polluted swamp

Stan weakly looked over and his brother frantically compiled research notes, convinced that if he could find the right combination of science and magic, he could make Stan better. A Sisyphean task, Stan knew there wasn't anything that could be done. Call it a gut feeling; his organs were shutting down and he had maybe 20% functionality left at this point, but his gut instinct was never wrong.

"Ford... it's okay, Ford." Stan softly called from across the room, unable to fully sit up from the lying down position he was in, only able to post up on his elbows. As expected, Ford’s hunched over form bristled and he slammed one of his six fingered hands flat on his desk, the noise not even startling Stan after years of distant and not-so-distant gunfire and traffic.

His brother turned heel to face him, his eyes bloodshot and manic; he was trying to make himself look angry and determined, but even after ten years Stan wasn’t fooled. Ford was scared, and he was desperate. Two emotions Stanley had gotten to know intimately in their time apart. 

He used some of his rapidly waning strength to motion with his arms for Ford to come closer.

"Okay?! Stan, you're dying!” Ford practically spat, but followed Stan’s requesting gesture, and strode over across the spare bedroom and to the side of Stan’s bed. “I'll figure something out. I'll make this right, I-I'll fix this.” He promised, but the younger twin knew he was trying to convince himself that more than he was trying to convince Stan.

“...'M not sure how much longer I can-.” Stan cut himself off to go into a coughing fit - the kind of fit that lasted for minutes and caused the eyes to tear up, the kind of fit that didn’t have relief when it ended, only more fatigue. Ford immediately gave him firm pats on the back as Stan was hacking, in an attempt to help alleviate the symptoms or at least the accompanying pain. His throat and chest was still sore and pained when it was over, but Ford was still rubbing his back; Stan was exhausted and lightheaded, but the warm, familiar touch kept him grounded, kept him awake and present. 

Seeing Stan finally calm down, if a bit woozy now, Ford began to withdraw and tried to return to his research. Return to his efforts to achieve the impossible. 

Sweet Moses, a guy breaks the laws of thermodynamics once and he thinks he can do anything, huh?

Desperately, Stan grabbed his sleeve to stop him; it wasn’t the grip itself that made Ford stop in his tracks - because Stan’s grip is so weak he couldn’t tear apart wet paper if he tried - it was Stan’s clear need for his undivided attention that gave him pause. When his twin looked back at him, still with those scared, desperate eyes, Stan slid his hand down from his wrist to his hand, slotting his five fingers between Ford's six, which his brother allowed with no resistance. 

Distantly, Stan’s mind pinged fond memories of when they’d done this as children, when he used to tell Ford that since he had six fingers and not five he could surround all of Stan’s hand unlike everyone else, and how that made him feel sheltered, safe even.

Interesting how it still had that effect on Stan even now, even when he knew what was coming. What he knew was going to happen soon.

“Ford, can ya just stay with me, please?” Stan rasped desperately, he saw Ford’s jaw clench and his free hand curled into a fist but Stan wasn’t afraid; because Ford wasn’t angry. Not really. “I can’t hold out for much longer…”.

“Just a little bit longer, Stanley.” Ford shook his head, and he tilted his head back slightly; a gesture Stan recognized as his brother trying to keep tears from welling up enough to be noticeable. “Just hold on a little bit longer, I can-”

“Stanford!” Stan exclamation came out as more of a strained huff, but it was enough to make his genius sibling shut his yap and listen. “You can’t fix this. You can’t fix me.” He told him, his tone softer, more subdued.

“I can!” Ford insisted, and it was Stan’s turn to shake his head. “Just let me-” Before he finished, Stan decided that negotiations were over now. Now was the time for orders, demands even if that was what it was going to take.

“You need to let me go, Stanford.”

“I ALREADY DID!” Ford yelled out in response, before collapsing onto his knees to be at eye level with his brother; tears were now freely streaming down his face and his nose was starting to run, but he hadn’t let go of Stanley’s hand. His grip had grown tighter even, almost painful, as though Stan would disappear if he slacked his hold on him even a little bit. “Our dad threw you out like garbage and I turned my back on you!”

“What Pa did wasn’t your fault, Sixer.” Stan reminded him gently, struggling to squeeze Ford’s hand in return, to bring his frantic sibling back to the present with him, and out of the past that they couldn’t change. “We both made mistakes back then.” His eyelids were getting heavy again, unconsciousness once again trying to claim him, but Stan was going to resist it as long as possible, because Ford needed him.

“Deciding some college I had just heard about was more important to me than my own twin brother wasn’t just a mistake,” Ford hissed indignantly, but the effect was lost with the hiccups making him twitch “it was nothing short of stubborn, heartless lunacy.” He started sobbing as his rant about himself ended, and Stan forced himself to scoot closer to him so he could bring his other hand to his twins shaking shoulder.

“Why won’t you let me save you?” Ford asked him in a small voice Stan hasn’t heard from him in a long time, not since they were just little boys and even a brainiac like him couldn’t understand the world around them and the things that were scaring him back then, and it broke Stan’s heart just the same now. “Why don’t you want me to save you?”

“Because ya can’t…” Stan replied, his own tired eyes filling up with tears, taking what little water he’d managed to force down today “Not in the way ya want to, not in the way that matters. Death is not a question you can answer or an equation you can solve, Sixer. Death is universal. It’s absolute. It is.”

Stanford sobbed even harder at Stan’s words, enough to make Stan shakily remove Ford’s glasses and place them on the nightstand, before returning his hand to his shoulder. Holding onto his brothers shaking form as long as he could, and refusing to let go.

“I thought I had more time,” Ford whimpered between tears, looking down at the floor between his kneeling body and the side of the bed “I-I thought I could be mad at you as long as I wanted, that I had all the time in the world to ignore you and I could just have you back as soon as it was convenient for me. I let you go and wasted ten years - I wasted all of that time.”

“We still have some time left…”

“Please don’t leave me.” Ford sniffled and he looked up from the floor, his eyes meeting Stan’s own. He looked pleading, his expression the picture of despair. And it made Stan’s dwindling heart pang to know that he was going to have to tell him no. “Let me do something- I’ll do anything, to help you stay.”

Stan took in a deep breath, holding it as long as his weak lungs would let him, before releasing a shuddering breath, and shaking his head again. “I can’t stay, Stanford.” He said with finality, “Even if ya could do something, with science or magic or religion or whatever, that wouldn’t be a life. I’ve lived on borrowed time and deadlines before, always lookin' over my shoulder waiting for a collector to cash in, and that’s not a life worth livin'.

I don’t want to be a ghoul or zombie or haunted doll. I just want to be human. I’ve had dozens of different identities and names in the past decade, but now?” He leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Fords. Trying to be as close as possible, as comforting as possible for the both of them. “Now, and for the rest of the time I have left, I just want to be Stanley… Your brother. Will you let me?” He was starting to lose sensation and now it wasn’t just his eyelids that felt heavy, it was his limbs, his head, his mind, his entire body felt heavy. He clung onto Stanford, his last and only lifeline.

“I never should have made you think you couldn’t be that.” Stanford sniveled, lurching forward and gathering Stanley in as tight of a hug as he could manage while still keeping one set of their hands joined. “You’ll always be my brother, Stanley. Always.”

Stan weakly nodded in relief, soaking in as much warmth as Ford would give him, all of the love he’s missed so desperately. After years of mutual, though uncommunicated, resentment, Stan thought he’d feel bitter when he’d see Ford again, choosing to come down to Oregon to say goodbye to him in person instead of seeing any of the rest of their family for the last time. But he wasn’t.

In a way… Stanley was almost relieved. There were so many other times he could have died or been killed - in some alleyway, prison yard, or trunk of car, but always alone. Alone like he had been since he’d been kicked out. 

He was dying, but at least it was as Stanley Pines. At least it wasn’t as Andrew Alcatraz, Steve Pinington, Panley Stines or, even worse, as John Doe.

Everything was heavy and he couldn’t move most of his body anymore, his eyes would roll but his lids would not so much as flutter. He was losing more and more feeling as darkness crept in, blanketing all of his senses. Blanketing everything he was. Blankets were supposed to be comforting, but the darkness still dredged up something primal within him

“Would ya stay with me?” Stan asked in a whisper, focusing on what little sensation he had left to cling to the feeling of his brother holding him “M’ scared… Dun wanna be alone…” He was slurring and he knew his voice was fading. But Ford understood him still. Of course he did.

“You won’t be alone, I promise. I’ll stay with you, I’m not going to leave you hanging this time. I love you, Stanley… I love you so much.”

“Can it, poindexter. I love you too.” It took the last of his strength to murmur that back, but it was worth it. All sensation disappeared, and the darkness took Stanley over. Either in unconsciousness, or in death, he wouldn’t know until he woke up… Or, he’d never know anything ever again.

He was dying.

But at least it was as Stanley Pines, Stanford Pines brother. The only thing he ever truly wanted to be.