Don't ask me how or why this idea popped into my head. It did and it's a thing now. I wrote this in about two hours at one in the morning. Hopefully it's coherent.
Not for the first time this week, Stan pulls open the drawer of his brother's nightstand and stares at the gun. He found it his first night alone in the house, when he'd been aimlessly wandering about, numbly opening cupboards and drawers to see what was what. He'd been a bit impressed by his brother when he found the gun, to be honest.
Stan considers for a fleeting moment what it would be like to take the gun out, press the cold steel to his temple, and then at last feel the bliss of nothing. But as trembling fingers reach for the pistol, a voice stops him.
"Don't even think about it." The voice is soft but stern, and Stan lets out a long sigh and pulls back his hand.
"I thought you finally left," he mutters, turning to face Stanford.
His twin is standing in the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, fingers drumming irritably on his arm. He looks the way he did the day Stan was kicked out of the house when they were eighteen. He looks the way Stan has always remembered him, and nothing like he did a week ago, when Stan knocked on the door to this cabin in the middle of the Oregon forest and was greeted by a paranoid man with mistrust in his eyes.
"As long as you're planning on doing stupid crap I'll always hang around," Ford scoffs, shooting a meaningful look at Stan. "I didn't peg you for the kind of person who'd give up hope so easily."
"Hope?" Stan asks bitterly, but he slams the drawer shut all the same. "I haven't had any hope for years."
Ford smirks. "You always said you'd die in a blaze of glory. I think shooting yourself in the head is a far cry from a heroic death."
"Shut up, Poindexter," Stan snaps, sitting down on the bed and letting out a heavy sigh. "And if I did decide to kill myself… what, would you stop me?" He looks at Ford inquisitively, challenging him to try to answer that one.
Ford rolls his eyes. "Go to bed, idiot."
Stan blinks, and Ford is gone.
"You should probably eat something, Stanley," Ford comments from his seat in the chair behind his desk as Stan peruses bookshelves in what used to be his brother's office. It's been a few days since Stan last considered the gun.
"Not hungry," Stan grunts, tossing aside an encyclopedia. It isn't what he's looking for.
"Doesn't matter if you're hungry. If you intend to keep running around aimlessly you need food to support your antics."
"Jesus, you're just as bad as I remember," Stan mutters, taking another book off the shelf. It's some kind of advanced physics textbook. Stan bites his lip and thumbs through it. None of it makes sense, but not much of Ford's science stuff ever made sense. So he adds it to the stack on the desk of possible books that can help him.
"Stanley," Ford presses. "Go to the kitchen and eat something."
"If I do will you shut up?" Stan snaps, looking towards the chair with a harsh glower.
But it's empty now.
Stan lets out a groan and crosses the room to the door. He supposes the few minutes it will take to make a sandwich won't matter in the long run.
Stan is ready to give up. He's sitting at the desk in Ford's old office, trying to read through the simplest physics text he's found in the house. The journal his brother gave him is sitting open to his right, displaying the pages that appear to only be part of a puzzle, but they're a start. He just can't understand any of it. The equations are entirely foreign to him.
And he's trying to understand, but it seems hopeless. None of this book makes sense.
"This is pointless!" he snarls, slamming the book shut and burying his face in his hands. "I'm just too fucking stupid for any of this!"
"I've always hated it when you put yourself down like that." Ford is leaning against the bookshelf, adjusting his glasses and watching his brother with a smirk on his lips.
"It doesn't matter what you do or don't like anymore, Sixer," Stan growls, crossing his arms and leaning back in the chair.
"Clearly you think it does," Ford says, his smirk turning into a wide, mischievous grin. "Otherwise I wouldn't be here."
"Screw you."
"You're not stupid, Stanley."
"Yeah, I am."
"No. Now, come on," Ford says, coming to Stan's side and opening the book again. "Read this part again. Out loud."
Stan lets out an exaggerated sigh, but complies with his brother's request. "Reality is multifaceted, with many different dimensions encompassing its totality. These dimensions range from the densest form of material matter to the highest, most subtle planes of light, consciousness, intelligence and existence. Far beyond what we human beings see and experience in the material world lies an entire spectrum of reality beyond the physical plane of existence that is literally closed off to normal human senses and perception…"
"What do you think that means?" Ford asks.
Stan groans. "This isn't helping."
"Stanley," Ford insists. "Please. Try."
He knows whatever answer he gives, it won't matter, but he's still afraid of getting it wrong. "There's all sorts of alternate realities and not all of them are as complicated as ours and some of them are way more complicated, and we can't see any of them because we're stuck in this one?" Stan asks, grimacing.
"Good," Ford smiles. "Now keep going."
Stan does. At some point he realizes Ford has gone.
But he doesn't stop.
Stan stands in the bathroom with his back to the mirror, craning his neck to get a good look at the burn on the back of his shoulder. It's healing nicely, at least. Ford had kept his bathroom well stocked with medicine that helped. Stan sighs and rubs more antibiotic cream over it, wincing. It still hurts, but he's not sure if the pain is real or if it's psychological.
"I'm sorry about that." Ford's voice comes from behind, and Stan glances up, seeing his brother in the mirror.
"Yeah, well, you should be sorry about a lot of things," Stan mutters. He hates it when Ford apologizes to him – at least, he hates it when this Ford does. Because it doesn't mean anything.
"We both should," Ford sighs.
When Stan turns around, he finds himself alone.
It's always harder at night, and some nights are more difficult to get through than others. Sometimes Stan lies awake thinking about everything that's gone wrong. Everything he could have done to prevent all those terrible things. Other nights the nightmares haunt him.
Like tonight.
Stan jolts awake, breathing heavily, shouting his brother's name. He lays there stunned for several moments, reality slowly taking root in his mind before he remembers where he is, and why, and because he is alone and the guilt is crushing his chest, he lets himself cry. He buries his face in his pillow and starts to sob, and then he starts to scream.
"Stanley?"The voice is concerned this time, and Stan is overcome with humiliation even though he knows it doesn't matter if Ford is here or not.
"Go away, nerd," Stan hisses through gasped breaths.
He feels the ghost of a hand on his shoulder. "I'm not going anywhere."
"It's too late for that," Stan chokes out, hating himself. Hating everything. "You're gone. It's my fault."
"Sshh," Ford hushes him. "It isn't your fault."
"Now I know you're just telling me what I want to hear," Stan says, wiping at his eyes and sitting up. He looks at his twin. "Why are you still here?"
"Because you need me," Ford says, shrugging his shoulders and offering Stan a weak smile. "And because you need reminders to keep going."
"But you're not real," Stan whispers, holding his head. "I just… how do I even know any of this will work? That you'll even come back?"
"I didn't die, Stanley."
"I don't know that!" Stan protests. "I don't know anything! You went into that portal – I knocked you into the portal! If I had just… If I had just listened to you…" He breaks down again, and feels Ford's hand on his back.
It's just like when they were kids and one of them had a bad dream. They would sit side by side, the one who had the nightmare shaking while the other tried to comfort them.
"It's okay—"
"It's not okay! Don't say that it's okay!" Stan bursts, wiping desperately at his eyes. He hates crying.
"You didn't let me finish," Ford scolds. "It's okay that you feel like this."
"Yeah. That makes me feel better," Stan mumbles.
"You won't feel like this forever," Ford reassures him. "I know you, Stanley. I know that you'll bounce back from this. And I know that you won't give up."
"You know, I have changed, Ford," Stan sniffles. "Ten years changes people."
But Ford shakes his head, still rubbing Stan's back. "Doesn't matter. You're still you, Stanley."
"You changed," Stan points out bitterly. "You changed a lot."
"And I'm not sure that's a good thing," Ford sighs.
Stan sits in silence for a while, recovering from his nightmare as Ford rubs soothing circles between his shoulder blades. His touch is growing lighter by the second the more Stan regains his composure.
"Sleep, Stanley," Ford whispers, and Stan nods and lays back down. "You've got a lot of work to do tomorrow."
"It'll take a lot longer than one day to bring you back," Stan mumbles.
"But you will," Ford says, and Stan can hear the smile in his voice. "I know you will. No matter how long it takes, you'll get there."
"I'm really sorry, Poindexter," Stan apologizes as he slips into sleep again.
"I am too, Stanley," Ford sighs, and then Stan feels his touch fade altogether.
Stan teaches himself the quantum physics involved in multidimensional travel over the next few years. He starts rebuilding his brother's machine and searching for Ford's other journals.
He doesn't see Ford again for thirty years.
And when his brother steps out of the portal, he has changed again.
He hasn't yet figured out how to say the things he was able to over those few weeks after Ford was lost to the portal that he could say to the hallucinations of his brother.
But he's still trying.
It is done. I am content with it. Review and tell me what you think!
Thanks for reading!