wear it. When the kids come looking for him, Stan tries to explain why he’s furious, but they won’t listen.

“Maybe people think Ford’s a hero because he didn’t want to hide in the Mystery Shack,” Dipper says, practically vibrating with disdain.

“Well, maybe if he hid in the Mystery Shack, he wouldn’t have been captured!” Stan snarls.

“Guys, guys!” Mabel proclaims, wrapping them into a hug. “Trust me, tomorrow’s going to be great! I believe in us.”

Stan shudders and thinks, But you don’t k n o w m e, shooting star.

This time, he remembers the thought after thinking it.

When he finally falls asleep that night, he dreams again.

#

It’s been 4.5 million years (give or take a few minor time paradoxes) since Bill got kicked out of the second dimension, and he thinks he’s doing pretty well for himself. Got a top hat, a bow tie, a cane that’s perfect for twirling, and also a couple thousand demonic bargains under his belt. He’s not one of the heavy-hitters yet—he still has to keep his head down when that bratty Time Baby sends his minions around—but soon.

Soon, he’s gonna be rich enough (all that power of summons answered and bargains fulfilled humming inside his angles) to go home and make several billion people real S O R R Y they ever kicked him out.

Right now, though, he’s still not quite as big a fish as he wants to be. So while the Nightmare Realm is almost completely his own personal domain, he’s still (prudently) sulking behind the remains of a strip-mined planet as the Axolotl reaches its once-in-a-millenium perigee that brings the (smug, insufferable) creature gets close enough to notice what’s up in these parts.

“What a fucking know-it-all,” Bill grumbles to himself. “Him and Time Baby, thinking they’re so special because they’re outside of normal spacetime. Well, guess what, soon you won’t be the only—”

Good morning, Bill Pines! Stanley Cipher!

He turns, and there it is, hovering in the ether-swirled void of the Nightmare Realm: Axolotl, the glorified cosmic salamander that could wipe him out of existence with a swipe of its tongue.

Excuse me, says the Axolotl. Was that the wrong order?

Bill finds his voice as he sweeps off his hat and gives the Axolotl an extravagant bow. “Name’s Bill Cipher, actually, but why doncha just call me a friend,” he says glibly. “Anything I can do for you?”

Not yet, says the Axolotl. But you will.

“Yeah?” says Bill, and can’t restrain a giggle. “Well, anything for you, frills. Shake on it?”

He thrusts his hand forward, blue flames snapping into existence. Fulfill a bargain with the Axolotl—a paracausal creature that exists outside normal spacetime—and he’ll practically be the Axolotl, that powerful that fast.

Yes, the Axolotl says cheerfully, ignoring his outstretched hand. You will do a great favor to me and all the multiverse, someday. So I am here to explain your reward.

Bill’s flames go out. “Oh?” he says, eye narrowing in suspicion.

The Axolotl stamps its feet a few time as if trying to dance, and then the absurd creature actually sings:

If you want to shirk the blame,

You’ll have to invoke my name.

One way to absolve your crime:

A different form, a different time.

Ugh. Bill can barely restrain himself from rolling his eyes. This is why he hates paracausal beings: so smug, so cryptic, so useless. If he ever attains that status, he’s absolutely going to tell all the puny mortals he meets exactly what they should do: buy gold and take his bargains.

You don’t believe me, the Axolotl says serenely. But I am going to save you, Cipher Pines. One day, you will be beyond anyone’s help but mine. If you call on me in that moment, I will answer, and bend time itself to let you return alive.

Bill blows a raspberry. “Seriously? Time is just the diaper of that toothless giant baby. Bending time is something any idiot with a juiced-up tape measure can do. Why don’t you reward me with something useful, like gold or—”

Then he realizes that the Axolotl is gone.

Bill huffs. “I’m the Axolotl, ooh, I’m so powerful, you can tell because I talk in stupid rhymes.” He twirls his cane. “What a rip-off.”

Eons later—after he builds up the power to become a being of pure energy and burn his home dimension, and after the ensuing trillion years that he’s imprisoned in the Nightmare Realm instead of just hiding in it—Bill has forgotten most of his conversation with the Axolotl. But he remembers the creature’s promise, and as his world burns around him, he shrieks: “Nruter yam I taht rewop tneicna eht ekovni i! Nrub ot emoc sah emit ym! L-T-O-L-O-X-A!”

#

Stan wakes up and he remembers.

He knows.

Not everything, of course. He’s pretty sure his puny meatbag human brain couldn’t ever contain the trillion-plus years of memories that Bill has lived.

But he remembers enough. He remembers being Bill Cipher. He remembers laughing at Ford’s pathetic indignation when he realized what was going on—looks like Mr. Brainiac finally got smart!—and he remembers being about to die and screaming for the Axolotl to save him.

Why the fuck did the Axolotl have to save him?

If the frilled idiot had to save him, why did it have to send him right back to be reborn among the people he’d hurt the most, to be Ford’s failure of a brother, Dipper and Mabel’s useless grunkle?

“Rise and shine, Grunkle Stan!” Mabel yells, leaning over him. Stan blinks and remembers where he is: sleeping outside, in the stockade around the Shacktron. Today’s the day they’re supposed to fight Bill and rescue Ford, and—

—Stan is—

“Grunkle Stan?” he hears Mabel say, worried now, but her voice is faint and distant. Another memory is coming back: playing a piano as he mocks Ford, we’ll meet again some sunny day, and Ford is in chains and the couch is upholstered with that skinny blond teenager who used to bag groceries at the Gravity Falls FoodMart, and you did this, Stanley Pines.

ẀͦĘ͇͒̽̃̆ͥͧ ̱͔̭̥̘̂͗̊D̙̬͓͍̿ͧ̾̈͑ÎDͫ̽ͥ̔ͮͅ ̬̩͡T͕̪̟̓̈H͖̬Í̗̟͚̟̑ͩͪ̋S̠͔͕̳̑͂

“Mabel? Did you break Grunkle Stan?” Dipper asks.

Stan blinks. He’s sitting up now, still half-in his sleeping bag, and both Dipper and Mabel are peering at him with a kind of concern that he doesn’t deserve.

“No!” Mabel yells. “He just needs some Mabel Juice and maybe kittens!”

Stan finds his voice. “Gonna pass on the kittens for breakfast, sweetie.”

“Not for breakfast!” Mabel protests. “For cuddles and LOVE, Grunkle Stan!”

“We don’t have any kittens,” Dipper points out.

“No, but I found a chipmunk that grew four extra heads, and that’s almost as good!” Mabel pulls a tiny, furry abomination out of her pocket and shoves it in his face.

Stan flinches back. He’s a monster. He shouldn’t be talking to them. He doesn’t deserve it.

He can’t let them down.

His head is buzzing and full of broken glass, but somehow Stan finds the strength to crawl out of his sleeping bag and stand up.

“C’mon, kids,” he says, feeling like each word is scraped through a cheese-grater. “I’m fine! Want some gluten-free Stancakes? I call ’em that because it sounds better than ‘butter-and-gnome-hair-cakes.’”

He makes it through breakfast, barely. But now that the wall in his mind is broken, the memories keep coming. Every thought is a step onto broken glass. Every moment, he’s reminded that Stan Pines is a lie, a lie he told until he didn’t know he was lying anymore, but all his lying couldn’t make it true.

After breakfast, everyone but him gets to work putting the final touches on the Shacktron. Stan sees Dipper heft the welding torch, sparks flying, and he barely manages to bolt behind a tree before he vomits.

Because this new memory, for him it’s in the past, but for his brother it’s right now: Ford strung up in chains, screaming as five hundred volts of electricity rip through his body.

It’s his own fault! It could stop any time!

Stan hears the echo of his old thoughts and gags again. He smells the memory of his twin’s flesh cooking, and he wishes he could just—just lie down and die before he turns into that thing.

But he’s already been that thing. He remembers dying—so Bill does go down—but he doesn’t remember how it happened or when, or who else died first.

And Ford is, right now, still suffering.

Stan’s good-for-nothing and a coward, but he’s never, ever backed down from going to help Ford. And as he shudders and leans against the tree, Bill’s memories washing through him, he’s starting to form the beginnings of a plan.

#

Ford wants to die.

That’s nothing new, which should probably worry him more than it does.

But right now, it’s a perfectly rational wish. Because Bill has him captive, nobody is—thankfully—coming to rescue him, so every second Ford is alive is another chance he could break and give Bill the equation.

(And his deaths haven’t been particularly permanent lately, anyway.)

Ford hasn’t said anything yet. He hopes he won’t. He keeps thinking of Dipper and Mabel and Stanley, reminding himself how they trusted him, and he knows that he can’t.

Can’t and won’t have no meaning anymore, IQ!

But it’s hard. Bill can heal any damage he inflicts, and he revels in that: fire and lightning, claws and acid. The floor of the Fearamid is painted with blood and gore, and Ford wonders, dizzily, if there’s anything left of his original bodily fluids. If what’s now pumping through his veins and churning in his gut is all just Bill’s weird simulacrum.

If somehow Dipper and Mabel can somehow defeat Bill and reverse Weirdmageddon . . . will Ford be sucked back into the Nightmare Realm along with the Henchmaniacs, too much one of them to be saved?

Maybe Bill hears that thought, despite the metal plate. Probably he just knows Ford well enough, after all these years. Because eventually, after a certain length of time-is-dead eternity, Ford wakes up hanging from his chains again.

“Heya, Sixer!”

Bill hovers over him, a massive godlike golden presence, and there’s still some shameful, craven part of Ford’s mind that wants to worship him. To submit and surrender, because at least puppets don’t hurt quite this much.

“I won’t,” he whispers between dry, cracked lips. “I won’t.”

Bill laughs, shrill and triumphant. “Huff and puff all you want, Fordsy! We both know you were never a real boy. Without your meathead bro to defend you or ol’ Fiddleford to help you or M E TO INSPIRE YOU, all you’ve ever been is six fingers and a superiority complex stacked inside a trench coat.”

Suddenly Bill is small again, twirling in dizzying circles around Ford’s head. “But that’s why I picked you! Because it means you only THINK you’re a hero. You helped me make that portal and you’re gonna help me take down the barrier.”

As Bill rambles on, Ford remembers his fight with Stanley after Mabel brought back the unicorn hair. He can’t believe that he nearly said his brother was like Bill, that he even thought it for a second.

Stanley is reckless and selfish and probably would like it best if Ford always agreed with him. But he never actually tried to make him into a puppet: during his years of wandering, Ford finally came to believe that breaking the science project was an accident after all, and since he got back, Stanley’s done nothing worse than sulk at him.

Stanley would never slide his hand between Ford’s ribs and twist.

Stanley has never really wanted to hurt him, and Ford holds onto that thought as he dies choking on his own blood.

#

There’s no tracking time while he’s dead, but Ford still feels like it’s only a little while later that breath rattles into his lungs and he wakes up, hacking and shuddering as he lies doubled-up on the floor.

Do Bill’s powers extend to reversing complete cellular brain-death, or is he bound by the same deadline as humanoid EMTs across dimensions? It’s an interesting question, but one on which Ford can’t hope to obtain any solid data.

He can’t hope for much of anything now. But though he’s lying in a puddle of his own blood—and possibly some stray organ tissue, which Ford is trying very hard not to think about—at least he’s not in any pain at the moment.

(One thing he learned, on the run across dimensions, was to be thankful for whatever he could get.)

“Welcome back to the party, pal!” Bill hovers over him, still the same small size as when he shoved his hand into Ford’s chest and pulped his heart.

Ford doesn’t respond, instead focusing on slow breaths. His hands are shaking, but he knows that’s purely psychosomatic; Bill’s healing techniques are flawless.

Not for the first time, Ford thinks grimly that it’s lucky Jheselbraum had inscribed the metal plate with mystic symbols of the Axolotl before she put it into his head. At the time, he’d thought it was superstition. Now he’s pretty sure it’s the only reason Bill hasn’t simply ripped it out, healed the damage, and taken what he wants from Ford’s brain.

Tiny fingers flick his nose. “Hey, don’t get lost in your thoughts there, Brainiac! I’ve got a present for you.”

Ford grunts as he hauls himself into a sitting position. “Whatever you can give me, I want no part of, Cipher.”

“Aww, but you haven’t even heard my offer! See, I’ve been thinking. It must be getting pretty hard for you to keep track of your ‘heroic deaths’”—Bill makes actual air quotes—“so howzabout I give you a hand? Every time you die, you get another EYE.”

And he snaps his fingers.

The world splinters. No, the world is holding steady, but Ford’s vision is swimming and shattering. Sometimes he’s seeing double, sometimes there are weird dark patches—he blinks and it’s like the whole world shudders, and there’s a weird ticklish feeling in his cheek—

“Ladies and gentlemen and other nameless, horrifying things,” Bill carols, thought none of the Henchmaniacs are currently present. “Let’s all congratulate Fordsy on finally living up to his potential.”

There’s suddenly a huge, gilt-framed mirror in Bill’s hands. Ford can’t help looking into it, and he sees—

it’s a lie it’s a lie Bill always lies but he also tells the truth when he knows it will hurt the most

—his own face, a little paler than usual, but that doesn’t matter because Ford can’t look away from the third eye that’s growing out of his cheek, blinking in time with his other eyes.

He tries to tell himself that three eyes aren’t any stranger than six fingers, but he knows it’s a lie. One is a known human mutation. The other is . . . Bill.

“Isn’t it perfect?” Bill crows. “Gotta say, I’m hoping you hold out a while longer. So by the time you give up and join us, you’ll really look the part.”

#

Stan had absolutely refused to let anyone even think about touching the Stanleymobile for Shacktron parts, so he’s got transportation covered. And everybody is used to him refusing to help with construction, so he has no trouble slipping away.

Minutes later, he’s speeding down the highway like a bat out of hell, desperately trying to remember everything he can about Bill.

This is going to work. He pretty sure it’s going to work, because Bill is exactly the kind of guy that Pop was best at scamming in the pawn shop: the smart guy who knows he’s smart, and thinks he deserves a little something extra.

If he’s gotta admit it—and the world is literally ending, his windshield wipers are starting to jam from the blood rain, what better time is there—Stan knows he’s that kind of guy himself, and he knows that’s why he never made it big as a con artist. He was good, but he was always a little too eager to get what he thought he had coming, and usually that meant he got the other kind of “what he had coming.”

Bill is a lot more clever than Stan ever was. But he’s also a lot more that kind of guy.

And Bill didn’t start out as a being of pure energy with no weaknesses: Stan remembers that much. He made himself into one through the power of deal upon deal, and deals with other dealers, a pyramid scheme of escalating demonic power until he was able to rewrite his own existence.

Pyramid scheme, hah. Even Stan was never enough of a sucker to try one.

And he knows all about how to rewrite yourself. Maybe better than Bill ever did.

By the time the Stanleymobile screeches to a halt in the shadow of the Fearamid, Stan can hear the lumbering steps of the Shacktron in the distance behind him. But he’s got his plan all worked out, so that’s okay.

Look him in the eye. Shake hands like a man. Lie until you can’t remember what’s a lie and what isn’t.

He steps out of the Stanleymobile, slams the door behind him. Squares his shoulders, and looks up at the sky.

“Hey, Bill!” he yells, but the words come out small and weak, drowned out by the vast weirdness around him.

Stanley draws a breath. He has to do this right. For the kids, he thinks. For your brother.

And he breathes in until his lungs are ready to crack, and his fingers are splayed and his eyes are watering, and then he yells with all the power of his recovered memories:


“HEY, BILL! W̙͓̯̖͍̟̌̑̀́A̜̻̺͖̅ͭN̝͖̖̦̥̤͠T̬̤̦͔̝̥̖͗͗ ̶̦ͨ̎͋ͩT̼̠͚ͩͣ͛͌͂ͤ̑O̥̘͉͈ ̢̱͍̗̓ͣͯ͊K̺̳͉̙͚̬̬̇ͣ̅Ň̼ͦ͒̿ͪ̃̉̕Ô̟͕̠̜͉̻ͣͤ̈ͤ͆́ͅW̸̖̩͕̲̱͍͙̌ ̤͕̤̲̦̳̎̅̅̅T̪͔ͨ̄͛ͯͩ́͂H̩̟̲͕̱͈̪͒ͫ̃ͤ̈Ē̴͔͕̜̮̜̩ ̷̱ͫ̍͒͑ͯ̒ͧẺͫͨͤ̏̍X̝̰͊̔̌A̲̠̖̮̪̽̂̅C̣̘̮̭̦̰̆̓T̵̰͖̝͔̥̩͕̑ ̡̜̹̜̌̚T̙̦̳̓ͮ̕I͕̯̭̝͍ͭM̜̘͕ͪ̉E̗ ̊̓͐ͪ̌̉͞A̘̞ͦ͑̑ͣ͑ͤN̯̠͓̜̬̩͍ͦ̈̈͂̿̍̿D̢̞̒̇ ̼͓̌̓̿̂̑D͇̪͆̌̎͊̅A̡̼͖͎̬̰̓T̲̤͎̹̥̤̟E̟̥̱͍͖̽ͯ̒̀̚ ͯ̌ͦ́Ö̏ͦ̊͗̎̌͟Fͤ̓ͮ̄̅͒̚ ͋̓ͣ̈́Ẏ̴̩̻̘̂̐̈́̀̅O͉͎̦Ṳ͔̤̗̪̮̫̒ͭͮ̀R̬ͥͧ̎̄̇̀ ̛̱͖ͭ̀D̵͖̫̽Ḛ̈̍͊̍͟ͅA̿̒̅ͫ͂ͯ͏̝̠T̟̲̥̍ͭ̓̐̿͘H̘͍͔͕̎̔̎̀?̐”

Dizzy, he leans against the Stanleymobile, his vision speckling and swimming as he pants for breath and wonders if anybody even heard him. If maybe he remembers nothing, he’s just crazy, and he’s about to be crushed into the ground—

“WELL well wellwellwellwellwell. Look who’s M E!”

Stan straightens and looks up. Bill is hovering before him, an enormous golden pyramid scheme with one all-seeing eye and one extremely vain bow-tie.

“Heya . . . me,” Stan drawls, slipping easily into his Mr. Mystery grin. “Looks like we got some catching-up to do.”

“I’ll say!” Bill carols. “C’mon, let’s have this talk somewhere more comfortable.”

He snaps his fingers, and the world whooshes and blurs around them. Suddenly they’re in a penthouse suite—oh, hey, it’s the room where he remembers taunting Ford, and the couch is still panting and licking the carpet. That’s a blast.

“Have a drink!” says Bill, as a martini glass appears in Stan’s fingers. “And tell me what you’re doing.”

Stan puffs out his chest, looking Bill right in the eye as he slurps from his drink. It tastes like fingernails and babies screaming.

“Ever heard of a stable time loop?” he asks. “Ever wanted to break one?”

Bill sinks down into a chair, eye narrowing. “I’m listening.”

“So you’re gonna die,” says Stan. “Not sure exactly when, but pretty soon now. And when you do, you’re gonna call on the Axoltol for help. He’ll keep his promise, but he’ll do it by making you get reborn as a three-dimensional meatbag. Me.”

“You,” says Bill. “Ugh.”

Stan makes himself laugh. “I know, right? I wasted thirty stupid years thinking Ford was my brother, and thirty more trying to bring him back. But I remembered the truth before that cosmic salamander ever expected, so we now have an opportunity.” He grins at Bill. “We don’t have to be just me or you. We can be both of us, and have—”

“—both our powers, twice over,” Bill finishes as he floats towards Stan. “If we’re in agreement.”

“Lemme tell you, living with a twin? It’s practically the second dimension.” Stan is stealing that thought from Ford, but he’s doing it to save Ford, so what the hell. “Just tell me how to access our power, and we’ll be so strong even the Axolotl can’t stop us. We’ll make that frilly ol’ fool regret he ever thought he’d put one over even half of us.”

Bill grins at him and slings an arm around his shoulders. “Well, that’s the kind of talk I like to hear.”

#

When Bill finally gets bored with torturing Ford and turns him back into a gold statue, Ford has six eyes.

Being gold is not like being dead. The world outside may be a dark nothingness to Ford, but he’s still vaguely aware of time passing, no matter how countless it is. He still waits, his whole existence itching with the need to move, move, do something.

Then the void cracks around him. As soon as he can act again, and the light dazzles his (six) eyes—

The first thing Ford does is cringe, hunching in on himself because he knows Bill is here, is about to hurt him again.

“Grunkle Ford!” Mabel yells.

Even as his heart leaps in hope, the next thing Ford does is press his hands to his face, because he knows the kids are looking at him. They accepted his six fingers, but that’s an almost normal human mutation. Six eyes is nothing but monstrous, and he can’t bear—they can’t see him—

“What happened to you?” Dipper asks.

A small body slams into his chest. “We were so worried!” says Mabel, her arms wrapping around him.

Once again, Ford finds himself defeated and shamed by their honesty. He drops his hands and meets their worried eyes.

“Kids,” he says, wishing he could put more joy into the words. “You did it.”

The other townsfolk are staring at him and muttering, but Ford knows that doesn’t matter. He’s never been anything but a freak, even before Bill got to him. If the four extra eyes pocking his face mean he has to spend the rest of his life hiding in the Mystery Shack’s basement, well . . . it’s more of a happy ending than he thought he’d get when he ventured into the Nightmare Realm with his quantum destabilizer.

(At least Stanley will be happy, a bitter, treacherous part of his mind whispers.)

What matters is stopping Bill. What matters is setting things right, and Ford can bear any kind of shame to accomplish that.

“You rescued me so you could find out Bill’s secret weakness, didn’t you,” he says to the room at large, though the only person’s eyes he can bring himself to meet are Dipper’s.

Dipper flinches. “Well—that’s not the only reason—”

“It’s the only reason that matters, my boy!” Ford’s heart is pounding and his stomach is churning, but now that he has a goal within his reach, it’s all right. “Anyone have a pen? Pencil? Anything?” He sees a can of spray-paint on the floor and grabs it. “Perfect!”

It takes only a few minutes to paint the zodiac on the floor and explain its significance. Miraculously, there seems to be somebody present for every symbol. One person after another steps onto the wheel, joining hands with each other, and as the rest of the townsfolk flee, mystical energy starts to flow through the members of the zodiac.

There’s only one gap left, right next to Ford.

“We just need one more person,” he says, and then his mouth goes dry as he looks at the fish symbol and realizes—finally allows himself to realize—exactly whom they’re missing. “. . . Stanley?”

Mabel bites her lip as Dipper hunches his shoulders.

“He . . . didn’t come with us,” Dipper admits.

“I’m sure he had a good reason!” Mabel proclaims loyally.

“Who cares, I’ve never held hands for this long, and I am VERY uncomfortable!” the teenager in a black hoodie complains.

Dread is clawing at Ford’s stomach, his heart and his lungs, but before he can manage to say anything—

“Oh no, it's Bill!” A triangular shadow falls across the zodiac as Ford’s god personal nightmare looms over them. “Right? Isn’t that what you’re all thinking?”

Bill isn’t alone. There’s somebody beside him, standing tall and proud with a puffed-out chest.

Stanley.

His eyes have turned yellow with slit pupils, which should mean he’s possessed, except that Bill is right here beside him with an arm slung over his shoulders.

Like they’re friends. Like they’re brothers.

“Haha, this is just too perfect!” Bill chortles. “Don’t you brainiacs know that the zodiac only works if all the people in it want to defeat me? Say hello to my new best FRIEND!” He slaps Stanley between the shoulders.

“Hey!” Wendy yells. “Whatever you’ve done to Mr. Pines, let him go!”

“You’ve gone too far, Cipher!” Gideon adds.

“I ain’t afraid to throw down with ya!” Fiddleford shouts, hefting his banjo.

“Oh, but YOU SHOULD BE!” Bill thunders, and snaps his fingers. Instantly, all the members of the zodiac except Dipper, Mabel, and Ford are frozen by Bill’s power, and then they’re floating up into the air and transforming into banners. A pyramid cage of blue latticework closes over Dipper and Mabel, while a red tendril of Bill’s power wraps around Ford, binding him in place.

Ford’s mouth is dry, his heart is fluttering, and that wouldn’t matter, he’d be able to keep fighting against any odds except—

—except—

Stanley is still beside Bill, grinning up at the banners in a smug way that’s all him, as if he’s actually thrilled to see Soos and Wendy’s terrified faces turned into decorations.

“Haha!” Stanley barks, slapping his thigh. “Wish I coulda done that a few years ago.”

“Oh no,” Dipper moans. “Grunkle Stan, what happened to you?”

Ford remembers how Stanley once growled, Some brother you turned out to be, and he’s gripped by the fear that Stanley has simply decided to replace him.

Bill cackles. “Aww, that’s so cute how you think your ‘Grunkle Stan’ actually exists. Don’t you know a scam when you see it?”

“Whatever Bill told you, he’s lying!” Mabel shouts. “He’s the one who turned Dipper into a sock puppet and stuck forks in his arms!”

“And literally ended the world,” Ford clarifies automatically.

“Pretty sure you did that, Sixer,” Stanley says, crossing his arms.

Ford flinches. “I know, Stanley, but—”

“But nothing!” Bill proclaims. “Your ‘twin brother’ was nothing but a meatbag skinsuit for my reincarnation. And now you’ve only got one chance left. Tell us how to take Weirdmageddon worldwide, and I’ll spare the kids!”

Mabel blows a raspberry. “Yeah, right. Grunkle Stan would never let you hurt us!”

“Don’t toy with me, Shooting— AHHH! CUT IT OUT!”

Bill staggers back, clutching his eye as Mabel brandishes a can of spray paint. “I know that hurts,” she says cheerfully, “because I’ve accidentally done it to myself multiple times!”

Without missing a beat, Dipper is already using the size-changing crystals to grow their cage until the latticework is big enough for them to jump through.

“You get through to Grunkle Stan!” Dipper yells. “We’ll take care of Bill!”

“Yeah!” Mabel cheers. “We beat him before—”

“—and we’ll beat him again!” Dipper finishes, exchanging a fist-bump with her.

A moment later, they’ve fled down a tunnel of the Fearamid. Bill roars in anger as he turns blood red. His power grips Ford again, who chokes and shudders, trying to steel himself against the pain he knows is coming—

“Hey, you go get the kids,” Stanley says, the gruff annoyance in his voice so normal that it’s comforting and nauseating at the same time. “I’ll have a chat with my little bro.” His voice turns sly and teasing. “Betcha I can make him talk before you get back.”

For a moment, Bill hesitates. Then he says, “You’re on,” and snaps his fingers. Suddenly the blue chains are back around Ford’s neck and wrists, though thankfully he’s still on the ground, not strung up in the air.

“See ya RE͡A̧L̵ ͡SO͠ON,” Bill sneers, just at Ford, his voice thrumming with the promise of pain and blood. Then he’s gone, roaring down the tunnel after the children, and Ford is alone with his brother.

With the thing that might have once been his brother.

“Stanley,” he says tentatively, “what did you . . .”

His voice trails off as Stanley turns to look at him, yellow eyes piercing and intent.

“Listen, Ford,” he says, his voice low and rough, “I don’t know how long we have, so. You’re just gonna have to trust me.”

He reaches out as if to put a hand on his shoulder, but Ford flinches, and Stan jerks back. There’s hurt plain on his face, and it looks real—but so do his yellow eyes.

“Is it true?” Ford asks, dizzy with dread. “Are you—Bill?”

“I’m scamming Bill,” Stan hisses, “and if you just trust me, then I can—”

“Are you a reincarnation of Bill Cipher?” Ford grits out.

Stanley’s shoulders slump. “Yeah. Surprise. Turns out you’re not the worst brother in the world.”

He was expecting the answer, and yet Ford still feels gutted by it. He thinks bitterly of the evening in the basement when he nearly accused Stan of being like Bill. He’d felt so ashamed then, but he wasn’t ashamed enough. Not clever enough, not suspicious enough—he still hasn’t learned his lesson, he’s never stopped being the naive fool that Bill found so hilarious—

It would be fun to watch you try! Cute, even!

“Ford. Ford!” Stanley’s gripping his shoulders. “Listen. It’s okay. I’ve got a plan.”

A harsh, hysterical laugh rips out of Ford’s lungs. “Of course you do. You’re the plan.”

“I can stop Bill,” Stanley says urgently. “I can turn his power against him. But I have to—I can’t do it until somebody makes a bargain with me.”

Ford realizes where this is going, and his throat closes up. “I’m not that much of a fool.”

“Please,” Stanley begs. “You gotta trust me. Look, I—I know I was always a shit brother, but do you really think I’d ever hurt the kids?”

Does he?

Ford stares at the alien, yellow-eyed face of his brother. He knows how Stan loves those kids, he’s seen it every day since he got back—but he knows what Bill has done to them (he remembers what Bill has done to him) and if Stan is Bill, if even a fraction of that monster remains inside his skull, then surely there’s no way—

Gargantuan footsteps echo down the hallway. Stan jumps away from Ford as Bill climbs back into view, Dipper and Mabel held in his fist.

“All right Stan, time’s up. I’ve got the kids. I think I’m gonna kill one of ’em now just for the heck of it!”

“You don’t need to,” Stanley shouts. “Me and Sixer worked out a deal.” He glances back at Ford. “Right?”

“No!” Dipper yells. “Grunkle Ford, don’t trust him!”

Ford looks into Stanley’s yellow eyes, and no matter how he tries, he can’t see anything except the brother who once stood between him and the bullies.

This is a trick, he thinks.

This isn’t a trick.

Stan kneels before him and holds out a hand. “Hey. Trust me, Ford. Take my hand.”

The words are pure reflex. “I won’t. I won’t let you into my mind.”

Bill cackles in the background. “Didn’t I tell you, Stan-o-War? Fordsy doesn’t trust you. He never did and he never will.”

But as he says that, Stan’s fingers are ghosting over Ford’s face, tracing the rims of his four new eyes, not recoiling.

Even when everything was the worst and most fucked-up between them, Stan never flinched from him.

“Sixer,” he breathes, “please.”

And maybe Ford is a fool, maybe he’s wising up for the very first time. Maybe he’s giving up and maybe he’s holding onto hope.

“What do you want,” he rasps.

Blue flames dance around Stan’s hand.

“Here’s the deal,” he whispers. “I’m gonna heal you. And you’re gonna let me in, from now until the end of time. And I’m gonna save you.”

Ford looks into the eyes of his brother, and for the first time in more than forty years, he trusts.

“It’s a deal,” he breathes.

Six fingers wrap around five, and they shake hands.

#

Oh, this is perfect.

This is everything.

Stan laughs and stretches and remembers and LAUGHS, as a trillion years of power and madness rush back into his memories. He’s been so little, for so long. Remembered nothing except a puny mortal life starting in Glass Shard Beach, had no dreams except clinging to a brother who never really wanted him.

Now he’s whole again. Now he can T̤̻̩̖̃ͥ͜A̼͈͚͈̰̰̼̿K̗̩̺͈ͬ̑̋̀E̎͊̐͐́ whatever he wants, and it doesn’t matter who trusts or believes in him.

Except it does matter. Stan looks at Dipper and Mabel’s terrified faces, at Ford who’s leaning forward in his chains, desperate hope in his eyes, and they all matter.

what’s h a p p e n i n g to me

First things first. Stan turns to Ford, presses a hand to his face—feels a little gasp against his palm and wants to vomit—and then he wills the four extra eyes to close.

For the first time since they were ever born, Ford obeys him. His new eyes dissolve into smooth skin and are gone.

“Aww, Stan-o-War,” Bill says, and his voice drips with sympathy but Stan can hear the warning there as well. “Don’t tell me you’re going soft.”

“Course not,” Stan says, turning to face him and squaring his shoulders. “Hey, Bill, guess what?

I

renounce

e̱̣̰̪̫̓v̲͔͈͔̈̆̽̂͢ě͍͇̦̣̏̓ͅṟ͚̯͙͇̯̆ͣ̐̒̊y͎͇͓̙͖̤͚th̛̩̱͕͋̋i̷͎̮ͮͬn͉͎͔ͪ̒ͦ̚g̟͉̹̅̾͑̌͛

that is owed us.”

For a moment there’s nothing but stunned, empty silence.

Then Bill screeches, “WHAT?” as blue flames start to dance around the edge of the room.

“Everything,” Stan repeats, grinning as he feels it: the cosmic unweaving of deals, the infinite horror of unpayable debts coming due. “The whole pyramid scheme you built your power on—it’s all going down, Bill.”

“You can’t! You won’t! You don’t want this!” Bill is an inch away from his face, waving his hands. “We’re linked on planes of existence you can’t imagine. You’ll go down with me! Your entire existence unravelled by the laws of meta-causality!”

Stan shrugs. “Eh, not like I was doing anyone any good before.”

Bill’s attention shifts to Ford. “You idiot! Don’t you realize you’re destroying your own brother along with me? Back out of the deal or—”

“No,” Ford says heavily, grimly. “I trust my brother. If he chose this—I trust him.”

Something ragged and broken in Stan’s heart heals over. He grins down at Bill, not caring about the pain that’s starting to sear the edges of his existence.

“Y’know what, Bill? We’re a pair of real wise guys. But we made one fatal mistake. You let me have a family.”

Bill shudders. The flames are closing around both of them now, the power of metaphysical deals unbound eating them both up.

“You’re making a big mistake! You could have anything! Money, fame, power, your own galaxy—what’s happening to me—” His body swells, distorts, and then finally Stan hears the words he’s already remembered: “Nruter yam I taht rewop tneicna eht ekovni i! Nrub ot emoc sah emit ym! L-T-O-L-O-X-A!”

A stable time-loop. Bill didn’t break it after all.

As the All-Seeing Eye crackles and deforms and breaks apart into dead, meaningless static, Stan sinks to his knees.

It’s over. He’s done it, saved his family, gotten the only wish he ever really wanted.

If he has to disappear for that to happen . . . it’s okay.

“Heh,” he whispers to the blue flames that are his whole world now. “Guess I was good for something after all.”

#

The world is saved.

Weirdmageddon is over, Bill is defeated, the sun is shining from a clear blue sky. Ford is standing unchained in the woods, healthy and whole and feeling nothing but a gaping hole in his chest, because Stanley isn’t here.

Because his brother sacrificed himself, erased himself so they could all live.

It doesn’t matter, Ford realizes, exactly how much of Stanley came from Bill, how closely they were connected through impenetrable laws of causality and magic. The only thing that matters is what Stanley chose: to save his family at the cost of his own life.

It’s the only thing he’s ever chosen for a very long time. Ford desperately wishes he could tell Stanley that he understands that now, but he’s alone as he stands among the trees, afternoon sunshine on his face.

“Great Uncle Ford?” Dipper says hesitantly. “Are you okay?”

He turns, and sees the twins standing behind him, leaning on each other. (If only he had ever trusted Stan that way.)

“Where’s Grunkle Stan?” Mabel asks, her eyes big and worried.

“He . . .” Ford’s voice cracks. It takes him a moment before he can try to speak again. “He sacrificed himself for us. When he destroyed Bill, he . . . destroyed himself too.”

Ford knows this. He saw it happen. The blue flames had overwhelmed Stanley, unspooled him into a network of glowing lines that shimmered for only a moment before they were gone. As Bill’s Fearamid broke apart and the Henchmaniacs were sucked back into the Nightmare Realm, Ford had howled in a fury of grief and loss.

He can’t do that now. The kids are looking at him. He has to be strong for them.

“I’m sorry,” he says, kneeling down to put a hand on Mabel’s shoulder. “He’s gone.”

Mabel shakes his hand off. “No!” she says. “I know my grunkle’s out there somewhere!”

“He renounced the axiom of his existence in this universe,” Ford says helplessly. “I’m sorry, Mabel, but when a paracausal being—”

“Don’t they exist outside of time, though?” Dipper says suddenly, his eyes bright and sharp. “Didn’t you make a bargain with him, Uncle Ford?”

He renounced that bargain along with all the rest, Ford is about to say, but then he start to think about it. Every bargain is a connection that runs two ways. Stanley had renounced everything he was owed—

But he never renounced his debts.

Because, after all, that wasn’t his right. Only the people he owed could call him to account.

Ford straightens up, feeling like a fool but, for the first time in his life, truly not caring.

“Stanley!” he bellows to the empty air, the crushing loneliness in his chest, and the entire universe. “Stanley Rutherford Pines, you still owe me. From now until the end of time!”

“Yeah!” Mabel shouts. “You said you were gonna give me french braids for my birthday, and you still haven’t! I’m not even thirteen yet!”

“And—and you said you’d give me your joke book!” Dipper adds, crossing his arms.

“If you don’t pay up, then you have to sing the Stan Wrong Song again!” Mabel yells. “THIRTY-FIVE MORE TIMES.”

Then there’s silence. The breeze whispers through the trees, and a bird chirps in the distance. Nothing happens, and Stanley is still gone.

Ford closes his eyes. Axolotl, he thinks, maybe prays. You owe me as well.

“Ugh,” Stan growls, “why is everyone having so many feelings?”

Ford’s eyes snap open. Stan is slouched at the base of a nearby tree, looking like his legs gave out from under him and he hasn’t bothered to try them again yet.

“Grunkle Stan!” Mabel shrieks, slamming into him.

“You’re alive!” Dipper shouts, joining the group hug a moment later. “I can’t believe it!”

“Yeah, yeah. I missed you knuckleheads too.” Stanley squeezes them both, tears glittering at the edges of his eyes. Then he looks up at Ford. “So, uh. Are we gonna be okay?”

Ford looks down at his brother, thinking of all the horrible things they’ve said to each other—done to each other—and all the necessary things they’ve left unsaid.

But now they have time.

He knows this isn’t over, isn’t fully healed. At some point he’ll wake up screaming and be terrified of Stanley. At some point, Stanley will be too overwhelmed by memories to even look at him. And sooner or later, they’ll have to talk about all the ways they hurt each other even before they knew anything about Bill.

But he’s ready to work at it. From now until the end of time.

“Yeah,” he says, kneeling down beside his brother, and takes his hand. “It’s a deal.”