Stan tried to go about the rest of his day working, but quickly found himself distracted by the slip of paper in his pocket. What did the symbol mean? And what did F mean by, 'help?' As much as he lamented the loss in profit, he had to know what F was talking about. Stan needed to see him.
It took Stan longer than he expected to actually find the Gravity Falls History Museum, but when he did, he was immediately confronted by an unwillingness to pay for a museum ticket. Standing in front of the museum, he stared at the paper, still not knowing what it was supposed to mean. Scratching his head, he looked up and around. F hadn't given him a time. But certainly F didn't expect for Stan to just wait around until he showed up.
That was when he noticed it. Carved into the back of one of the owl statues leading to the Museum's entrance was the image of an eye. An X was spray painted on top of the carving. Stan recognised it immediately. It was the same symbol as the paper in his hand. Walking up to it, he noticed that the eye seemed to be looking off in one direction. Following its gaze, he found a similar symbol roughly carved into the trunk of a tree across the way. This had to be some kind of trail.
Following the gaze of the eyes, he was brought to the back of the building. There he found F, leaning against the wall, chewing a wad of tobacco.
"So you decided to come," F said ominously, spitting out a black wad of fluid to punctuate his sentence.
Stan looked around a little confused. "How long have you been waiting for me out here?"
Ignoring the question, F motioned for Stan to follow him into the open passage next to him. The passage seemed to be going into and underneath the museum. As F walked into the darkness, Stan was hesitant to join.
"It's nothing to worry about, Stan," he told himself. "You're just following a possibly deranged man into a dark and mysterious underground passage. Nothing unusual here." Nervously he tried to laugh, but it did little to ease his nerves.
Stepping into the darkness, Stan could hear the entrance closing behind him. He glanced back for a moment before noticing light shining towards him at the bottom of the staircase. Following the passageway, he came into large stone chamber illuminated by torches along the walls.
"What is this place?" Stan asked, following F to a small table next to a single chair in the middle of the chamber. "Don't tell me that this is some kind of secret clubhouse you and my brother made." Somehow a secret clubhouse under the museum sounded exactly like his brother.
"This? Aw, this secret level's been 'ere long before your brother or I came to this here town. Stanford would've been able to find out more about its exact age. He always was into the weirdest things. Architecture and stonework included! All that stuff never meant nothin' to me, but I know that this here room's at least a hundred years old." Fiddleford glanced around the room as he took the device from its place in the chest on the altar.
Stan let out a mildly interested grunt. "So, what did you bring me down here for? You gonna to tell me that you're part of some secret organization or something? Because the last time I was taken down to a secret room like this, I had to fight off half of the Nebraskan mafia with just a cob of corn and a record of Frank Sinatra's greatest hits." Laughing, Stan's eyes darted about the room for anything that could indicate what this room was supposed to be used for. Noticing some droplets of blood on the floor, he couldn't help but to assume the worst.
F seemed to be genuinely surprised by the analogy. "What? No! No. I ain't about to try fightin' you. Now why don't you take a seat?"
"You're not going to tie me down or anything like that are you?" Stan looked at the chair with suspicion. It certainly looked like a comfortable seat, but the arm straps screwed into the wood were more than a little concerning.
"Ah, that won't be necessary." Somehow, F saying that did little to comfort Stan. "I just wanna hear how you got that scar."
"Scar? You mean the burn scar on my back?" he asked, moving a hand to his right shoulder.
"Yeah. That one. It must hurt a lot to think 'bout." Stan watched as F seemed to be messing with some device in his hands.
"You can say that one again." Stan sat down in the chair in a huff. "Ford practically branded me like a horse or something. Some brother he turned out to be."
F hesitated. "I'm so sorry. Can you please explain?"
"Not much to explain." Stan crossed his arms. "I already told you that Ford and I got into a fight. Well, I tried to burn his journal, and he tackled me. We wrestled on the floor for a bit and I ended up on top of him. He kicked me away, and he accidentally pressed my back onto… Well... You'd know more about whatever that thing was than I would."
Turning to Stan, the guilt was clear on F's face. "I… I'm so sorry. We… It's our fault really. We should have been safer… But we were so excited, and we were so exhausted… We should have made the cooling runes inaccessible, or at least have covered them up or something, but neither of us were thinking straight… I… I…" Fiddleford was shaking as he grabbed his head with a free hand.
Stan realized that F was on the edge of another kind of episode, so he leaned forward and put a hand on his arm. "It… It's alright. It was an accident. I mean, who leaves something that hot just out in the open for anyone to touch? But hey, shit happens, right? At least now I know how livestock feels."
F seemed to be calming down. He let out a small laugh. "Right. I mean… Only a couple of idiots would do something like that."
Stan gave F a small smile in return. "Look," he began after a moment of silence. "I'm not going to… Blame you exactly for what happened. It's just… It hurts sometimes to think about, you know? When I remember what happened… Sometimes I can still feel it burning. I just couldn't believe that Stanford could…" Stan wanted to say more, but his voice faltered.
"Would you like to forget?" F asked after a long moment of silence.
"What?" The question seemed to come out of nowhere, taking Stan by surprise.
"The memory. It hurts. 'Course it would. But would you like to forget it?" Only now did Stan get a full view of the gun-shaped device in F's hands.
Shaken, Stan looked from the gun to F's face. "I… I mean, I guess if I could… But it's not like you can just wipe it from…"
"Yes, I can."
Stan fell silent, a mix of shock and horror on his face.
"Don't worry." F affirmed, holding the gun to his chest. "There are no negative side-effects. I engineered this device myself, and I've used it hundreds of times on myself and on others. I can simply remove that one memory from your mind, and it won't bother you no more." Holding the memory-erasing gun to the light, he indicated the cylinder on the back. "If you want to remember the removed memory for whatever reason, you can simply rewatch the record stored in this cylinder here, and it'll be just like the memory never left you."
"W… What?" It was the only thing Stan could say through his shock. "Why…?"
"Look. I've been awful lonely since I left your brother to finish working on the portal on his own. I… I've missed him. Certainly you've missed him too." Stan looked at the ground. F was right. "And I was just thinking… You know… You must have a lot of painful memories in that there head of yours that keep you up at night. I can fix that." F gingerly knelt down and put his hand on top of Stan's. "Think of it as a favor from me to you. An apology for earlier." Stan and F's eyes met for a moment before F stood up again, pulling his hand away. "However, I don't want to force you into anything that you don't want to. You can try living without the memory of Stanford giving you that scar for a week and see how you feel. And if you like it… Well… I can let you use this here memory gun as much as you want to keep the bad memories away. And then maybe... We could be... Partners?"
Happy Saturday! Today fall break is starting for me! Whoo! Can't wait to spend all break reading for classes and writing essays! In any case, I may post the next chapter on Thanksgiving. You know. To celebrate our weird little nonsense holiday. And also because family and all that. But I dunno.
In any case, back to the story at hand, what will Stan choose?! Can you predict where I plan on taking this story!? When will I make due on the conflict I allude to in this story's summary!? As always, I hope that you have a good weekend, and any feedback for this fanfiction would be greatly appreciated!
My silly encrypted anecdote for the day is: BHV, I GHYLVHG WKDW ZKROH HQWUDQFH VHW XS, DQG VWRRG WKHUH IRU OLNH… DQ KRXU MXVW WR PDNH VWDQIRUG'V EURWKHU WKLQN WKDW KH'V PBVWHULRXV DQG FRRO.
8-1-14-4-19 20-8-1-20 16-21-19-8 1-14-4 8-1-14-4-19 20-8-1-20 16-21-12-12,
20-23-15 2-15-14-4-19 20-8-1-20 8-1-14-4-19 3-1-14'20 2-18-5-1-11.
6-15-18 20-8-5-19-5 20-23-15 13-5-14 23-9-20-8 13-1-20-3-8-9-14-7 8-1-14-4-19,
20-8-5 15-6-6-5-18 23-1-19 14-15-20 6-1-11-5.