Author's note: Whew, this one was a doozy to write. I hope you all enjoy it.
Chapter 8
The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something.
Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don't want it badly enough. They're there to stop the other people. - Randy Pausch
Yellow. Endless, unsettling, glowing, golden yellow cradling two deeply set streaks of long, black void. A fixed stare that seemed to be trying to swallow him up completely with a compelling pull into its vibrant and poisonous intensity. This was Stan's entire world now. The sky and searing bright light of the sun above him, the hard dusty ground, the scorched dry air, the car, the rocks, the sagebrush and Joshua trees, the entire desert landscape, was all gone. Gone and disappearing from his consciousness as a peculiar dream fades soon after waking. Stan knew, he knew in the back of his mind that all of it had to still be out there… somewhere... but it might as well have just bled out from the world entirely for all that he could interact with it. Reality was truly out of sight, and out of mind.
Even his own body seemed like a foreign and nonexistent entity beneath him. He couldn't move it, couldn't tell if he were still gripping tightly onto the chains that he'd dragged out from the car, or if he'd already let them slip through his loose fingers and drop to the dirt below. He didn't feel thirsty, or sore, or hurting, or hot. He wasn't even aware if he was breathing anymore, or if his heart were still beating in his chest. There was absolutely nothing for him to look at, nothing for him to focus on, save for the piercing yellow eyes that now ominously loomed over him, and the cruel satisfaction that swam within their depths.
"There, that should make things a bit easier." His brother's distorted voice bounced throughout his skull in a near deafening clarity. The volume of it was enough to make Stan wince internally, as it drowned out and scrambled whatever other thoughts that had been going through his head at the time. "Can't have a silly little thing like the fact that your meat bag of a body might be dying of heatstroke distract you from what's really important, now can we?"
Stan tried to make a noise of protest at this, but his lips and throat were unresponsive. His whole body was unresponsive. Even the gratification of feeling a thrill of terror race its way through his heart at this sudden repeat of paralysis was denied to him.
"Aw, what's the matter Stanley? Don't tell me you're tongue-tied right now. Come on, you don't have to be shy around me. I promise I won't bite." A round of spiteful, childish laughter rang in-between Stan's ears as well as outside of them. Now that the owner of the shining amber orbs held all the power, it seemed to be almost enjoying the fact that Stan was wary and apprehensive in its presence.
"Really, though," the voice continued on, "there's no need to worry too much about your potential death creeping up on you right now. Believe it or not, I didn't come here with the explicit purpose of killing you. Actually, as things stand now I don't have any intention of letting you die at all, just so long as the two of us can come to an agreement. Heck, I may even help you out of this fine little mess you've gotten yourself into if you have the sense to behave and cooperate fully with the demands I have lined up. I mean, being your subconscious and all, the only way I can help you if you agree to do what I say first. Right? Speaking of agreeing to things, I did actually come here with a specific purpose in mind, so what do you say we talk a little about that."
Stan's head was reeling, exasperatedly trying to keep up and take everything in. Though his mind might not have been currently flooded with the aching discomfort of his own body slowly giving out on him anymore, it was still a dizzy, murky, muddled, absolutely exhausted mess. This whole situation was far too surreal for him to make any sense of, and he was now finding himself continually plagued by the sinking suspicion that even if he'd woken up with a strong grip on reality while he was still within the confines of the trunk, it was more than likely that he'd already completely lost said grip long before he'd ever gotten out.
That was… if he'd really gotten out at all.
As discouraging as it was to admit it, at this point he had to surrender to the idea that this was a viable possibility. The simple fact of the matter was that he didn't really know what was going on. He didn't feel that he could be too sure of anything at the moment. Maybe this pair of glowing yellow eyes really was his subconscious, or maybe it wasn't. Maybe his brother had defied all odds to rescue him somehow, or maybe everything having to do with Stanford had merely been a product of Stan's own delirium. Maybe he was still locked up in the trunk, or maybe there had never been a car trunk in the first place, and all these events were just part of one long and terrible nightmare that he couldn't wake himself up from. The boundary between what was real and what wasn't had been badly blurred, like lines of chalk in a very heavy summer rain, and Stan simply didn't have the energy or clarity of mind to correctly sort out one from the other.
All Stan knew was that he just wanted for all of this to be over as quickly as possible, and if that meant he had to go along with whatever lunacy or delusion he was trapped in, then so be it. Even if there were going to be some disastrous consequence later down the road for him because of this, he couldn't find the energy to care right now. Besides, what this thing, his subconscious, his voice of reason, his brother, maybe something else entirely, wanted, it couldn't really be that outrageous or terrible. Could it?
Stan put up a front of false confidence to hide the fear and fatigue that he knew would cause his rasping voice to tremble, and tried to inform the yellow eyes as apathetically as he could that they could go ahead and make their stupid proposition already. He was then quickly reminded that he couldn't move his mouth to speak. It didn't seem to really matter. He could tell by the smug glinting that they somehow knew everything without him saying anything at all.
"Well, well, well, would you look at that. We both want this business to conclude as quickly and effortlessly as possible. See, this is gonna be a synch. We're finding common ground before we've really even started. And look, I know you may not like the sound of what I'm about to propose at first, but if you'll just keep an open mind and actually hear me out all the way through then I'm sure I can force you see the sense in it. Really, I think we'll both prefer it if I don't have to resort to more…. drastic means of getting you to comply."
Experience told Stan that the underlying threat should have probably made him nervous, especially if it was being brought out this early in the game, but he was feeling too disoriented and weary to be intimidated. He was ready to sign whatever dotted line was necessary just to break free of the insanity that had apparently taken hold of him, and get back to figuring out a way to escape from the desert with his life intact. Assuming all of that had even been real.
"Yeah, don't let that bother you too much right now. It's just something I kinda want you to keep in mind while we're having this little discussion of ours. You know, to provide a little extra motivation." The glowing golden eyes curved upwards a little indicating that their owner was most likely smirking. They seemed disgustingly pleased by his cooperation thus far.
Stan gave no response. He just blearily stared up and waited for the eyes to continue.
"All right Stanley, so here's the thing. You know how your life's complete and utter disaster right now? Well as your subconscious I'm going to do you a favor and instruct you on how to take care of this little problem." The somewhat flippant tone of his 'subconscious' began to take on a slightly more sinister note as the eyes glowering down at Stan renewed the ferocity of their focus.
"Seriously, you need to listen to me this time, because right here, right now, I'm going to give you the chance to do the most worthwhile thing you've ever done in your life. Something that will set it right back on course and fix the complete trainwreck it's become. You see, you kinda have this habit of getting so caught up in how you feel at the moment, that you don't pay any attention to the way the world is moving on around, and without you. You don't notice the signs of the times, the ones that tell you 'Hey, guess what? It's time to jump ship. It's time to give up and move on to something else.' In fact, you routinely ignore those warnings until it's too late. And guess what Stanley? It's far, far too late. Consider this your last wake up call. Your brother, Stanford, he's the sinking ship that you need to abandon. You need to move on to something else and finally give up on him, just like he's already given up on you."
Stanley felt the dispirited haziness in his mind growing imperceptibly as the weight of the words set in, his thoughts whirling in a cold and tired stutter as he tried to discredit the accusation.
No, that... that was wrong. Stanford hadn't abandoned him, that was ridiculous. Things between them were... they were just... things were complicated right now, that was all. So what if he'd just imagined that Stanford had rescued him out of the trunk earlier? It wasn't his brother's fault that he hadn't really been there. It was Stanley's fault, it was always his fault. He was just a good for nothing screw up who had let his pathetic loneliness get the better of him and start playing tricks on him. It's not like Stanford could have known what had happened to him, and if he had known... h-he was sure he would have been there. He wouldn't have abandoned him. Even if things between them weren't... great right now, Stanford would still have his back. They would always have each other's back.
Stanford's warped voice gave an exasperated groan as the eyebrows above the yellow orbs furrowed in frustration. "Oh, don't give me that. You were nearly ready to kill the guy just a few moments ago."
Stanley couldn't help shrinking a little in shame. Now that his earlier outraged hysteria had burned itself out and left him more sobered, he was starting to feel a good deal of regret and guilt over his brief flirt with madness. He was fairly familiar with his own temper and knew that it tended to be pretty brief, explosive, and volatile, like a sudden eruption, but this was the first time his unrestrained fury had driven him to something as awful as potential murder. Granted, he hadn't really been in his right mind at the time, and in all likelihood still wasn't, but the fact that he was even capable of that at all left him feeling unsettled. That it had been directed at his brother, of all people, just made the dizzying remorse and overwhelming self-disgust that much more potent.
But then, that hadn't really been his brother, had it? That had been, well... that had been whatever this thing was. The real Stanford would have never treated him so cruelly. Didn't that make this a moot point?
"Ha! Look, I realize you're blindly loyal, so this isn't going to be an easy pill for you to swallow, but don't forget, I'm your subconscious, and I know what's best for you even if you aren't always able to recognize it yourself. Stanford Pines isn't exactly the stand-up, can-do-no-wrong guy that you seem to think he is. Really he's the kind of guy who wants to believe so badly that he's made for great things and that he's so much more important then the rest of his fellow flesh sacs in this backwater dimension, that he'll pretty much buy anything you tell him so long as you affirm that. Heck, I even made up some complete rubbish about six fingered beings representing a higher power or supernatural intelligence, and that idiot just lapped it all up. Seriously, even an interdimensional cosmic entity forged yesterday would know that kind of defect is pretty much cosmetic. It has no more significance or specialness to it than having an oddly shaped mole on your butt. Having two heads on the other hand…" His 'subconscious' trailed off for a moment, "Well, let's get back on track."
"Stanford, he's never going to bring you anything but heartache no matter how much you do for him in return. Just trust me on this one. If you go blindly running along to him whenever he calls, it's not going to end well for you. All you're going to get for it is thirty years of life down the drain and a punch to the face as a thank you for your hard work and countless sacrifices. And that certainly doesn't sound like any fun, now does it?" Stan's 'subconscious' gave a solemn shake of its head at this, though it never once broke eye contact.
Stanley's mind tensed in a hot and defensive discomfort.
No, it didn't sound like fun, but... it was wrong. It was wrong about everything. He didn't even know what it was talking about. What was with all that thirty years nonsense anyways, what exactly was that supposed to mean? And h-how dare it! How dare it say those things about his brother. Stanford wasn't an idiot, or ungrateful, or a bad person, that was how people had always described Stanley, but not him! He didn't like that the eyes drilling down into his own had talked about him like that, he didn't like it at all, so Stanley pictured himself flipping the bird in his mind to make sure that he got this message across.
The yellow eyes curved in a fake satisfaction as they ignored his rude gesture. "Glad to see we're both on the same page, but here's something you might not have thought of before. You value your own life. I mean, that should be pretty obvious looking back at the lengths you went through to try and keep it, especially considering the hopelessness of your situation in the trunk back there. So if that's the case, then cutting ties with Stanford really would be the smart move for you. Don't you want to make a smart move for once in your miserable little life Stanley? If you don't… I guarantee that he won't hesitate to get you involved in whatever potentially fatal mistakes he's making right now. He'll drag both of you down with the weight of his own pride. From what I've seen, your brother has a pretty poor track record when it comes to being aware of or concerned about the health and wellbeing of the people around him. Either he doesn't realize the destructive consequences that his actions have, or he just doesn't care. Quite frankly, I'm leaning towards the latter being more accurate. Think about it Stanley. You had the decency to hang up the phone those two times and not drag him into your pathetic problems, so why should you have to be dragged into his? Surely you deserve better than that don't you?"
Did he deserve better? Why had he hung up on both occasions? Had that been out of pride or... no. No, it wasn't pride. When he had first been kicked out of his home in New Jeresy as an arrogant and angry teen, he'd put a very high value on his self-righteous outrage and stinging ego, but by this point he had already long ago crossed the line of selling out his own self-respect for the sake of comfort. No, it wasn't pride that had made him twice hang up the phone when he'd needed his brother's help six months ago. It was a fear of rejection. If the tables were turned, however, if his brother came to him instead, then that fear would be irrelevant.
Yes, Stanley valued his own life but he didn't mind being dragged into his brother's problems, even if they did have the potential to be life-threatening. He didn't want to deserve better, he didn't want to be proud. He would be happy to suffer through his brother's mistakes with him if need be, to follow him if he fell, and to be there to help stand him back up on his feet again. It wasn't an inconvenience.
Stan felt warm, softly burning embers catch in the centers of his eyes, and he slowly shook his head. He had no idea how he'd managed to move it, and after he'd finished he found that he wasn't able to move it again. But then, he only really needed to shake it once to get the message clearly across.
No.
His 'subconscious' gave resentful snort. It didn't seem to like his little display of motion. The intensity of his gaze receded a little in an attempt to make itself seem more friendly. "Now, now, settle down. Let's not let things between us get too heated up yet. Remember what I said about keeping an open mind?"
Yeah, he did remember, Stanley thought to himself with a bit more confidence, but then, he hadn't earned the nickname 'pendejo obstinado' while locked up in Colombian prison for nothing. Stanley was tired and he just wanted to get this over with. Whatever game this thing was trying to play, whatever point it was trying to make, it needed to hurry up and get to it already.
The black slits within the toxic yellow seemed to narrow as if mulling something over. " All right, all right. As someone who's spent the better part of his life conning people I thought you'd be a little more appreciative of the fine art of selling an idea, but fine. If you want me to cut straight to the chase, then I'll cut straight to the chase. You see, your brother is actually working on something really big and influential right now, something that will change the course of the entire world. He can't really afford to be distracted by his lowlife loser of a twin brother dropping by. Of course, every big project has its setbacks and Stanford may find some time in the near future that he was 'lied to' and that his 'life's work' isn't exactly what he thought it was. And it might be that in this time of 'darkness' for him, when he has no one else to turn to or trust, that he'll turn to you, and ask you for help. And here's the part where I'm really gonna need you to listen in close Stanley…."
Stan internally winced as the force behind the steady glowing orbs suddenly began to dig itself even more insistently into the sockets of his skull, tightening firmly around his mind till every other thought within it was snuffed out and silenced by the unyielding pressure.
"Ok, so here's what I want you to do. When your brother asks you for your help, when he beckons you to come and visit him in Gravity Falls, Oregon…. You're going to ignore him. If he calls you, you're going to hang up. If he sends you something in the mail, you're going to burn it without looking at or reading it. If he comes to your car, you're going to drive off without hearing what he has to say. If he comes to your doorstep, you're going to slam the door in his face and you won't open it no matter how hard or frequently he knocks. No matter what happens, no matter how he may try to ask, beg, bribe, or persuade you otherwise, you're going to stay away from him, and you're not going to let him get anywhere near you. How does all of that sound?"
It sounded terrible. The alarm bells that had begun sounding in his head after he heard the 'advice' were almost enough to cut through the cottony, lightheaded weariness that was currently muting and restraining his thoughts.
If his 'subconscious' had asked him to do almost anything else, compromise his morals, humiliate himself, get a steady job, beg his father for help, rob from an orphanage, even kill a man in cold blood, then Stan would have probably gone along with it just to get this whole ordeal over with. This, however, was one stance that he wasn't going to budge on regardless of how badly he wanted this misery to end. And while the biggest reason for this was the fact that he cared deeply about Stanford, to the point where his blood was boiling over just listening to the way this thing was talking about his brother, it wasn't the only reason that he wouldn't consider giving ground on this.
Because in a way, this was what Stanley wanted most right now.
Stanford was the most important person in Stanley's world, and he wanted to be wanted by his brother. He wanted to be needed. To be necessary. To be important and useful to him. If Stanford were to show up on his doorstep and request for his help, then Stanley give it to him without hesitation. Not just for his brother's sake, but for his own as well. Having his brother ask for him now would return to Stanley a sense security and purpose that he had lost some time ago, that he was now sifting through the ruins of a failed adult life to find. If Stanford needed him, Stanley would have a place to fit in. He would have a home. He would belong somewhere. And of all the things Stan desired for himself, he desired these the most. If Stanford were in trouble, if he called out for his brother's aid, then nothing in the heavens, or the earth, or under the earth, would stop Stanley from coming.
"Ah." The yellow eyes flickered with the same impatience and cunning that a cat staring down a mouse just out of its reach might give. Somehow it had sensed all that Stanley was feeling right now, and it seemed intent on readjusting its strategy to remedy the problem his stubbornness was presenting.
"You know, I think I'm finally beginning to understand where the heart of this disagreement of ours truly lies, and I have to say, I'm actually a little disappointed in you Stanley. It's absolutely ridiculous that you're still clinging to your brother even after all this time. He doesn't care about you, he never has. GET OVER IT! If you had any sense right now in that tiny little human brain of yours, you'd forget about your pathetic attempts to earn back his favor and focus on living your life however it is that you really want to live it. You don't need him as much as you seem to think you do. Your life hasn't been an out of control mess because you're just a natural failure. You're not. No, no, no. You're a self-made failure, and honestly, that's probably worse. Deep down you have to realize that if you just ditched your hopes of ever fixing things between the two of you, and instead settled on getting a steady job that didn't offer potential loads of fast cash but still gave you what you needed to keep yourself afloat, then you wouldn't keep ending up in stupid situations like this! Do you really think you'd have ever found yourself locked up in a car trunk if you weren't always purposefully throwing yourself into dangerous money-making schemes or dealing with shady thugs in a sad attempt to earn enough to buy back your family's acceptance? When you look at it that way, it's that fact that you care so much about your brother that put you into that trunk in the first place. And I'll tell you what, Stanford certainly isn't the reason that you got out! His presence in your life has only ever brought you trouble and disappointment. You really think someone like him is worth all of this? Fine then, show me why. Back this stubbornness of your's up. Give me one good reason, one happy memory, that outweighs all the ways in which you're destroying your life for his sake."
Heh, it had been a big mistake to ask that question, Stan thought in a tipsy and sluggish self-assurance. If this thing wanted good memories to prove that his brother was worth every sacrifice he'd made these past seven years, then Stanley could provide more than half a lifetime's worth right off the top of his head. That would be the easiest thing in the world.
As if in answer to his overconfidence the brightness of the yellow eyes seemed to grow in a sudden, fixated intensity. An opaque glow that shined like light and moved like fog consumed every inch of Stan's field of vision. It poured itself into his eye sockets and filled every crevice in his head pulling him even deeper within himself, deeper into his own mind, into something like a dream. It dragged him further and further away from the reality of the desert still taking its toll on his motionless body hunched over in the dirt. The golden presence didn't quite intrude on his mind just yet, though. Instead, it confined itself to slowly circling around the outer edges in a tension that implied an unspoken threat.
"Well, I'm here now. So if it's so easy, then think of one already. I'll see it. Go ahead, just one is all I'm asking for. I'll wait."
Stan's mind was dazed and blank for a few long moments. The force of the will behind the yellow eyes' had been as overpowering as the undertow of a mighty river, and he couldn't help but be temporarily stunned by how wispy and frail his own presence seemed in comparison. Slowly, he eased himself out of his stupor and began to cautiously summon the requested memory. It was one of the most important and precious that he'd ever had of his brother. He remembered it as clearly as if it were happening to him right now. It was the time when the two of them had been…. When he had….. It was… it….. where…..
Stanley froze again, overcome by the creeping of a frantic, despondent dread.
How? How in the world could he have possibly forgotten it? Stan focused even harder on the recollection; desperately shoving aside the gilded mist that curled and billowed in the forefront of his mind to try and fill the empty space that the memory had once occupied. He thought he might have brushed up against it for a moment, and was given a brief impression of two boys sitting on a sitting on a swing set on the beach, but he couldn't remember what had made it so particularly pleasant or why it was important to him.
"Well. I'm still waiting."
Stan's train of thought was a stuttering collapsing mess. The engines smoldering with a frustrated, panicked sense of loss that he couldn't understand or hope to explain. But fine. Fine, fine it was all fine. Fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fine, fi-. Even if he wasn't able to recall that memory, it wasn't a problem. It wasn't a problem at all. There were no problems. Everything was fine. There were still plenty more where it had come from.
Stan refocused the trembling energy of his thoughts in an effort to call upon those memories as well. He thought of all the good times that he and his brother had shared, all the make-believe and sometimes even real adventures that the two had partaken in, all the trouble they had gotten into and the punishments they would endure while shooting either regretful or cocky grins at each other. He thought of every time that one would make a joke that would send the other into a breathless huddle of uncontrolled laughter, every time when one of them would be upset and the other would stay by their side and hold them close, every time one of them had promised that they would go to the ends of the earth and back again for the other. He even tried to sink himself into the warm easiness of all the quiet moments the two had shared, where nothing had really happened at all and they had just enjoyed the others company.
But each time he tried to bring up one of these memories they would slip from his grasp before he could get anything more than a faint impression of their contents. The process from the first memory seemed to be repeating itself again, and again, and again. The gleaming haze devoured everything while simultaneously denying all wrongdoing, and Stanley was too deranged and disoriented to follow up on his distraught, half-formed accusations.
His tormented mind began to shudder even more violently, like a brittle autumn leaf in a windstorm. He felt desperately, hopelessly lost. Alone.
W-where had they gone? Where had those memories of Stanford gone? They were there, they had been right there! They had been right there! What had happened to them?! How had it taken them away from him?
He had to resist the childish part of him that wanted to cry out to his brother for help.
The scene in his mind began to take an even more dreamlike form. It was as though Stanley were now standing on the old, barnacle-encrusted, rotted, half-sinking skeleton of the Stan O' War. He was adrift without an anchor, surrounded on all sides by an endless sea of golden, shimmering, malevolent presence.
Then something that the shining fog had been collecting while Stan had been previously preoccupied began to take shape, and he sensed its shadowed form seeping out from behind the curtain of glowing mist. It was a flock of dark and dangerous albatross that circled him from high on above. He knew, he knew what they were. He watched their progress, watched them spinning above him with a fatigued and unhinged acceptance and forced himself to remain steady. There was barely any time brace for the torrent before they descend upon his waning sense of purpose with a surprising viciousness. They scratched and clawed at him in a competition to grab his attention. They flew up close, and spread their large beating wings so that they took up the whole of his mind in a cacophony of squawking and shirking. Moments where he'd been the most angry, upset, resentful, and jealous of Stanford appeared before him now in a stunning, undeniable, painful clarity.
There was a memory over here of Stanford saying nothing while their principal had openly mocked and belittled Stanley in front of their parents. There was an earlier memory over there of the time when Stanford had tattled on his brother for nicking a couple of tangerines from the grocery store, which had gotten their father to box Stanley 's ears before grounding him for two whole weeks. There was yet another memory over in the corner of Stanford's bruised and swollen face scowling in anger as he ranted about what a dumb, worthless, waste of time boxing was, and how much he utterly despised the wretched sport. As Stanley had listened to this, the ribbon that he had been hanging up from the match he had won earlier that day suddenly didn't feel as significant or important as it had before. It was the first and only award to sit upon his shelf. A shelf that sat opposite another shelf with forty plus awards overflowing off its sides.
But there was one memory that was far more damning and damaging than all the rest. It was one that Stanley only clung to at the times when he was feeling the most bitter and spiteful at himself and the world around him. It sat boldly, patiently gazing down at his efforts to fend off and swat at the other terrible memories for a long while, before swooping down upon him itself to deliver a final, fatal blow.
It was the memory of Stanley reaching his hand up to beg for his brother's aid while his father was throwing him out, and of Stanford turning his head away, and closing the curtains on him.
Stan could feel tears pricking in his eyes. The pain that it brought to his mind was stinging, and dull, and heavy. It held the same terrible, somber weight that the last sunset would carry with it, on the last day of the earth.
The yellow eyes stared into him with an almost bubbly satisfaction. "Soooooo, why exactly are you willing so sacrifice so much for this guy? You still haven't answered that question for me. You seemed so sure of yourself before. I thought you'd be able to offer me one reason at the very least, even if it wasn't a good one. "
Stan didn't respond. He couldn't. His mind was whirling, spinning, and tumbling out of control. The image his brother's softly smiling face was being replaced with the one that Stanley had been imagining while he was still locked in the trunk of the car. It was the one of Stanford condescendingly looking down on a brother that he must have felt himself to be so utterly and completely superior to. It made Stanley's insides writhe with a bitter and miserable contempt. It was unbelievable sometimes what an egotistical, pretentious, know-it-all his brother could be.
Stanford had a tendency to be selfish, arrogant, and self-righteous. He was easily flattered and especially sensitive to criticism or humiliation. The latter was one of the reasons why Stanley, who had come to take a special pride in being desensitized to what most other people's opinions about him were, had taken the fall for his brother on so many, many occasions. Like who had wet the bed, or who had dusted the shelves incorrectly, or 'Was your brother in on this?' 'No mam, I wrecked the lab equipment all by myself', or even tossing punch all over himself on prom night just so his brother wouldn't have to suffer in his embarrassment alone. And when, when in all of those times had Stanford ever done the same for him? What had he ever sacrificed for Stanley's benefit to prove that he cared about his brother just as much as Stanley cared about him?
Stan was sure that there were plenty of times when his brother had, he was so sure, but they were hidden somewhere in the shining yellow gloom surrounding him, out of his mind and memory. As things were now, he honestly couldn't recall a single time when the shoe had been on the other foot.
Maybe... maybe he didn't care. Maybe all of this really was useless. Maybe he was hopelessly chasing after something that had never been there to begin with. Something that he had fooled himself into thinking existed, just like he had fooled himself into thinking that Stanford had come for him and rescued him from the confines of the dark trunk.
Stanley felt as though his whole world were slowly being turned upside-down on him, and all the loose debris that were clattering to the new floor were assaulting him on their way down.
No. This wasn't right, none of it was right. That wasn't how things between them had been. This wasn't how he felt.
"Come on now Stanley, can't you see the sense in this yet? It's not like you brother's ever fought for your sake, so why should you try and work yourself into an early grave making money for him? Why should you care at all about him, when he doesn't care enough about you not to put his 'academic excellence' ahead of his own brother? He's abandoned you to suffer this fate alone for more than seven years. He didn't once take hold of your outstretched hand to help pull you back up from this disastrous wreck that your life has become. And now Stanley, now you have the opportunity to return the favor. Now you can leave Stanford with his arm outstretched, begging for your help, while you turn away and close the curtains on him! Wouldn't that be so satisfying?"
In this moment, Stanley felt as though he could almost agree with that. His mind was blistering in an overwhelming sense of frantic hurt and betrayal, as fragile and hot with anger as paper-thin white ash curled around a glowing orange cinder. The yellow eyes bored into him expectantly, commanding him to submit to its designs.
"No."
The quiet sound rasped out from his dry throat. Stan had absolutely no idea how he'd managed it. The word hadn't even come from his mind but had seemed to well up from some other gently aching place deep inside his chest till it overflowed his lungs and poured forth from his mouth. It wasn't an answer to the entity's question, not really. It wasn't a good memory that outweighed all the difficulties he had put himself through for his brother's sake. It had no reason, or logic to back it up. It had no proof to prop it up or justify its existence.
Yet it was still there, defiantly and undeniably true despite all evidence that its existence was a flawed one. It needed no foundation to hold itself up, it just was.
The glowing yellow within the eyes dimmed in an impatient, savage anger. "Stanford's already abandoned you in your many, many hours of need, so now you're going to abandon hi-"
"No."
Stanley wasn't going to abandon his brother, wasn't going to doubt that Stanford truly cared about him, even if he didn't have a single goddamn reason not to. He just wasn't capable of that.
The daunting yellow eyes seemed to shrink in revulsion for a moment, and then the gilded mist that had invaded his mind earlier withdrew. In doing so, it returned the treasured memories Stan had thought to be lost to him. The comfort he felt at experiencing them again was as heartbreakingly wonderful and warming as wrapping one's arms around a loved one thought to be dead. For a few seconds, he was left to enjoy the fruits of his senseless, illogical defiance in peace.
He reveled in the memories of the times when Stanford had patiently helped him study for the classes he was failing in, even though Stanley was a slow learner and a real pain to try and teach. How Stanford would sit with him late into the night and read over the contents of their textbooks by the dim light of their lamp, while Stanley would puff his cheeks and pout at him as he tried to sneakily slink off the chair that they were sharing. How his brother had even helped him to cheat on numerous occasions, despite how opposed he was to the idea and the way his hands would shake at the fear of getting caught.
A warm and tender affection sprang into his mind as he remembered staring out into the car lot where a shining new El Diablo had sat, and Stanford walking up to him, barely able to keep the knowing grin off from his face, and offering to use all the money he had been collecting and saving up over the years to help pay for the vehicle. Stanley had hugged his brother so overzealously that there had been bruises on his ribs the next day, and while their parent's wrath at this 'frivolous waste' had been a sight to behold, Stanford had just smiled back at Stanley throughout the whole lecture.
He even reclaimed the memory of the two of them sitting on a swing set by the beach in the early morning, and remembered why that one, in particular, had been so special to him. Nothing much had happened in it, no words had even been spoken. It was just... peaceful. Just the pair of them listing to the whispered creaking of the swings and the dull roar of the ocean in the background. Just two lonely souls, quietly enjoying being in each other's presence.
More and more began flooding all about him with a clean and undarkened strength, propping up his weary mind and filling it with a very calm, cold, and tired certainty, the same one he had become familiar with in an earlier dream. Whatever he had to sacrifice, whatever trials he might have to endure, however much of himself he had to whittle away or however long he might have to wait, his brother was worth it. Even if Stanley received nothing else for his efforts, not even a thank you, Stanford would always be worth it.
But his relief didn't last long.
"So that's what you're really gonna stick with, huh? Fine then. Have it your way." The familiar and yet unfamiliar voice of his brother snapped with a caustic, clipped distaste, as though its owner had been personally offended by Stan's resolve. The deep black pupils tightened to slits as sharp and thin as the edges of a dagger, and they glared at him in a disgusted dissatisfaction.
"I thought the two of us might be able to reach a mutually beneficial agreement without anyone getting hurt, but if you're gonna be stubborn about this then I guess I don't have any other choice than to resort to plan B. At least I had the foresight to catch you in a state where you're not going to have the clarity of mind to fight me off. So that's a plus. I really wish I didn't have to, though. Not because of how absolutely awful this is going to be for you, cause that's actually going to be pretty funny. Naw, I'm a little miffed because this is gonna really tire me out for a while, and I was kinda planning to use my energy for other important matters I have lined up. But nooo, you just had to go and inconvenience me. Because at the end of the day that's what you do best, isn't it Stanley. You just make things more difficult for yourself, and your brother, and your family, and for everyone else around you. Now you're going to enter a world of pain and suffering Stan Pines, and you don't have anyone to blame for this but yourself. I hope you take a lot of pleasure in that fact because I know I'm certainly going to while I'm listening to you screami-"
Stan's subconscious abruptly cut off, and the glowing golden energy that had consumed Stan's field of vision inexplicably retreated. His body slumped forward like a puppet suddenly being cut from its strings. He fell back into reality, into the hot sunlight and cloudless blue sky, into thirst and the aching exhaustion of his body and the faint beating of his own heart against his ribcage. His head pounded insistently against the hard desert ground, and he blinked in a heavy, lazy sleepiness as he watched the waves of heat distort the various shapes of rocks, and trees, and sagebrush milling about in the distance. Questions began to lethargically buzz around in his mind.
What had happened? What had caused this madness to release him? Where was he? What was real? Had it already done something to him and he just didn't realize it? Why did dirt make such a lousy pillow anyways?
Stan wearily risked a glance up at his 'subconscious' looking for some answer to all of this, but the image of his brother wasn't looking back at him. He could still make out the expression on its face, a strange combination of confusion, apprehension, and white-faced anger, and he could see that its eyes were no longer that disquieting shade of yellow that they'd been for the later half of their talk. However, he had no real idea as to what had suddenly caught its attention or what had caused it to shut its big mouth. He observed Stanford's lifeless hanging body for a few more moments, noticing that it now seemed intent on holding as perfectly still as possible, before he followed its focused gaze back out into the empty plains of the desert.
He didn't see anything for a good long while, save for the scorched landscape and desiccated plants, but just as he was slowly closing his eyes to maybe... take a little nap and ease his parched, fevered fatigue, he noticed that there was one small shape on the horizon that was moving... differently. Not like the way the other shapes were being bent and swirled around by the searing heat.
He thought it almost looked a little like... the shadowed figure of a man leisurely making its way towards the two of them. A warped and wavering outline of a pitch-black silhouette. The same one that'd had its back to the sun and had loomed over Stanley as the trunk had opened.