Stan looked out the window as Ford drove through. There was a little convenience store, a diner, city hall, a lumber mill…
"Kind of a little Podunk town, ain't it? "
Ford shrugged. "My studies show that this town has more instances of strange anomalies than any place in the United States."
Stan's eyebrows shot up. "If you say so."
There was a groan from the back seat.
"Oh dear—how long've I been asleep? "
Stan looked in the rear-view mirror at their passenger, whose thick hair was even messier at the moment than it usually was. "Long enough for you to get a stitching mark from the seat on your face. "
Fiddleford's eyes went wide as he got a look at himself in the rear-view mirror. "Goodness! I hope we don't run into anyone with me lookin' this unpresentable! "
Stan rolled his eyes and pulled his comb out of his back pocket. Tossing it over his shoulder toward the back seat, he said, "Don't worry, Fiddles, I don't think we'll run into the Queen or anyone like that in this place. "
The young man in the back seat looked out the window. "My, is this Gravity Falls? "
"Yup." Ford acknowledged.
Fiddleford looked out the back window to see what he'd missed. "Kind of a quaint little place, ain't it? "
"I guess that's a word for it. " Stan said with a shake of his head.
Ford drove all the way through town and headed into the woods.
"I thought you said you were doin' your research-y stuff in Gravity Falls." Stan said, confused.
"Well, technically this is still Gravity Falls." Ford answered. "The house I had built is more on the outskirts of town. "
Fiddleford looked out the window at the huge redwoods. "Amazing. I wonder what kinds 'a' creatures were roamin' the earth when these trees were saplings. "
"Probably things that would've considered you less than a snack." Stan joked.
"Stanley…" Ford said, shooting his twin a warning glare.
Fiddleford bit his lower lip. "I hope—I hope there's nothin' like that out here, now."
"Well, I don't know about dinosaurs, but we're here to find out what's here," Ford said, turning into a clearing. "—and, we're-here. "
Stan and Fiddleford both looked out the front window. A few yards ahead of them was a house with a number of peaks on the roof—they were parked close to what Stan guessed to be the front door, but he saw a covered porch with a door that led into the house on its south east side, too.
"Not bad, Sixer," Stan said, getting out of the car and inhaling the forest air.
"Wait until you see the inside." his brother answered as he shut down the car and pulled out the key.
Fiddleford, who had used Stan's comb to try to straighten his hair a bit, got out of the back passenger's side. "Goodness, it sure does look mysterious. "
Ford went back to the trailer they'd been towing and started untying one of the ropes that held the tarp down over their things.
"Oh, let me help you with that." Fiddleford said, going to the other side of the trailer and trying to undo another of the ropes.
Stan took a last look at the house, then came over to help, too.
"Okay, Fidds," Ford said when he undid the last rope. "Help me get this off and fold it, won't you? "
"Certainly." Fiddleford answered him, coming over and taking hold of the ends of the tarp.
Stanley climbed onto the large tire of the trailer and hopped inside. He grabbed a suitcase, lowered it over the side as close as he could to the ground, and dropped it. After doing this with a couple of his and Ford's suitcases, he came to a black rectangular trunk with tarnished silver colored bands across the top.
"This all you brought, kid?" Stanley asked, picking the trunk up by the handles on the sides that were the same tarnished silver color as the bands at the top.
Fiddleford was just walking toward Ford with his end of the tarp as they finished folding it. He looked over at Stan when he spoke.
"Oh, do be careful with that! " Fiddleford cried, pushing the end of the tarp into Ford's hands and running back to the side of the trailer.
"No worries, kid, I got it. "
Ford set the tarp on the ground and came over. "Here, Stan, hand it to me instead of dropping it like you did our suitcases. "
Fiddleford took the handle that was closest to him, and Stan relinquished the other handle to Ford. Fiddleford gritted his teeth from the weight, but he and Ford managed to lower it to the ground fairly gently.
"There." Ford said, looking up and Stan, who looked a bit confused at Fiddleford's outburst. "Stan, you and I should carry this inside when we're ready—and be careful with it. "
Across the trunk from him, Fiddleford smiled gratefully.