Stan Pines pulled open the front door of his brother's home, bracing himself against the biting wind that immediately blew in. He pulled his ratty coat tighter around himself and leaned over to pick up the bucket of wood signs, the hammer, and the nails sitting by his side, then went to inch over the threshold. Once he was outside he shut the door with his hip, not even bothering to lock it, and stepped out onto the snowy ground.
It had been three weeks since he opened up the shop. Three weeks, and nearly a month since his brother had disappeared through the mysterious portal. It was still hard to believe how long ago it had happened. Each and every day the shock of it still washed over him like a fresh stab to the chest, and each and every day he came no closer to finding a solution that would bring his twin back.
Stan could only take solace in the fact that the world didn't deem him a complete lost cause. Now that he was running a steady business he shifted most of his focus onto it instead of the portal. Though he still went down to check on the machine on a nightly-basis, it filled him with pride he had never felt before. Working brought money streaming right into his arms, and that money went straight into paying his brother's house bills. The longer he was able to hold the place up, the higher the chance that somehow, eventually, he would find a way to rescue him.
"Do-do-do, gonna go hang up some signs," Stan sung to himself, swinging the bucket a little. Snow crunched beneath his boots as he trudged into the woods. At about every other tree or so he would stop to hammer up a sign, then continue forward. It had become much of a routine, and at one point about ten minutes in he accidentally struck his own finger with the hammer instead of the nail. For nearly a minute he stood with the bleeding digit in his mouth, mumbling curses around it and mentally slapping himself for not bringing any gloves with him.
After that things went smoothly again. The amount of signs Stan had left to hang up was quickly dwindling, and content filled him at the prospect of his little gimmick bringing in boatloads of new customers.
He was, in fact, so drawn into the mental image of it that he didn't notice the stray branch jutting out into the path in front of him.
"Gah!" he exclaimed, nearly tripping over the bramble. It snagged his pant leg, and he gazed down at it, giving a few small tugs. When that didn't work he dropped the bucket and grabbed his pant leg with two hands, pulling harder. Eventually it lost its grip on the fabric and Stan stumbled back.
"Haha! Victory!" he cheered, pumping a fist in the air. He turned around, throwing his arms out high to the treetops. "Nothing can hold back 'ol Stan Pines! Nothing can hold—"
Almost immediately Stan went silent. He slowly lowered his hand, his eyes widening.
There, about twenty feet off, a gargantuan creature kneeled in front of one of the trees, prodding at one of the signs Stan had hung up with a clawed finger. Thick fur lined its muscly back and small mushrooms grew from its shoulders, a spectacular sight in itself. Was this one of the oddities he had come to learn Gravity Falls was infested with?
Stan wasn't a stranger to the creatures that lurked around town. During the first week of his isolation he had poured over every page of the journal his brother left behind, right down to the random blots of ink and the coffee stains. That meant reading up on all of the bizarre creatures the man had encountered in Gravity Falls, and Stan would have thought it all to be false, if a few days after that he hadn't come across a gnome and a squirrel in the middle of a heated game of chess in one of the spare rooms.
He shivered at the memory, then straightened up and raised a fist. "Hey buddy! Thing! Whatever you are!" he shouted. "What do you think you're doing? That's my shoddy overpriced advertising you're messing with over there!"
The thing ceased its poking and turned to look back at him. Two glowing red eyes seared right into his own, and it made Stan's stomach flip.
"Yeah, I'm talking to you! Stop!"
Snarling, the thing stood up, turning around to completely face him with two large stomps that shook the snow off of some nearby trees. It unfolded its body until it was standing at full height, a good four feet above Stan, its lips pulling back to showcase two rows of sharp, glinting teeth in addition to two large tusks that jutted up from its gums. It took a few steps toward him.
Stan's eyes widened. Suddenly afraid, he dropped the bucket of signs and began backing away slowly, hands up in a show of no harm. "Hey, you know what? I...I changed my mind. Mess with my sign if you want. Mess with all of 'em for all I care!"
It continued to draw closer. Fifteen feet, ten, five. The angry sneer never fell from its face.
"I'm warning you!" Stan cried. "I haven't showered in at least a week, and I won't taste good if that's what you're wondering!"
He tripped over his words, and eventually onto his rear end as well. The thing let out an inhumane roar and immediately rushed the last few feet forward. In less than a second it swooped Stan up into one large hand, causing a yell to rip from his throat.
"Hey, what are you doing?" Stan yelled, wriggling and struggling in its strong grip. He kicked and beat his fists against its meaty arms with all the strength he possessed. "Let me go! Let me go you…you thing!"
It didn't relent. Instead its eyes began glowing a bright yellow, and the sight of it made Stan ram his fists even harder against it. "You wanna give me that look?" he yelled. "Fine, buddy! Have it your way! But I was a boxer once and I'm not afraid of you!"
Stan reared his head forward to stare into the creature's face. Within seconds, though, his threatening scowl loosened. Panicked, he tried opening his mouth, tried turning his head, anything to get away from the beast. But no matter how hard he tried all his efforts were in vain. Immediately his own eyes began glowing the same yellow as the creature's, and before he knew it his body went limp in its grasp.
…
Nothing but inky blackness surrounded Stan on all sides. It closed in on him, squeezing him, suffocating him. He sucked in a few ragged breaths, blinking rapidly as if it would make darkness subside. It didn't, and for a few moments he struggled to keep his breathing under control.
A loud click sounded overhead. Stan whipped his head up, trying to locate the source of the noise only for a burst of bright light to suddenly blind him. He cringed at the intensity of it and rubbed his eyes. When his vision came back he found that he was still sitting in darkness, but now a fixed bit of light was shining down on him from above.
"Hello?" he called out, wincing at the crack in his voice. "Can anyone tell me where in the heck I am? And how I can possibly get out of here?"
No voice met him back, not even a sound. Before Stan's mind could conjure up any horrible thoughts as to where he could be, another light flicked on about ten feet in front of him. A figure emerged from the darkness under it, murky at first, and then it grew clearer around the edges. Stan's eyes widened in recognition.
"Mom…?" he choked out.
In front of him stood his mother just as he had seen her last. Her usually bright eyes were clouded over with tears and wet tracks trailed down her cheeks, smudging her make-up.
"Stanley, how could you?"
He winced at how broken her voice sounded, confusion ebbing into his tone. "Ma, I don't—"
"We could have had it all," she continued, cutting him off. "Your brother's invention would've made us rich and then we would've sold the shop and moved out of that cramped apartment, just like we'd always dreamed of." She paused, her entire body trembling with a hiccup. "We could've…we could've had better lives. And all because of you those hopes were crushed. All because of you we ended up having to give up the apartment."
"What?" His eyebrows shot up. "Ma, I had no idea, no one ever called, I—"
"You ignoramus," someone else called out. Stan's blood heated and then turned to ice at the sound of that deep, growling voice. A third light flipped on from overhead, and his father came stepping out of the shadows, right next to his mother. His pointed dress shoes clacked on the ground as he strode toward Stan. "Look at what you just did. You made your poor mother cry. You good-for-nothing twat."
"Dad…"
"All you ever did when you were around was make our lives miserable." Anger stirred in his eyes, visible even behind his dark glasses. "Stanford's invention was gonna make us millions and we were gonna live it up far, far away from that slum city. But because of you…because of you…"
"I'll make it up to you!" Stan suddenly exclaimed. He scrambled up onto his knees and threw out his hands, newly-found enthusiasm flickering in his eyes. "To both of you! I'll, I'll…"
"You were a mistake the second you came out of your mother."
Stan froze. He slunk back down to the ground, his father's words hitting him hard. His throat closed up. His mouth went dry. He couldn't find it in himself to say anything – he could only stare off into the empty space next to the man, eyes dull and unseeing.
A distant movement swam into the edge of Stan's vision, and he turned. His expression immediately brightened and he reached out, eyes sparkling with hope. "Ford!"
His brother took a step forward, head tilted to the ground. His hair was a gnarled mess and his clothes, which had to have been neatly pressed and clean at one point in time, were rumpled from days of being worn on-end. He didn't say anything, just stared silently to the ground.
"Ford, I, I…tell them," Stan pleaded. "Tell them it was all an accident. Tell them I never meant to do any harm."
Ford lifted his head, and Stan cringed. The man's face was covered with stubble and his eyes were sunken deep into his tired face. Even from a few feet away Stan could see how bloodshot they were, could see the thin veins running along them. They were filled with a faraway weariness. "Stanford…?"
"Stanley, I'll never forgive you for sabotaging my future."
The coldness leaking from his brother's voice made something wrap around Stan's already wounded heart and squeeze. "Ford…you know all of that was an accident, right?" he asked. "I didn't mean to break your invention. I really didn't mean to."
"You're lying!" Ford yelled, his lips drawn back into an angry snarl. "You were obviously jealous of the places I was going. The places I was going without you." He pointed an accusing finger at Stan. "You meant to break my project so that I'd be stuck in New Jersey with you! You didn't care about the consequences! You only cared about yourself!"
"That wasn't the case at all!" Stan yelled back. His hands balled into fists, clenching and unclenching. "Ford, you gotta know after everything that's happened that breaking your project was never my intention! I was dumb, and I was angry, and I just…"
Stan began to shake.
"Do you really think I would deliberately try to sabotage something so close to you?"
"The only thing I understand about you is that you're a dirty, rotten, no-good excuse for a brother. And now..." Ford breathed in deep, closing his eyes. They immediately snapped open again, full of new hot, boiling anger. "Now I'm stuck in another dimension all because of you!"
"I know!" Stan's shaking grew to outright trembling. He curled into himself, his hands flying to the sides of his face as he struggled so hard not to break down. "I know, okay? I know I'm horrible, and I know it's all my fault. But I'm trying to get you back, Stanford! I really am! You should see what I'm doing, how far I'm getting..."
"It's not enough!" he yelled. "Nothing you do will ever be enough! No matter how hard you try, no matter what you do, you'll always be worthless!"
"Sixer…" Stan murmured, so quiet he could barely hear himself. "You gotta believe me…I never meant to…to screw up…"
No one listened. His family's voices only seemed to increase in volume around him, his mother's ugly sobbing, his father's threats, his brother's shouts. They filled his hearing until his ears were ringing.
"What happened to my precious son? Where did I go wrong?"
"You're a failure. You're the most pathetic excuse for a son I've ever seen."
"You're not my brother, Stanley Pines."
"Please!" Stan shouted above all the chaos. It was a word that had always been impossible to wrench from his mouth, but now it was so easily pouring from his lips. He curled in tighter to himself, each jab and jeer striking him hard. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"
All of the voices melded together into one loud, mocking sound, and Stan couldn't take it. He shoved his hands over his ears so hard he could feel his heartbeat throbbing in them, his breaths coming out in hard, wheezing pants. He screamed, and then the ground gave out beneath him.
…
…
One second he was falling, and in the next he was sprawled out on the ground, staring dazedly up at the clouds above.
Coldness seeped into Stan's back. His body shook like a leaf and his chest heaved, his mouth gulping in bursts of frigid air like his life depended on it. For minutes he remained that way, helpless and on his back until most of the oxygen had returned to his lungs.
Grunting, he attempted to push himself into a sitting position with weak, quivering arms. His disoriented mind struggled to comprehend what had just happened to him. The painful throbbing in his skull and the stars bursting behind his eyelids told him he had hit his head pretty hard, but everything else was a complete blur.
He closed his eyes and went to rub his temples. All at once waves of memories came flooding back to him. That insane creature...somehow he had managed to kick his way out of its grip, and judging by the large retreating paw prints left in the snow, it was now long gone. After he blacked out he had found himself somewhere completely different, and then—
Stan's stomach jolted, and he snapped his eyes open. Suddenly all he wanted to do was leave.
It was that desire that pushed him to finally stand up. Wearily, he glanced around himself, testing his ability to walk with a few shaking steps. Once he decided it was okay to move on he began gathering himself together. He wiped the snow off his pants with a few quick swipes. He pulled his coat tighter around his body and raised the hood high over his head, trying so hard to block out the cold as he began walking forward.
One step at a time...
But no matter how tightly he clutched the coat around himself, no matter how hard he tried to reassure himself that things were alright now, he couldn't push off the chill wrapping around his heart.
…
It haunted Stan later that night as he lied awake in bed.
Sleep wouldn't come to him no matter how hard he willed it to. For hours he tossed and turned on his mattress, his mind working and chugging away on overdrive despite how drained his body felt. Eventually he had found his way onto his back, and currently he was staring up into the rafters of the ceiling, deep in thought.
He had done so well at keeping his worries concealed. Over a decade of living on his own had hardened him, and eventually, as all contact with his family fizzled out, he had learned to forget about them altogether. For years he had worked on mending his wounded heart, taping it up with metaphorical bandage after metaphorical bandage until almost, just almost, he could call himself okay again. No longer did he grieve and mourn for what had been. No longer did he let his mind stray to them in his darkest hours.
His brother had been the only exception all those years. When the portal incident happened, the wound in his heart opened.
But what occurred today made it bleed.
Slowly, the bandages began unraveling. All of the long-held doubts Stan had kept tucked away inside his mind for so long were suddenly bubbling back to the surface, making themselves known again. Doubts about his family. Doubts about his brother that had been lingering in the back of his mind for years. Whatever that creature had done to him in the woods, it had gotten to him. It had gotten to him worse than anything else ever had – every horrible thing he had to endure in his past, every scar he had gained trying to make a living on his own.
Coldness washed over Stan's body, and not because of the temperature. It chilled him, piercing through his blanket, piercing through his clothes, piercing through his chest as the horrible realization came to him.
When he had looked into the eyes of that beast he had watched his worst nightmare unfold right in front of him.
And coming face-to-face with the very fears he had buried deep down inside himself for so many years scared him more than anything in the world.
A/N: I really wanted to finish this before the finale airs, and I did just in the nick of time. This is it, guys. Less than a day until it all comes to a close. I want to see it so bad, but at the same time I'm dreading it.