Pain. Pain and discomfort. Those were the whole extent of what Stanford felt.

Even breathing was painful, so he took shallow breaths trying not to aggravate his already poor state. He didn't have a clear idea of how much damage he had taken. However, if it rendered him this uncomfortable and powerless it couldn't be good.

After chasing his brother and friend into the woods, he had lost track of … everything.

He vaguely recalled running then coming across a road. He could recall some bright light followed by an agonizing throbbing in his left wing and back leg. And yet, he had kept moving forward, pushed by sheer instincts and adrenaline to find his twin before anything could happen to him. Especially since his brain knew they were running into the territory of something bad.

Then, he had seen a huge shape and two bright red eyes and knew for certain they were in trouble. He had ignored the pain penetrating his limbs and had jumped in to save his twin and friend, the latter had been caught by the monster. He had felt anger rise in his chest, pushing aside all other instincts and common sense and had saved them.

He had beaten the Gremloblin, how he had remembered the name was beyond him, had saved his brother and had fallen on his side shortly after, where he was pretty certain he had stayed since then.

All of those images superimposed themselves on top of the sensation of hands going through his fur and feathers, rendering him lost, confused and in pain. He whined, growled and tried to shove them away—albeit very weakly—but they were always back.

Some voices yelled around him. Ford managed to catch part and parcel of the conversation but his dazed brain couldn't really understand what it was clearly about. He tried to listen but the two voices didn't make much sense. They echoed around him for some time. He couldn't help but to find them annoying.

"What d'ya mean you can 'fix' it!"

"That's what the machine is for!"

"You're completely mad!"

"I don't care, he's my brother!"

"I can't believe you!"

"Then don't! Just… Will you help me or not?"

There was some more shouting but he lost track of the conversation. Besides, his heart started to hammer in his ears and every sound became muffled.

At some point, it was just too much to bear and Stanford simply drifted off, wishing secretly that everything would just … stop.

His prayers were answered one day or night, he had kept his eyes closed most of the time so he wasn't certain what was happening and how much time had passed until he sensed something small sting him on his side. It reminded him of a bee sting but bigger. For a moment he growled at the annoyance and then he couldn't feel anything and his thoughts became clouded.

He sighed and managed to fall into a dreamless sleep for the first time in … forever.

When he woke up, much later, Ford quickly realized he wasn't in the forest anymore. There weren't any leaves blowing in the wind around him. The ground wasn't wet anymore and it felt dry … mostly cold. Cold and quiet.

Am… I … dead?

As more of his senses came back, he concluded that he was not dead since he could experience different levels of pain and discomfort. His throat and tongue were dry and raspy. Clearly, he had been sleeping for some time. The fog that had clouded his mind was vanishing quickly, leaving him overwhelmed with the sensation of thousand ants running up and down under his skin.

He tried to take a deep breath, to help himself get the courage to move and get the metaphorical ants out of his body, but he found his chest to be restrained by some bound.

Begrudgingly, he opened one of his eyes slowly. Everything was blurry for a moment before the distinct ceiling and soft lights of the basement came into focus. Ford frowned.

How did I … get here?

He closed his eyes and slowly raised his head to better assess his surroundings. He had only barely readjusted his position so that his chest and head were straight when lightning pain laced his sides and back, freezing him in place. He dug his claws into the concrete floor in shock. He managed to take a few shallow breaths and the pain turned into an aching discomfort.

Once the sensation piped down, he slowly turned his head and assessed the damage.

If his shoulders had not been tightened together, they would have dropped.

He was missing a lot of feathers, revealing a pinkish skin with purple or green spots underneath whereas a bruise was healing. It resembled uncovered chicken skin, which made sense since he was kind of a bird. If it wasn't a bruise it was small open wound, with smaller sewing threads to keep it close. They all looked cleaned and dealt with but he couldn't remember when they had been.

He leaned forward to probe at one of them but stopped when a voice in his head told him to leave it alone. It told him that if he touched it, it would reopen and hurt him more.

He ignored them and instead turned to examine the many bandages that covered his body.

I must look like … a mummy.

He didn't know why he was struggling to find the right words but it didn't matter. He wanted to examine his injuries.

His left wing was closed and covered with a thick layer of bandages, securing it against his side. He couldn't even readjust its position and even if he could, the aches that emanated from it told him he would be better to not try to move it too much.

Ford's eyes then landed on his left hind leg. That one wasn't as heavily bandaged as his wing but it came in close second. Judging by the awkward angle at which it was bending, it well deserved it.

Tentatively, he tried to wiggle his toes and winced at the discomfort it gave him in his thigh. It must have been broken at some point and someone—Stanford could guess who—tried to treat it as well as they could. He spotted something shiny and frowned.

He grunted as he twisted toward his wounded leg to inspect it closer. He noticed how some part of his limb had been shaved off, if the itchiness he could sense were any indication, and he could see small bolt pieces poking through the bandages.

He opened his beak, his curiosity getting the best of his judgment, and tried to grab one. Ford had barely grazed one when it sent lightning pain in his bones. They were screwed in tight.

The pain took his breath away and for a few seconds he panted and waited until it went away. It was all Stanford could do. Wait in pain.

Once it did pass, part of his brain wanted to probe the bolts again but his more rational side told him to leave it alone. He was in the motion of raising his head when he picked up the sound of the elevator doors opening followed soon by a loud shout that had him flinching.

"Stanford!"

The griffin didn't have time to turn before someone embraced his neck in a tight hug that stayed clear of his many wounds.

He turned his head to see his brother burrowing—in what was left of his plumage—his shoulders shaking and his clothes in a dishevelled state. There were some papers discarded on the floor near them, his twin must have brought them with him and dropped them when he saw Ford.

The griffin didn't return the hug, fearing it would hurt him more than do any goods but he did tilt his head so that his beak rested near Stan's brown messy hair.

After a while, his brother calmed down and Ford found himself absentmindedly preening his twin. His brother stepped back and observed him with red-rimmed eyes.

"I-I was so worried when ya didn't wake up. I thought I gave you the wrong dose." Stan said with a tight voice as he rubbed the tears away. "You were … badly hurt. And I needed to move you back home and didn't want to aggravate your state…"

Stan kept on rambling but the words didn't register in the griffin's head. It was as if he couldn't quite understand what he was saying exactly. If he stopped and listened, he could make out the individual words but next to each other … it was a jumble of words to his ears. He did pick up the sad tone in his sibling's voice and it had him worry.

He didn't enjoy his twin sounding as such. He took matters into his own paws, without moving them, and started to rub his head against his brother's chest and purred loudly, in the hopes that it would soothe his worries away.

It took a moment for Stan to stop rambling on before he started to pet the griffin's side.

"What imma gonna do with ya?" He whispered.

"Rooo Ooo!" Ford cooed, he could sense his twin's frame and humour lifting.

His eyes landed on the paper scattered on the floor. They resembled … newspapers! It had been a long time since he had seen or read one of those. Out of curiosity, his eyes scanned the words idly.

Giant … homicidal … pterano-tron … destroys … downtown … engineer…

He frowned. The words themselves made sense individually but when he read them one after the other … he couldn't quite figure out what they meant. Grumbling, he tilted his head hoping to understand them better.

The movement startled Stan and he pushed himself away from the griffin to follow his gaze. He sighed and picked up the papers to read. He looked Ford in the eyes with a sad expression.

"Yeah … you're…" he cleared his throat and chewed the inside of his cheeks for a moment before continuing. "Fiddleford didn't take the whole thing well … as he went back to his house that night… I understand that his wife finally asked for a divorce … it was the straw that broke the camel's back."

Stan looked defeated, the paper in his hand crumbling as he clenched his fist. He turned it into a ball and tossed it to the side. Ford had to fight every cell in his body to avoid jumping on it as it bounced on the floor. Instead, and to ignore the piece of paper, he focused his attention on his sibling.

His brother was standing in the middle of the room, his face hidden behind his hands. His shoulders were sagging and … he looked quite small.

The griffin didn't enjoy seeing him this distraught. He rose to his paws, his legs and limbs trembling and throbbing, protesting the movement. Maybe he should stay on the floor, but the need to comfort his twin was stronger than anything else.

He took a careful step and limped to Stan, stumbling on his paws. He scrubbed his beak against his brother's forehead, making circles before moving back to grooming Stan's hair. They really needed to be cleaned.

"Stanford! Stop it!"

Ford stopped, startled by the angry tone in his sibling's voice.

Stan sighed and waved at him. "Look at what you're doing! You're … you're cleaning me with your beak!"

Stanford tilted his head, confused. His brother had never opposed his cleaning habit before.

What … wrong?

Maybe he had tugged too hard on a strand of hair and had hurt Stan. He should be careful from now on.

He stepped closer to finish what he had started, no point in leaving his brother's hair half taken care of, but got pushed away before he could do anything.

"Ford! Stop that! Stop…" his twin took a deep breath and locked gaze with his misty eyes. "It scares me sometimes how much … how much you've changed. You're becoming more … more animal!"

The griffin blinked owlishly. He understood what Stan had said but wasn't sure how to process or react to it. He lowered his head and made a series of apologetic whines, bumping his head into his sibling's chest.

Again, his brother pushed him away and stomped his feet angrily.

"Don't try ta apologize! Be mad! Be furious at… At me! For how incapable I am to solve your problem!" He rented. "Don't just stand there trying to comfort me!"

Both siblings stared at one another, the griffin one staying perfectly still and the human one panting. The staring contest went on for some more seconds before Stanford limped back to his makeshift nest, his head hanging low between his shoulders.

He climbed his uneven, unfinished and tangled mess of branches and small trees he had grabbed over the years to make himself a comfortable place to rest while his twin worked next to him. He whined as he had to raise his paws higher than he would have preferred but he managed to crawl into it.

Stanford wasn't sure he understood where his brother's hostility was coming from but he didn't want to fight him, he was too tired and too sore for it. He curled on himself, splaying his injured leg next to him, as opposed to its usual position under him. He sighed and rested his head over his front paws before closing his eyes.

Letting his thoughts wander, he pondered on what he had done that resulted in his sibling's behaviour. He just wanted to … take care of Stan, the same way he took care of him. Returning the favour for once in a while.

For a brief instant, he felt the fog in his head cleared and he realized what his brother had said and especially what he had read on the paper. He moaned and covered his head with a huge paw.

It just feels so natural and right … to do … these things … to care for him like he does for me.

He opened his eyes to stare at his own monstrous paw. The rough pads were scarred and wormed down from him walking around. The dark long sharp claws that poked out at the end of his … digits, talons? He didn't know how to call them anymore, even after fifteen years. Fifteen years…

Has it been that long? I… I can't tell.

He sighed and dropped his paw. No wonder his brother threw a fit. He had been working hard to help him all this time and … he barely saw the fruit of his labour. With Ford's behaviour being out of his control, no wonder Stan was mad.

Except, the griffin didn't see it that way. Of course it was taking some time, but he was still spending that time with his twin and … he loved him. He learned to enjoy seeing his twin working on new theories and rambles about his breakthrough to save him. No wonder Stan had enjoyed it as children…

There were some bristling noises, taking him out of his thoughts. He turned his head to see his brother climb in his nest. He still looked dishevelled and tired but … less angry than he was a moment ago.

Stanford didn't move and just followed his movements as Stanley took a seat leaning against the griffin, keeping clear of the bigger injuries. He raised his knees to his chin to lean on and stared at his hands. Following his gaze, Ford saw something clutched in them. He frowned and chirped curiously to get his attention.

Stan sighed and opened his hands to reveal a feather. The griffin wondered why his siblings had done that, it wasn't as if it was the first feather he ever lost. Upon close inspection, Ford realized the feather wasn't in the usual brown hue that covered most of him. This one was saturated and pale.

"It's … one of the few ya lost fighting this thing." His brother said in a whisper. "I wouldn't have given it much attention but … yeah, it's grey."

He turned his head to face Stanford. His eyes were sad but clear.

"We're getting old Stanford. You're getting grey feathers and I've got grey hair on my temples." At that last remark, the griffin tilted his head to glance at the side of his brother's head and surely enough, a few of his hair had started to turn grey around his ears.

They both stayed quiet. Stanford wasn't sure how he should take the news. It waw true they were both getting old but what did that have to do with his predicament? He knew his brother was working hard and wouldn't stop until he was back to being human. So why did a few grey feathers worry him?

"With each year that passes, I feel like I'm losing you. You … you barely use the tiles anymore, you sleep late into the morning," he motioned to the wall of branches around them. "Heck, ya even built a nest."

Stan dropped his arms and clenched his hands over the feather. "Am I … If I manage to turn you back or even if I don't… Will I still have a brother?" Tears had gathered in the corner of his eyes. "Or will all of this would have been for —"

Stanford screeched.

He didn't let him finish that last part. He didn't want to hear it. He trusted Stan to find a solution and he believed he would. The simple thought that his twin was wasting his time doing what he did was enough to make the few remaining feathers on his neck stand on end. If moving didn't hurt as much as it did right now, he would have probably mauled him for saying such a thing.

Instead, after he stopped screeching, a low growling erupted from his throat and he narrowed his eyes at his brother.

His brother just stood there, frozen in place by his outburst. He didn't move until he was done and just stared at Ford. He opened his mouth a couple of times until he found the right words. The shadow of a smile creeping up on the corner of his lips.

"Of course you'd react like that … you've been nothing but supportive … this whole time. It's just…" he sighed and avoided the griffin's eyes. "I feel like I should be doing more."

Of course not, knucklehead. You always put my needs before your own. You are doing fine and I believe in you.

The griffin huffed and dipped his head closer to his twin, his feathers slowly setting down his neck. He clapped his beak and made a series of indignant noises before ending with soft purrs.

Stan laughed softly. "Ya know, it's ironic but … your purrs are very soothing…"

Neither of them said a word after that.

An hour later, Stan rose, exited the nest and grabbed a piece of paper from the work desk.

"I still got this, so better not waste it." He said as he sat at the desk. "This I can handle, I can deal with. I'll concentrate on your friend's blueprints and … work from there. I can fix it… I have too."

He turned his back to Ford and picked up a pencil and some paper. From his point of view, he couldn't see what his twin was doing but the sound of a pencil running across the paper started to lull him into sleep. It was a soothing rhythmic soft sound and it quickly made the griffin's eyelid heavy.

Ruffling his feathers and stretching his sore limbs as far as he could without hurting himself, Stanford curled inside his nest, yawned and closed his eyes. He rested his head on his paws and sighed contently.

"If I ever see Fiddleford, I'll try to explain and…" His brother rambled.

It all blurred together and soon Ford was back to the black land of slumber. The fog in his mind rolled back in.

Time passed and Stanford's wounds healed up. It was months before they completely took the bandages off. His wing had recovered almost completely, it still had a small weird bent in it but it moved perfectly. Besides, it was not as if he used them regularly.

His leg was another story. Despite Stan's great care, the griffin still ended up with a limp. The orientation of the hip and paw being a little bit off when he stood up. The problem was most likely at the knee, which had probably been broken. Ford couldn't even sit properly on it anymore. Instead, whenever he sat on his hunched, his leg would stick out to the side.

Fortunately, the feathers had grown back and hid most of the scars he had acquired during his fight and escape through the woods.

The limp in his leg also meant that Stanford wasn't as actively walking from the basement to the main house as often as he used to. His trip to the surface became more and more scarce and Stan took the hard decision of sealing Ford's tunnel. Well, he didn't completely seal it but did put a door, a trap one at the end. Ford was able to open it by pulling on a wooden handle near the top. It was good work. From the outside it resembled Stan's septic tank, which is what he pretended it to be.

He had managed to finish this little contraption just before the first snow rolled in and before the dirt froze for the next couple of months. It was far from being Stan's proudest decision but he felt it was a necessity with what had happened to Stanford.

Not wanting to leave his brother completely alone or bored, Stan set up dozens of security cameras around the house and inside. He wired them all to a huge TV set—that he may or may not have stolen from a huge mansion nearby—he set up in the basement. Ford was able to shift between the different cameras with a console that was bigger than normal to make sure he wouldn't smash a few buttons at the same time.

The griffin was reluctant at first but quickly found it amusing to switch to the different feed and watch what was going on. Especially when his sibling started working on a special project near the end of the winter at night.

He didn't know how his brother managed to do everything. When he wasn't in the basement working on the blueprint, he was either at the lumber mill doing some hours to pay for their bills or in town to get supplies.

Stanford was staring at the screen, awaiting for his twin's return from one of those run into town.

The errands were just a poor excuse to get out of the house and alone for a while. It was true he needed some stuff from the grocery store but getting away from Ford was needed sometimes.

Stan loved his brother but he hated to see him like this. Seeing him build a nest in the basement, preening him in the morning and just staring at the TV screen to see the outside.

He felt as if he was losing his brother. He was still pretty much himself, Ford just acted too much animal-like to his taste. He felt as if he was failing him, despite everything he did.

He sighed and pushed his cart forward, absentmindedly picking up some canned soup and tossing them in. He came to the end of the aisle and turned right into the next one. He stopped short when he saw the waitress from the diner, Susan, in a deep conversation with another woman with an impressive beehive and hooked nose. Both of them blocked the aisle, preventing him from passing on either side of them. He groaned and rested his head in his hand waiting for them to finish talking until he could pass.

"I'm telling you. There's something living in those woods." Susan kept rambling. "It left claw marks on the back of the library a few years ago."

Stan cringed. So people had seen those. Well, no matter what, a single claw mark didn't prove anything.

The other woman just closed her eyes and slowly shook her head.

"And Dan said he spotted weird huge paw prints near his lumber mill a couple of times. I also saw some of those near the dinner. Then there's that truck driver that hit something big with wings last summer. It had to be some big animals. Gravity Falls's own beast."

"No!" Stan immediately shouted.

He cringed at the sound of his voice and slapped his hand over his face. He hadn't meant to answer but he couldn't bear to hear someone calling his brother a beast, not on his watch.

Both women turned to look at him. Susan frowned and then her face brightened as she realized who he was.

"Oh it's you! You're that scientist that lived in the cabin outside of town. We don't see you often." She said, "Doctor Pines, isn't that right? You must know what is going on."

Stan raised a finger and was about to correct her about being a doctor until he remembered. He was one. They all looked at him expectantly.

Right, they asked me something.

"I don't think there's such a thing as a beast in those woods." He said.

Susan frowned. "Well, how do you explain the claw marks?"

"Bears?" He took a deep breath and explained calmly. "If there were a large animal living in those woods, there'd be traces of its presence. Ya know things like droppings, paths and animal carcasses. Lots of them. Or, as it stands, the only proof anyone has is the occasional claw marks and paw prints popping here and there. Which I believe are the products of bored teenagers pulling up an elaborate prank to get outsiders to the town."

"And the feathers." Susan cheered.

"The what now?"

"The feathers. Every summer, some weird big feathers sometimes float into town. I saw one this morning pass my window. They are pretty and seemed real enough for an elaborate prank. I just pick them up and use them to make toys for my cats. They love that stuff."

Stan just shrugged and leaned on his cart. "Give people enough time and materials and they'll make anything. Just shows how much they wanna sell their dumb prank."

Susan looked a little sad. "You really think there aren't any beasts?"

Stan shook his head and crossed his arms. "No."

She sighed. "It's a shame. Something like that might've brought in some tourists for a change."

The biophysicist raised an eyebrow. "You'd pay ta hear some dumb facts about a fake … thing living in the woods?"

Susan shrugged. "Well, of course I'd pay to see this. Sounds interesting and fascinating. What do you know, it might spice things up here?"

Stan tapped his chin with his fingers.

What'd ya know … there could be an idea here.

That was interesting. He had done a good job at keeping evidence of Ford's presence to a minimum but there was so much he could do. He didn't know where his twin was doing his … droppings but he had a pretty good idea where they ended up. He himself made great use of that pit just a few paces away from their house. But if he could come up with a good enough story about what is going on in the woods, it would take the heat off Ford's back, so to speak. He could describe another monster that would fit the descriptions of what the people in town saw while being different from his brother. If he played his card well enough, it could even bring in money.

"So … what do you think? Would you be making an exhibit of sorts?" Susan asked with an excited voice.

"Not at the moment. Nothing's ready yet" Stan spotted how a small crowd had gathered around them.

People from the town wanted to hear about the legendary animal in the woods. He put on his best-selling smile, it had some time before a crowd had come around him. He cleared his throat.

"But don't worry ladies and gentlemen! I'll be working on uncovering the truth behind those … phenomena." He paused for a moment. "And for a short fee of five … ten bucks you'll get exclusive access to the first ever tour that'll be putting on!"

There was a beat. The small crowd went completely silent. For a moment, Stan was sure they would start to throw tomatoes at him, they looked kind of ripped in the corner of his vision. It had been a while since he had tried to sell something to someone, maybe he was out of practice.

Suddenly, they all started to dig into their pockets and threw out dollars at him. It took him by surprise. People wanted to come see the dumb thing he would be putting on. They were buying what he had half sold. It could be the start of something big.

"Thank you, thank you!" He said as he gathered the money they were handing to him. "Don't worry, all of this will be put to good use!"

"Thank you Dr. Mystery." Stan heard the crowd call him as he left to finish his errands.

Dr. Mystery … it got a nice ring to it.

Ideas were running through his head at an alarming speed, each succeeding the other. He had quite a lot of work to do if he wanted this to land. Did he want to go through with it?

That project would be a full-time thing. He would have to quit his job at the lumber mill. Not that he minded that much. He had been pushing papers for them for the past ten years or so, they could probably manage without him. He could always bring it home and do it from there. Most of it was just adding numbers and making sure everything balanced out.

He chuckled to himself. He was basically running the whole thing from the office they gave him. The only difference was that all had to be approved by Dan now. He would bet his first pay cheque they wouldn't mind him doing it from home. He should have thought of it years ago.

Stan shook his head, he would have to think about those things if he decided to do the Dr. Mystery business. It could be fun.

He would have to collect all of Ford's feathers he could get his hand on. Maybe some of the broken claws. He would definitely need some picture of part of him, to sell the whole thing. He should add a scratcher or something that his brother could do his claws on, to make it look even more real. Maybe some sort of tall wooden post would do the trick, he had spotted his twin doing his claws on the house or the nearby trees.

Lost in his thoughts, Stan didn't notice the other cart coming his way. He bumped into it hard enough to make his own trolley tilt over spilling his groceries on the floor, bringing him back to the present. He grumbled as he placed them back into his cart.

"Hey pal, watch where you're going!" He shouted as he put the cart back on its wheels. He looked up and froze when he came face to face with "Fiddleford..!"

The engineer didn't look good. His hair was a mess, his clothes in a dishevelled state and he had the start of a thick beard growing around his chin and long nose. He wasn't wearing his small round glasses which worried Stan. He didn't look good at all. And if the small stench he was picking up was any indication, Mcgugget hadn't showered in a while.

It sent a pang of shame in the biologist's heart. He didn't think the reveal of Ford's predicament would have such a devastating impact on his health. It was big to take in but he never suspected it to be this big.

He shook his head, he wanted to help him but he couldn't spend time on him and Ford at the same time. Fiddleford was a grown man, he could take care of himself. He was not Stan's problem.

"Oh … hum … hi Stan…" The engineer said uncertainty.

"Stanley… I'm… I'm Stanley, although that name has technically been dead for a few years." He laughed nervously and scratched the back of his neck.

He had tried to dissipate the tension between them but his sentence only seemed to aggravate the scrawny men's state. He visibly got paler and started to shake in place. Tugging and fiddling with his fingers nervously.

"This … this isn't … hum … that doesn't reassure me…" he mumbled.

"Yeah, I bet…" Stan deadpanned. "Look I got stuff ta do, so…" He made to move his shopping cart around the engineer to head back, when the scrawny men grabbed it, stopping it dead in its tracks. Stan eyed him. "What are you doing, Fiddleford?"

The thin man sent him a knowing look as he kept a firm hand on Stan's cart. He stared for a long time. "You're gonna do it, won't ya?" He said after a while.

Stan rolled his shoulders. "The tourist thing? Maybe. Sounds like fun and it would let me stay close to the house. Hehe, might even bring in some money … it's been a while since I used to work with crowds…"

"No!" The engineer exclaimed before glancing worriedly over his shoulders frantically. "I'm talking … about your brother… You're really going to go through with that machine?" He added in a whisper.

The grip of the biologist on his cart tightened, his knuckles turning white from the clenching. A growl erupted from his throat as he glared at Fiddleford. "I would do anything to help him, Mcgugget. A-N-Y-T-H-I-N-G! So yeah, I'll build this damn machine if it's the last thing I do!" He yanked his cart free and stormed out of the store, not bothering to pay for his stuff.

He only realized what he had done once he was back home and even then, he couldn't bring himself to go back and pay for it. It's not the first time he had done something as such, they would be fine.

He emptied his shopping in the different cupboards before taking the meat he had taken for Ford downstairs in his own fridge. Since he spent most of his time there, there was no point in keeping it upstairs.

As the elevator doors opened, Stan found his twin just a few paces away from it, waiting for him. He greeted him just as he always did, chirping and circling him happily. He became curious with the package in Stan's hand, nibbling the corners with his beak to convince his brother to give him some. Ford had recognized the package as his meal and wanted his share.

Sighing, Stan dragged his feet to a corner of the lab where a lamp with a crystal was set on the corner, pointing toward a wide clean flat surface on the floor. He opened the package in his hands, set a fistful of ground red meat on the floor and put the leftovers in the refrigerator next to the flat surface. His twin started to shuffle on his paws as Stan lit the lamp on and a soft pink halo illuminated the pile of meat on the floor.

Despite witnessing the phenomenal multiple tiles over the past years, it still fascinated the biologist to see the meat expand and grow under the glow. After a few seconds of leaving it under the light, it became the size of a house cat and then a dog. He stopped when it got to the size of a large pig, such as the ones in farmers' Sprouts barn.

The griffin waited for a moment before digging into his meal eagerly. Stan just leaned against the counter and watched, his heart clenching. He rested his hands behind him and they grazed at some paper. He glanced down to see the blueprint Fiddleford and him had cooked up.

The machine on it would be perfect and wouldn't take too long to build, no the waiting game would be with the tests. It would have to be perfect otherwise he would turn his brother into a monster. The research on the human genome would be useful once it would come out but, in the meantime, he would focus his energy into fine-tuning it.

His brother ate eagerly and in a few short bites he licked his beak and purred at his twin. He had finished eating his meal. Stan made a mental note to stack up on more meat at the time from now on, so that he won't let his twin starve.

The human looked at his brother before the thought from earlier. "Hey Ford, I've been thinking…"

All right, you can do this Stan… You might be rusty but you still got it.

Stan stared at his reflection in the mirror in the hall. He was wearing the best lab coat he had got from his years of studying biology. He wore a simple blue shirt with a brown vest and khaki pants, the only clean things remaining from Ford's wardrobe.

He wasn't the homeless bump that stumbled upon a wrecked house fifteen-odd years ago. He was a mid forty-year-old biologist living in a lonely cabin in the middle of the woods with a griffin for a brother. He wouldn't have believed it if someone told him that when he was a teen. How the time had changed.

He heard the sounds of many footsteps walking near his front door.

Show time.

He sighed, wore his best-selling smile, put his glasses on and walked to the door. He opened it with a theatrical movement and dipped his head.

"Welcome ladies and gentlemen! Welcome all to the Mystery Lab! Where genetics gone wrong aren't frowned upon!" He said enthusiastically.