Ford paced across the gallery, passing the spot where they'd found his brother's phone in a pool of blood; somewhere behind him, Michael and Dave deliberated what to do about his missing brother in hushed whispers. Of course, they were worried for no reason. Stan could take care of himself. Even if he were injured—not that he would have gotten injured. Whatever he was up to, Ford was sure, Stan was perfectly fine.
His footsteps quickened, his grip tightening on the bloodstained phone. Surely, Stan would reappear soon, unharmed, with some zany anecdote. He'd done the same sort of thing hundreds of times as a child, causing all sorts of mischief; there wasn't anything to worry about. No reason to fret. Not at all.
His heart jumped when his cell phone rang. After evening his breathing, Ford checked the screen. Mabel. He found himself answering the video chat before registering the inappropriate timing.
"Um, hi Mabel."
"Hi Grunkle Ford!" On the other side of the screen, Mabel flailed. She seemed to notice something in the background and put her face close to the camera to investigate. "It's so dark. Where are you guys?"
Ford glanced aside. "Oh, uh, we're just investigating an anomaly. In the dark. Where weird things are, being weird and all that."
"Oh, that's cool." She backed away from the camera, allowing Ford a better look at the colorful, glittery side of the twins' bedroom. It did look eerily similar to the pizzeria. "Anyway, is Grunkle Stan there? I need his help with a…secret project…"
"Secret project?"
"It's a secret, Grunkle Ford, I can't tell you." Grinning conspiratorially, she tried to peer over Ford's shoulders into the darkness. "Grunkle Stan? Grunkle Stan! GRUNKLE STAN-!"
"Mabel!" Dipper's voice floated in from behind his sister, stopping her shouts. "Grunkle Stan is probably busy hunting some kind of creature."
"But Dipper! I need his lock picking expertise to break into the zoo—it's super important!"
Dipper appeared over his sister's shoulder. "Don't mind her, Grunkle Ford, she's working on some 'secret business' for the knitting club. You know how she gets all worked up over that sort of thing."
A borderline hysterical laugh tore from Ford's throat. "Y-yes, Mabel does tend to get excited about those sorts of things."
"Are you okay? You kinda look worried about something."
"Me? I'm fine—everything's perfect—all according to plan. I have everything under control, nothing to worry about here." Ford's voice rose to an unnaturally high pitch. "There is nothing here I can't handle. I have absolutely everything under control."
The twins exchanged an unsettled glance. "Are you sure?"
"Absolutely! What could I possibly not handle in this situation?" Ford wiped a small spatter of blood from the phone's screen. "There's nothing to worry about."
Mabel frowned. "You're acting kind of jumpy and junk."
"I'm not acting suspicious. Who's acting suspicious? I'm certainly not. N-nothing of the sort! I'm fine—everything's fine."
As Mabel had earlier, Dipper tried to look past Ford into the restaurant. "Um…Is there someone there who can be more convincing that everything is okay? Is Grunkle Stan there?"
"Stanley?" Ford actively avoided meeting the kids' eyes. He had always been a terrible liar; his current distressed mental state only made his mouth run uncontrollably. "He's fine—perfectly okay. Definitely not missing. Who said he was missing? Because he's not. He wasn't attacked by some kind of possessed animatronic, if that's what you're thinking. I most certainly didn't lose track of him last night and fail to find him yet. Why would you ever think such a thing?"
"What?"
"I'll call you later, kids, study hard, don't be late for school again."
"But it's Saturday—"
Ford clicked to end the call, then slid the phone into his pocket. He ran a hand through his hair, collecting himself, when he became aware of Michael's and Dave's stares. Clearing his throat, he clasped his hands behind his back and turned to his undesired audience.
"Well, Michael, Dave? Have we reached any conclusions concerning the whereabouts of my brother?" He frowned. "I think I've been more than patient on the matter thus far."
"Yes, and we greatly appreciate your patience." Michael matched his frown. "Unfortunately, there is nowhere your brother could be on the premises." Before Ford could contradict him, Michael continued, "He must have left the restaurant at some point."
"Is there some way we could find out? Some security footage, perhaps?" With a derisive snort, Ford rolled his eyes. "It's not as if we could ask if any employees saw him, as they were all sent home."
Michael folded his arms, considering. "The security cameras may have caught him—"
"There are actually security cameras? Why the devil didn't we check them earlier?" Scowling, Ford violently gestured toward the lower level. "Perhaps we ought to do the obvious before drawing any conclusions about my brother's whereabouts."
The elevator binged again at the bottom floor. Michael exited first, Ford storming half a pace behind him. Dave walked distantly behind the two of them, keeping his commentary to himself. Their destination was an office, the first door on the right. It was a small room, immediately crowded once Ford entered, with more than a dozen monitors fixated around the restaurant. Most of the screens were black.
"I last saw Stanley in the Circus Gallery, around nine o'clock last night," Ford told Michael as he looked among the monitors. He hoped the camera for that room wasn't one of the ones showing no feed.
Michael kneeled to glance among the tapes stowed below the console, pausing when he fully registered the sentence. "Dave didn't call me until well after eleven."
"I may have gotten carried away studying the animatronics." Avoiding Michael's incredulous stare, Ford adjusted his glasses.
"I see." Apparently, Michael had no intention of asking Dave to explain any further. He made a frustrated noise as he rummaged through the tapes. "Typical."
"Typical?" Exasperation seeped into Ford's voice. He made a sweeping motion with his arm. "What's the issue? The tape should be there—it was only a few hours ago!"
Michael held up an unlabeled tape. "The last month's security footage has been wantonly stacked here, unlabeled. I'll have to have a talk with the night crew…" A groan rumbled in his throat. "We'll have to go through them individually—"
"You must be joking."
"But that I were." Michael stuffed the tape in his hand into the VCR embedded in the console; one of the monitors sprung to life, displaying a workshop. Ford recognized much of the work as partially-constructed animatronics. Almost immediately, Michael removed the VHS. "This will take some time…"
Ford snorted. "Quite the understatement." He glanced at his watch; it was nearly seven in the morning.
"You may want to settle in." Sighing, Michael popped another tape into the VCR.
One tape showed the parking lot from two weeks ago; the next, the atrium from the year prior. The one after that was also the atrium, from last week, and the following one was from the kitchen a few days before. Michael moved methodically, inserting and removing the VHSs one by one, slowly working through the intimidating stack, too fixated on his task to speak. For his part, Ford had no questions that hadn't already been asked, silently watching as the screen cut between static and old footage.
His patience wore thin quickly. Stan was somewhere, lost, alone, injured—he had already squandered the entire night, trusting that his brother had sound judgement, and now his trail had been lost. Ford cursed himself. There must be something he could do to make up for lost time. He couldn't stand there, useless.
Ready to demand that Dave escort him about the premises again, Ford turned to the open door. His complaint died on his tongue, as there was no one there to verbally assault—the technician was gone. Flabbergasted, Ford returned his attention to Michael; the younger man continued to shift tapes in a consistent rhythm, such that he appeared to have worked himself into a daze. Ford made to inform Michael of the second disappearance, but changed his mind. Instead, he stepped back, moving silently, and slipped into the corridor unnoticed.
Sure enough, he didn't see Dave in the hallway, either. Ford hurried along, trying each door as he passed, hoping to find one unlocked. The sixth knob he tried happened to turn under his grasp. Hoping it may lead somewhere useful, he slid into the room and closed himself inside.
A single floodlight lit the room. Before him was a large machine, fed by a conveyor belt along one wall; the whole apparatus mostly hid an observation area angled to see the inner workings of the machine. Animatronics rested on the motionless conveyor belt, all lifeless due to the hour. One of them had been partially disassembled, revealing a network of metal guts, sprung traps, and cavities large enough to hold a person. A small pool of dark, viscous liquid settled beneath one of its arms.
Ford darted to the unfamiliar animatronic. Blood aside, there was little to work with. Stan had clearly been here, but there was no indication of when, for how long, at what point his brother had escaped, or where he had gone. Frantic, he searched the nearby area—stray blood droplets must have splattered somewhere to provide him a clue. A few splotches of blood stained the wall just beside the humanoid simulacrum, but seemed not to have spread elsewhere.
It made no sense: Stan had to have gone somewhere. At some point, his brother must have tended to his wound, ending the blood trail; he'd have to search on his own. Ford paced the room, inspecting the machine, the conveyor belt, the synthetic creatures, the area beyond the observation window, the ceiling, and the blank walls. Nothing yielded a solution, only eliminating possibilities. When finally he thought to investigate the floors he'd traversed half a dozen times, he found a discolored floor panel.
Instantly, he dropped to his hands and knees. The panel appeared to be bolted down, but the faint bloody handprint indicated that it was more. Gently, he nudged the metal plate aside. This is where his brother had gone, he had no doubt. Ford dropped into the dark passageway, only hesitating to replace the panel. At least he had a pen light to guide him.
