Stan opens his bedroom door and stood there for a moment, listening. It was quiet in the hallway until he could hear the faint sound of someone talking. Confused, he creaks the door open a bit more. He couldn't think of anyone who would be awake at this hour.
The twins went home about a month ago, Soos and Wendy have already left. The older man frowns and steps out into the hallway, it's far too early in the morning for this spooky nonsense. He looks around his surroundings and grabs a wooden bat to arm himself with.
More talking with quite laughter brings his attention towards the front of the store.
Was he being robbed? Over his dead body!
Stan slowly makes his way to the front, bat ready to swing if needed, listening to what sounded like someone talking to themselves but couldn't understand through their harsh whispers.
"Who's there?" He demands, wanting to sound threatening. When there was no answer, he steps forward into the room but steps on something rather sharp and cuts his bare foot. Stan jerks back and curses something under his breath, scrambling to find the light switch.
Lights fills the room and he looks down at his foot, only a small cut from the glass on the floor. Wait, why was there glass on the floor? Stan looks up and draws a breath.
"Ford?"
The brother mentioned was kneeling in front of a shattered mirror and lets out a heavy sigh. Must have broken it while getting a glass of water or something.
"Sixer, you klutz. You could have turn on the lights instead of messing around in the dark." Stan sets his bat down and makes his way around the glass to help his brother. No answer, which concerns him. "Did you hurt yourself?"
Stan kneels down beside him and places a hand on his shoulder. Then he sees the blood from along Ford's hair line, running down his face.
"Hey, did you cut your head on the glass?"
It was more of a obvious statement than a question.
"Yes," The answer was so quite, he was honestly surprised he heard it in the first place. Ford's shoulders shook as if he were laughing to himself. He turns to finally look at his brother with a twisted smile, his teeth stained red. "It was fun."
Those words, the way he said it; sends a cold chill down his spine and he jumps up, stepping away from him. Yellow eyes watching him.
"Stanford, what the heck?!" He runs his hand through his hair and watches that smile grow inhumanly wider. Slowly, Ford gets to his feet using his knee to help himself up. Bits of glass imbedded in the palms of his hands. "Why-what did you do to yourself?!"
He sways on his feet and reaches up to touch his own head, shards of glass fell from his hair.
"I thought it would be a thrill to bash my own face in," He laughs, letting his hand fall back down to his side.
"That's...crazy, why would you do that?" Stan asks, his eyes catch the piece of glass in his brother's hand and takes a step back. Something was wrong but he couldn't think of what, the last thing Ford was doing before he went to bed was messing around down in the lab. Just going through some old stuff. "What did you get into?"
Instead of getting an answer, he got laughter; the kind of laughter only a mad man would make. Stan reaches behind himself to grab his bat, his hand freezes when those eyes looked at him again. Ford tilts his head to the side like he was confused.
"What's wrong? Why are you staring at me like that, Stanley?" He asks his brother with a frown. "Afraid?"
"Of course not-"
"Is it because I'm a freak?" As this, Ford looks down a his hands with a concerned expression.
"Ford no," Stan shakes his head and tries to reason with mentally deranged man. "You're hurt, your head looks bad and we need to get that glass out of your hands. Just follow me to the bathroom, I should have a first aid-AGH!"
Stan grabs his upper arm, stumbling backwards from the other lunging at him with the piece of glass. Angrily, he grabs his brother's wrist and twists it to the side, forcing him to drop it. Stan jerks him forward by his wrist and slams his elbow down to the back of his neck.
Ford lets out a breathless noise and falls to his knees while the other twin grabs his bat, holding it above his head to strike.
"Stanley, stop!" Ford tells him, his tone held concern it it. It was enough to make his brother pause and lower the bat, wondering if he had somehow managed to snap out of whatever state he was in.
"How do I know if you're yourself?" Stan asks in return. He could tell Ford was heaving, his shoulders were shaking. Wanting to make sure that the other was okay, he steps closer. "Try anything or I'll knock your head into the hardwood, got it?"
It was a empty threat, really. He didn't want to serious hurt his brother. Whatever was going on, he knew Ford had no control over. "Hey, Sixer. Say something."
Ford lifts his head in response, looking at him with a guilty expression then grins menacingly. There's a sudden pain in the top of his foot. Stan shouts and swings his fist, hitting his brother across the face. Ford falls back onto his rear, laughing as his brother took a step back to take their glass out of his foot. Stan growls, dropping his bat and kicks him, knocking him onto his side.
"Damn it, Stanford!" He kicks him onto his back and straddles his waist to keep him from getting up. Hitting him again, and again. After a few more blows, he stops to breathe. He had busted his brother's lip and could see where bruise were already starting to form. Guilt riddles his chest.
Ford stares up at him with a dull look and runs his tongue over the bloody cut on his lip, his hands laying uselessly by his head.
The two just sat there in silence, staring at one another.
First things first, deal with Ford then try to clean up whatever mess he's gotten himself into.
"Don't hold this against me afterwards, it's for your own good." Stan tells him. He hits him again, hard enough to make his head bounce off the floor with a loud creak, leaving the elderly man unconscious. He drops his hands to his sides and takes a deep breath to ground himself, taking in his surroundings.
Glass and blood everywhere. This is going to be a huge pain to clean up. His eyes were drawn back to the shattered mirror and he winces, afraid that some of the glass was left in the wound of his brother's head.
"Let's go clean you up," He gets up off of the other and lifts him up off the floor with a grunt. It seems like Ford has lost weight since he last held him. He tries not to dwell on it too much and takes him to his room, he'll just patch him up in there.
After finally getting all the glass out of his brother's hair, he manages to stitch up the gash on his head; clean and bandaged his hands. Running his thumb over each of his brother's fingers tenderly, he exhales out of his nose and checks his restraints again.
"That should make sure you stay put until I get back," He amusingly thinks about tying the other down nightly to make sure his brother got plenty of sleep instead of staying up all hours of the night.
Stan gets to his feet and presses a kiss to his hair. Fords' probably gonna have a horrible headache in the morning but he'll just bring him some migraine medication later. Right now he's more worried about what caused his brother to act this way. And what was with those yellow eyes? They looked a awful a lot like...
No, it couldn't be. That floating fiend was long gone. This had to be something else and he's sure whatever caused this was down in the lab.
"I'll be right back," This was mostly being muttered to himself but he pats his brother's leg and covers him up with his blanket. "Keep my bed warm while I'm gone."
