Chapter Text
Ford sighed, he tried to not think on the past when he could. It mostly only hurt him. "I had built what was intended to be a perpetual motion machine for the Science Fair. It won first prize by a landslide- Not that that's saying much given the people in my home town."
Stan snickered, nodding. "Sixer's IQ put everyone to shame."
"IQ is actually a pretty misused and meaningless metric given the wide array of fields and styles of study and testing-"
"Love your lectures, hun, but you're going to get side tracked." Bill stopped Ford before he could get going. He's heard this rant far too many times, he's aware if Sixer gets going, there is no off.
"Ah- Right." Ford went red, chuckling. "My project was impressive enough, the talk captured the attention of one of the most prestigious colleges in my fields of study. West Coast Tech. If I could get in there, my career as a world renowned scientist was practically guaranteed-"
"As would Pa bein' able to mooch off Ford's riches." Stan chimed in, as they'd need to context for later. "Your great grandpa was no pile of sugar. He was pleased by very, very little. Least of all me and Six-"
"Six and me." Ford corrected, earning the pit from Stan's soda being chucked at him.
"Can it!" Stan laughed. "Point being. We felt like we had to earn his approval constantly. And he wasn't handin' that out easy."
Ford sighed, nodding. "Still.... he was impressed when our principal informed him West Coast was sending representatives to see my work, and possibly earn a scholarship. It seemed my life was finally in my favor...."
Stan frowned, glancing away. "Until I ruined it."
"What?? No- Stanley-" Ford sighed.
"I did. If I hadn't hit that table-"
"Did you or did you not tell me when you left, you swear you saw it moving again."
"Yeah, but-"
"I should have made sure it was alright. I knew I had bullies, and I knew it was important-"
"And whatever came loose was probably my fault. If I'd told you right when I got home what happened-"
"It was my project, Stanley. I should have kept an eye on it."
"Okay, I'm getting real lost here!" Mabel announced to end the bickering.
"Look- I didn't take hearing Ford might leave real well. I was young and stupid and didn't care how big the opportunity was, all I was hearin' is that I'd be alone. I ended up sneakin' into the school. Mostly 'cause it was one of the few places I could go without worry of Pa happening to catch me. My angry wandering landed me over by Ford's machine. In a burst of anger, I slammed a hand on the table, and a bit fell off and started to smoke. I panicked, and tried to fix it. Thought I did. Thing was still spinning after all. So..... I didn't tell Ford I touched it. I just went home, and went to bed."
"Some point over the night, it must have gave out entirely. When I revealed it to the representatives, it was as still as a rock." Ford sighed, holding Bill closer. "They wouldn't give me a chance to troubleshoot it, they just left. I discovered a bag of Stanley's favorite snack near my table, and assumed-"
"Rightly-"
"ASSUMED off VERY LITTLE evidence at the time. That Stanley had sabotaged me. I stormed home, and in my own fit of blind rage, began to yell at him without checking first that we were alone."
"Pa overheard that I ruined Ford's chance, and..." Stan swallowed a bit, the man still scared him a bit, even in death. "He was madder than I'd ever seen him."
Ford frowned, seeing his confident and bold brother shut down, even a little bit. "Pa threw him out without even a second thought. He didn't even let him pack. He quite literally threw him onto the street, and slammed the door on him."
"Ma packed me a quick bag, but.. I didn't even have a job. I was only 17. I only even had a car cause Gramps left it to me in his will, given I had helped him restore it over a few breaks."
Ford looked away, starring at the floor. "I didn't do a damned thing to stop Pa either."
"Stop him?? Six, what could you have POSSIBLY done?!"
"Not just close the window and leave you out there! You were begging for my help!"
"Of course I was, we were both dumb teenagers! Don't mean I blame you for walkin' away?? Who knows what that lunatic would've done if you'd tried to argue with him!"
"I could've talked him into letting you back inside! I could've explained how I wired it wrong- Or told him I forgot to check it! I could've said SOMETHING!"
"And he would've beaten you black and blue, Ford!"
Dipper and Mabel both paled, clinging to each other. The idea of a parent hurting their own kid that badly completely unimaginable to them both.
"I still should have TRIED! We were all each other had!"
"If you had tried to argue with him that YOU lost him the millions not me-" Stanley glanced to Ford's hand, the scars across the back ever present, decades later. "..........We already know what he woulda done, Six...."
Ford shoved his hands in his pockets on instinct. "It's my fault both our lives were ruined-"
"Like hell it is!" Stanley stood up. "I was bein' selfish!"
"I was being careless!" Ford snapped back.
"Sounds like the fault's with neither of you, dudes." Soos piped up, trying to ease the situation. The kids were trembling. "If anyone's to blame, it's your deadbeat dad."
Both elder twins paused their shouting match to stare at Soos.
"The only one overreacting was him." Soos shrugged. "You both had reasons to be mad. But.... no dad should just toss a kid aside..... Ya know?"
Stan frowned. Here he is bitching about his Pa when Soos' wasn't even around....
Ford sighed, rubbing his face. "....Regardless- I ended up going to Backupsmore after it all. The pressure to make something of myself was higher than ever. I knew I had to devote my every waking second to being worth all the hassle-"
Bill and Stan both glanced to Ford in worry at his wording.
"I busted my ass to go from undergrad to PhD three years ahead of schedule, and secured a hefty grant for research. And then, I was left to decide what to study with it. My whole life, I'd been teased for my six fingers, but that got my thinking about anomalies – things that were odd, unusual, statistically improbable. And according to my investigations, there was one place with a higher concentration of these things than anywhere else. Gravity Falls."
"Meanwhile, I was basically disowned from the family entirely." Stan gave his brother a moment to collect himself. "I still wanted to be in it tho, ya know?.... So. I tried to cut a big break. If I could become successful, Pa would let me come home. I just needed to find my niche. I sold and shilled anything and everything, going anywhere I could to hunt down my shining moment. It...uh.... Never really panned out."
Ford held Bill's hand, smiling softly. "It took no time at all for me to discover this town is chalk FULL of anomalies. I began to document them all in a journal-"
"The journals!" Dipper cheered in excitement, sending soda splattering across the wall as he threw his hands up in joy. Dipper went red to find everyone starring at him. "Sorry....... Just got- excited.... Journals- ..... Go on."
"I began to keep a journal-" Ford ignored Dipper's noises of excitement. "The more I studied, the more I found. And the more questions they gave me. Where did it all COME from?? Why HERE?? What did it all MEAN?!" Ford sighed. "I hit a dead end. The pieces were all there, and I just could not figure them out.... In my frantic attempts to solve this town, I became more bold in where I'd journey. Until one day, I found a cave full of strange drawings-"
"We probably need to remove those-" Bill realized.
"Yeaaah.... Tomorrow." Ford nodded. "The cave depicted a being of immense knowledge and power. There was an incantation with them, that I read out loud. But nothing seemed to happen... Until I ended up taking an afternoon nap." Ford grinned. "And in my dreams, I met Bill. He told me he was a muse, who chose one mind every century to inspire."
Dipper raised a brow.
"Yeah, he was full of shit." Ford snickered.
"RUDE!" Bill cackled.
Ford snickered. "At the time, I believed it however. Especially when, with his guidance, my research took off. It wasn't long until I confessed to him my questions about the origin of it all. My desire to find and discover a theory or cause for all of it. He explained to me that he could help. That the weirdness in the falls was leaking in from another world, thru a thin point in the veil between realities. And that I could build a portal to it."
"Why lie?" Dipper side eyed Bill.
"The portal came with great risks, especially back then." Ford half lied himself. "The portal was intended as a way for Bill and his crew to escape their own realm that was actively decaying away, intent on taking them with it. And history had shown Bill time and time again that, when the dangers of the portal became clear, no one deemed them worth the risk to save."
Stanley side eyed his brother slightly. This was not what he was told thirty years ago.... Had something... changed? Stanley glanced to the rings on Ford's hand, and the gem on Bill's tie.... He'd ask when there weren't paranoid and antsy children around if that Revolution of Ford's was still on or not. For now, he sipped his soda to hide any reactions he may have.
"I couldn't build the portal myself, however." Ford sighed in frustration. "Engineering was.... not my major. But.... It WAS my old college roommate's major.... So, I called him up and asked if he'd want to work with me on a scientific breakthrough of unimaginable proportions. Fiddleford McGucket wasted no time rushing out here to assist me."
Dipper sat up straighter, tense.
"We got the portal ready for it's first test run at exceptional speeds. Unfortunately.. My carelessness in double checking things got the better of me once more. A cord had tangled around Fiddleford's leg in one of the gravity fluctuations. He got dragged halfway into the portal, only kept on our side by me clinging to the other end of the cable. When I managed to pull him free from it...."
Ford took a moment to breathe, trying to not get upset. "He was talking in tongues, babbling utter nonsense. Whatever he'd seen in that portal was too much for his mind to comprehend. He quit the project, convinced it was more dangerous than it was worth. I confronted Bill about it, and he confessed that the weirdness around us was not from some other dimension, and the portal was self serving. Still.... At some point in working for my Muse, I had become- Particularly fond of him." Ford chuckled, holding up his ring hand. "Clearly."
Mabel giggled happily at that. Love stories were always so sweet.
"But. I still couldn't do it alone. The test had ripped major parts of the portal apart, and I simply wasn't capable of handling it myself. So, I called up Stanley."
Stan smiled. "Free room and food for a bit of heavy lifting, AND I got my best friend back? He didn't need to ask me twice! I hightailed it out here, happy to help with whatever it was."
Ford smiled. "With Stanley's help, we got the portal up and running again in no time......" His smile fell. "Unfortunately. Fiddleford's accident, along with his over use of his memory gun, led him to be completely convinced Bill and the portal were both evil and out to destroy everything and every one. When he noticed the signs of the portal being used again, he rushed over to stop it. In the strife, I ended up shoved thru the portal entirely."
"The bastard shut it down right by the time I got there." Stan huffed. "Ford had tried to keep it quite that I was around, and that we looked pretty well identical to most people, specifically because of that nutjob. So when I barged in, it took the guy by surprise and he shot me. When he bolted for Sixer's journals, I tried to jump him. Being shot makes doing a lot of things pretty difficult. So... he got away with two of the three journals. Still... I had one. And that was something. So, I did my best to try to fix the portal and bring Ford home with it. But, I'm not as book smart as he is. Not back then, at least. I couldn't maintain his grants. ESPECIALLY not with 2/3rds of his research gone. So, I needed to figure out how to make ends meet while I tried to figure out how to save him. With a bit of investment from a friend-"
"A capitalist pig-"
Stanley chucked his soda can at Sixer's head. "Quit it!"
Ford didn't even have a moment to be upset, needing to focus instead on holding Bill down from lashing out.
"DON'T YOU THROW THINGS AT-"
"Easy! Easy, Love!" Ford held his tight, covering Bill's hands with one of his own so Bill couldn't light them on fire. "We're messing around! I'm not hurt!"
Stan raised his hands in surrender. Something deep in his mind bubbling up in long forgotten fear.
Bill huffed, simmering down. "When's that food getting here....."
"Go raid the fridge if you're hangry, dude." Soos got up to go help him find a snack. "Come on. I'll help you look, okay?"
"....Fine." Bill grumbled.
Ford cautiously let his hothead go. "This place is flammable you know."
"...." Bill crossed his arms and pointedly landed on the floor, walking his way to the kitchen.
Ford snickered gently, smiling fondly. His little Drama Angle.
Stan shook his head, shaking off the fear. "Anyways- I started the Shack to get by. But..... Stanley Pines?...... Had a loooot of people with a score to settle that, if they found me, would make saving Ford hard.... And.... Stanford?.... Well... Stanford had a deed to this place and could actually get permits to build on it..... So... I faked Stanley's death, to clear my past, and took up Ford's name, to secure his future."
Ford gave a nod. "I was not fond of the idea at first, but. His logic was sound. And it was my fault he was in my mess in the first place-"
"Don't even start again!" Stan laughed. "I made my bed, I lied in it. Okay?? It worked out in the end anyways. Now we just gotta go talk to Preston's lawyers to get Stanley undead, and you hopefully cleared of several-crimes-I-may-or-may-not-have-commited-in-your-name-and-a-wedding-to-a-statue." Stan said in a hushed rush.
"WHAT?!" Ford leapt to his feet. Right as the doorbell rang.
"OH! PIZZA! BILL THERE'S PIZZA NOW!" Stanley rushed to the door to avoid Ford's fury.
Bill floated back over, munching a block of cheese. "What's got you so cranky?"
"I APPARENTLY need to get a divorce before we can get married thanks to STANLEY."
"........What?" Bill snickered. "To who??"
"Not who! WHAT!" Mabel cheered happily, grabbing out her scrapbook and showing a picture of Goldie.
If looks could kill, Ford would be starring bloody gruesome murder into Stanley's back.
Bill doubled over in laughter.