oh god

1. The FBI's Famous Cases & Criminals archive (fbi.gov/history/famous-cases) has detailed breakdowns of real fraud cases, Ponzi schemes, and confidence operations. The language they use is clinical and precise, which is perfect for getting the procedural details right.

2. The FTC Consumer Sentinel Network publishes annual reports on the most common fraud tactics in the US. Great for understanding how modern scams actually work and what makes people fall for them.

3. The Smithsonian's American Art Museum has a free digital collection of forgery case studies. If your character forges documents or art, this is gold.

4. Court Listener (courtlistener.com) is a free legal database where you can read actual court transcripts from fraud trials. Want to know how a real con artist talks under oath? This is where you find out.

5. The Internet Archive's collection of old newspaper crime sections. Search for "confidence man" or "swindle" in papers from the 1920s through 1960s and you'll find incredible real stories that would feel too dramatic for fiction.

Bonus: The Psychology of Fraud section on the Association for Psychological Science website has accessible articles about why people trust, how deception works cognitively, and what makes someone a convincing liar. Essential reading if you want your con artist characters to feel psychologically real.

We of course have Soos assigning Stan as his father figure the moment he got hired

But Stan holds that moment dear too, with Soos becoming his main source of company after the Mystery Shack, his first big success, was starting to hit rock bottom. And he made sure to keep the screwdriver that led Soos to him for a decade which unfortunately gets stolen by a certain time traveler...

(Their meeting being a paradox of Soos' family leading him to them is super sweet too!)

Playing one game of catch with their dads still was a dream for both of them, even when it was clear that it'll never happen, even when Soos knows that the Pines are his family and he shouldn't care about that biological deadbeat, even when Filbrick threw Stan away like trash.

But both of them end up finding closure with each other anyway.

Bill if he ever escapes out of the theraprism

Referenced pic under the cut ⬇️

Without text under cut :3c

“We really showed that trapezoid what’s what, eh Sixer?”