rabbit hole

The newspaper notice—I put it there as a joke, kind of to show the ridiculous lengths that Ford’s condescension reached. That he exposed Stan like this in an embarrassing and humiliating manner, first by implying that Stan was an omega for every person with two neurons reading the newspaper, and second by implying that Stan wasn’t capable of protecting himself. It’s important to point out here, I think, that Ford didn’t have the slightest idea that Stan was homeless or actually struggling or he would have been absolutely freaking out! No, he was just being his old condescending alpha self, and he wrote the newspaper notice just in case—that was what he imagined to be a tempting offer. He was also still angry and bitter at Stan, because Ford is a grudge holding champion, but he greatly valued his self-imposed sense of alpha duty and was very conscious of the fact that he remained Stan’s alpha.

What would their reunion have looked like... Well, that would have been alpha!Ford at his worst! He wouldn’t have been humbled by his own failure with Bill (Bill’s betrayal isn’t Ford’s fault, ofc, but Ford himself would disagree) or by Stan’s noble sacrifice in Weirdmageddon, so his perceived superiority (one validated by his alpha status) would have been even more deeply rooted in his subconscious. The Ford you know from the fic? Imagine him 10x worse, hahaha. And if (when) he discovered what Stan went through, that Stan had been homeless, suffering... Poor Stan! 😭

I think this Ford, after the heavy blow of the shock and subsequent enormous guilt, would have become truly, deeply overprotective, not just in his usual, vaguely condescending manner, but in an intense, obsessive, maybe even scary—as scary as pre-portal Ford is capable of being, that is—manner. Especially because he would have blamed himself for everything that happened with Stan, even if subconsciously; for not being there to protect Stan when Stan would have protected Ford without hesitation, even as an omega. Stan would have been pampered, but also suffocated, and soon enough things would start getting too much for him, despite his love for Ford. Stan has an inferiority complex towards Ford and because of it he loves feeling useful. If Ford started taking his freedom away to turn him into some sort of glorified housewife in a gilded cage, things definitely wouldn’t have gone well. I don’t know which part of Stan would win out inside his brain—the needy, attached, family-loving Stan who would deep down feel comforted by being taken care of and having daily evidence that his brother still loved him, or the proud, offended, independence-seeking Stan. Even if the latter won out, escaping Ford’s protective arms would be quite a challenge when Ford, as I imagine him, has promised himself that he would never let Stan leave his sight again.

“This isn’t some dark bible or cursed gateway—it’s the last pathetic gasp of a has-been who fears being forgotten. Bill isn’t a god, he’s a needy theater kid in search of a stage. [...] You can’t kill an idea, but you can think of a better one. [...] I’ve found my happiness.”

— Stanford Pines, The Book of Bill

“Ford.” Nothing. “Ford.” Nothing. “Ford. Hey, buddy, I’m talking to you.”

“Hmm? Oh, sorry, Stanley, I was too busy studying these beautiful translucent scales,” he gestured to a pile of glittering stuff beneath his microscope, and alright, Stan could admit they were pretty, if only in the safe privacy of his thoughts where he didn’t have any grunkliness to uphold, “that Nayara—the redhead siren, if you don’t remember—so helpfully gifted us. Who could imagine that they can shed them, after all! Fascinating!”

In any other occasion, Stan would have asked for some to send their grandniece. This was not any other occasion.

“You sure... like... anomalies, huh. Monsters. Whatever. According to Dipper, you once dated a siren...?”

“Oh! Yes, yes. I have. I suppose that’s something I have in common with Mabel, despite sirens and mermaids not quiiite being the same thing.” He chuckled quietly to himself, and Stan knew his brother enough to identify the sheer fondness in that sound. It warmed his heart a little, like a single cup of coffee with sugar, before the Arctic chill rushed in again. “Really charming creatures! I could write an entire book about their mating—”

“DoyoueverthinkaboutBill?”

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

Stan grunted. He didn’t believe in no god, double negative and all, but a mysterious force in the universe seemed to really hold it against him sometimes. Which was ridiculous, because Stan was innocent. Could it be that wretched pink lizard? Paul Bunyan would never.

“Do you. Ever think. About Bill.”

Ford’s sweet disposition changed almost instantly. Stan didn’t need to see his face, not when his shoulders visibly tensed. Guilt wormed its way in his stomach—he hated to be the one ruining his brother’s good mood, but he had been in a terrible one himself, ever since...

“Stan. You know I do.”

Stan cringed. Yes, he knew. He was the one to comfort his brother every time he woke up from a particularly vicious nightmare, sweating cold. Ford had learned to abandon most of his paranoia, but it had been a struggle all of its own to convince him a gun underneath his pillow was not, in fact, necessary. Bill had probably traumatized him for life, but at least that trauma could be managed with time.

“Yeah, I know. I don’t... I don’t mean it like that.”

“How do you mean it, then?” His tone now had a curious edge to it.

“I mean... If you still miss Bill,” Stan whispered, steeling himself for the answer.

“Sorry? I couldn’t hear you.”

“If you still miss Bill!” He had to remind himself not to shout. Ford wasn’t the one with the hearing problems, between the two of them. “I know, I know, you told me that I shouldn’t ever touch TicTac—TokTik—that strange hellish app Mabel likes so much, ever again, but! But I couldn’t help but be curious! I wanted to know what more they were saying! I knew it would be bullshit, okay? But I wanted to know what kind of bullshit! And guess what! I found out!”

“Oh, Stanley...” Ford had turned to look at him now. There was emotion in his eyes that could almost be pity, as if they were saying, Strangers on the internet, Stanley? Really?

Stan really didn’t need his judgement now. Especially not when Ford was supposed to be the focus of that conversation.

“So. Do you miss Bill or not?”

“Short answer: no.”

“No, what?”

“No, I don’t miss him. I’m relieved he’s gone.”

“Stanford. Be honest with me.”

“I am. I don’t miss him. Sometimes I do miss the being whom I mistakenly thought he was, in my utter blindness and naivety. Not his true self, not whom he really was.” Ford sighed. “The being whom I thought he was—I am free to admit it now—was especially fashioned to enchant me. It reminded me a lot of you, Stanley, in a period of my life where your absence was especially felt, down to the very nicknames you called me. Sixer, Fordsy.” He made what Stan was Pavlov-conditioned to identify as a self-deprecating noise. “I see it now. He took advantage of my loneliness, of how much I missed my brother and human companionship. He was imitating you, not fully, but at least a little. I am ashamed of how well it worked.”

Stan could feel his own cheeks warming. Ugh. Not the time to be a sap.

“But that isn’t news for you, is it, Stan? I told you about how I always needed that second, that other person. You, and then Fiddleford, and then Bill, and then even poor Dipper.”

“That’s not it.”

“What is it, then?”

“I want to know: Bill’s true self, for you, is...?” He didn’t finish, hoping his brother would understand the opening to elaborate.

Ford looked puzzled again.

“You have read my old Journal 3, haven’t you? It’s exactly as I have described him in there, both visibly and in blacklight: a monster, a screeching, graceless lunatic, an angular psychopath. The good guy he pretended to be never really existed, and it was that nonexistent good guy whom I once thought I loved, if only in an obsessed, quasi-religious sort of way.”

Loved. Past tense.

That was enough, Stan thought. It was more than enough reassurance. Any reasonable person would be satisfied with that and not continue to push further, not with something that clearly made their brother uncomfortable. Again, Stan was not a reasonable person.

“But what if he became that?”

“Huh?”

“What if Bill became exactly that, Ford. The good guy you thought he was. For real, this time.”

“He won’t.” He had never heard Ford sound as certain of something. “There’s no hope for a being like him, Stan. He’s irredeemable.”

“Pretend with me, okay? Indulge me, like you say.”

“Well, then... good for him, I suppose. It would mean the Axolotl’s therapy worked.”

“And?”

“And, what? Stanley, if you’re not clear with me, I can’t know what you mean. Communicate, remember? Imagine Mabel is here. Imagine her saying what you know she would say if she knew—”

“Can it, Poindexter! What I want to know is if you would forgive him!”

“The Axolotl? There’s nothing to forgive, really. Do you mean it in a classic ‘God wasn’t here when I needed it’ way? No worries about that. I understand that, in the end, the Axolot’s ways are not our ways and things would have turned out—”

“Not the fucking lizard, you dumbass genius! Bill! Bill! Would you have forgiven BILL!” To hell with the no shouting policy.

Ford tilted his head like a confused dog. He had seen that gesture on the twins, before. It was cuter on them.

“Me... forgive... Bill...?” he repeated, dumbfounded.

Stan nodded.

“Stanley, do you have a fever? Are you drunk?”

Stan shook his head.

Something too quick for Stan to identify passed like lightning through Ford’s face.

And then he smiled.

“Alright, then,” he said in a far, far too cheerful tone. “I’ll just have to be a liiiittle more specific, Stanley! Just a little bit.” His smile didn’t reach his eyes. An almost manic expression he had never seen on Ford’s face. “What do you want me to forgive Bill for?”

“I—I dunno, the—the whole—”

“For deceiving me? For making me distrust my brother and my friend? For traumatizing poor Fiddleford? For haunting my dreams and giving me sleep aversion? For controlling my body like a puppet and bruising it all over? For threatening to commit suicide with it just because he could? For using it to ruin my reputation with the townsfolk? For tattooing it without my consent as a sign of ownership? For making my eye bleed, driving a nail through my hand, and making me eat live spiders? For persecuting and terrorizing me? For pulling my bones out of their sockets and subjecting me to excruciating pain? For threatening to erase my memories and messing with the meaning of words in my brain? For calling my brother’s number and threatening to commit suicide? For ruining my entire goddamn life?”

Stan was impressed, it nothing else, with how quickly Ford was able to name all of those things. Did he keep a mental list? Less impressed, however, with the clear annoyance behind them. Directed at Stan? Uh-oh.

“Stanford, I didn’t mean—”

“No, no! Let me guess!” The fake cheerfulness was grating in Stan’s ears. “For deceiving and possessing Dipper? For leaving a message to Mabel threatening Dipper’s suicide? For hunting me down in the multiverse? For taking advantage of Mabel’s feelings? For mocking one of my deepest insecurities? For humiliating me publicly? For turning me and the townsfolk into statues? For torturing and electrocuting me? For attempting to blackmail me? For turning Fiddleford and five more people into tapestry? For threatening to kill the three people I love the most in the world, for wanting to destroy the entire planet, for relishing in human agony, for being one of the most feared beings in the entire multiverse and terrorizing other dimensions to the point that their inhabitants were afraid to pronounce his very name?” He took a deep breath, as if recovering his energy. As if getting ready for more. “For—”

“Stanford, I’m sorry, okay? I really am! You don’t have to keep listing shit!”

Especially not shit Bill had done to his family. Stan wanted nothing more than to bring him back and kill him ten times over.

Something in the tone of Stan’s voice—or the fact he was offering a sincere apology, and those didn’t come easy to him—must have finally snapped Ford out of it. His visible anger gave way to deep-seated exhaustion.

“Oh, Stan, no. No. I’m sorry. Remembering all those things... I couldn’t help but... take it out on you. I forget myself sometimes. It wasn’t fair and I... I apologize.”

“It’s all good. I didn’t mean to offend you, I just...” He didn’t know what to say.

“You didn’t offend me, Stanley,” Ford assured, even though he was now rolling his eyes. “I was angry at him, not at you. I am just surprised with how forgiving you are.”

“Forgiving? Me? Oh, that triangle can fucking rot, I—”

“Not towards Bill. Towards yours truly! See, only a few months have passed since we decided to sail away together and you’re already forgetting the forty years I spent holding a grudge against my own twin brother for two mistakes he never even meant to make? Have you forgotten, perchance, the kind of unforgiving bastard I am?” The grin on Ford’s face was genuine, now, and Stan had to smile at that. “Mabel hasn’t forgiven him. Mabel. You saw her drawing about what she would do to him if she ever saw him again. And you think I would? Me, of all people?”

The unbidden image of Mabel eating the demon like a crunchy nacho came to Stan’s mind, and yeah, he was fully laughing now.

“Frankly, it sounds like you don’t know me at all,” added Ford in a mock-hurt tone.

“Oh, you shut your yap! I do know you, okay! It’s just that... those people on the internet...”

“I haven’t observed a lot of insightful, sensible discussion on this inter-net.”

“Internet,” he corrected, just for the petty satisfaction of being the one to point out his brother’s mistakes for once.

“Yes, yes. An impressive pool of human brilliance.”

Stan really could do without the sarcasm.

“As I was saying,” he continued, perhaps a little too defensive, “those people on the internet... they seemed to think you would feel...” He swallowed. “Incomplete. Without the... dorito.”

And just like that, any remaining anger vanished from Ford’s face.

“Oh, Stan.” His brother’s tone was very, very familiar, now. Guilt. Ford’s best buddy since Weirdmaggedon and the bane of Stan’s life. “I’m—I didn’t—” He seemed to fumble with his words. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were feeling neglected.”

“That I—what?”

“Stan. You’re one of three people I love the most. The most important person in my life. You know that, or at least I hope you know that. I’m sorry I haven’t demonstrated that in forty years, I’m sorry I’m not being as loving as you perhaps thought you would be, but I promise you, I’ll do better. You’ll never again think Bill was more important than you, because he never, ever was, and I’ll make sure that we learn how to—”

“Ford, what the fuck! I’m not feeling neglected!”

Ford’s eyes widened at that. Mabel was right. He did indeed look like a startled owl.

“No? I thought that perhaps this whole conversation stemmed from your low self-esteem. It was the only explanation why you would think I was feeling incomplete when my real soulmate and adventure partner is right in front of me. Bill couldn’t ever compete against you.”

Paul fucking Bunyan.

“Stanford, I’m not having a self-esteem crisis.” He sighed. “I am worried about you, because I happen to know that many... abuse victims... have mixed feelings about their abusers, and... um. that’s, uh... that’s valid, you know. Totally valid.”

“Do you? How do you know that, Stanley?” He raised an eyebrow. “Who ‘abused’ you?”

“Stanford, again, I don’t—”

“Pa... Of course!” Ford spat, brows furrowed, protective rage all over his features. “Pa was your abuser. I’ve never associated this particular word with him before, but now I see it. I really do. I’m so sorry, Stan... I’m sorry I took me so long to see it...”

“Pa wasn’t an... an abuser! He just didn’t—”

“See! Defending him even now!” Ford ran a hand through his face. “Stanley, I know that this happens. You are the living proof of that. Dipper told me about how you talked about Pa’s ‘tough love’ approach, as if it was something you were grateful for.”

“We are talking about you, Ford!”

“Are we? Because I think we’re talking about you. I think you’re projecting your own experiences with abuse onto me and expecting me to feel as you do.”

Wow. Candid as ever. Some of his hurt must have shown on his face, because Ford’s face softened.

“I’m sorry, Stan. That was mean. But what’s up with that kind of talk? It almost seems like you’re the one going to therapy, with that... uncharacteristic wording.”

“Alright, alright, you got me!”

Slight surprise flashed across Ford’s face. An arched brow was quick to follow, a knowing ‘caught you with your hand in the cookie jar’ glint in his eyes.

The pomposity. The audacity. Stan would bet his ass Ford couldn’t guess the truth in a million years.

And that was why, obviously, he crossed his arms. Exactly like the petulant, immature child Ford thought him to be. Because he wasn’t that.

“Well?”

Oh, to hell with it.

“You know I like writing my own Duchess Approves stories, right? And I might or not have mentioned it to Soos and he might or not have told me it’s apparently called ‘fanfiction’ and that there’s a big public on the internet for that, so I asked him to teach me the basics. Turns out there was a fandom of Duchess Approves—if you don’t know what a fandom is—”

“Stan. To the point.”

“Well. People were saying that the Duchess’ mother was a ‘narcissistic mother’ and an ‘abuser’ or something and using all kinds of shrink talk and that got me feeling weird because her mother was just... she was just like Pa.”

“And?”

“And I may or not have created a self-insert fanfiction with characters based off all the people I knew and written about our whole love story in the guise of an AU. Alternative Universe, you know. Like a different story from the original.”

“And?”

“And the fans are getting weird about you and the triangle.”

Ford laughed, looking tired but genuinely amused.

“Oh, only you, Stan...”

“No, really! They loved the plot and that made me over the moon! Like wow, people really like what I write? Soos was right! They made fanart and everything!”

“Congrats!” Pride was added to Ford’s amusement. Stan felt like a petted dog.

“They adored your relationship with that godsforsaken demon and kept drawing you two smooching and at first I was like ‘ugh’ and ‘yikes’ but then I was like ‘alright,’ you know, ‘cause that had been my own fucking fault for writing it based on my stupid fucking life. I was not going to take it personally, I decided after the third our fourth fanart. They all thought it was fictional, and... and I suppose you did have a relationship with Bill, right? So to each their own.”

Ford didn’t seem very surprised. Nor impressed. Nor offended. Stan supposed that the Thirst Comments Incident had left him thoroughly desensitized.

“But?”

“But then it started getting out of control! Now some of them are pretending Bill was just a silly little clown or a poor lonely misunderstood soul who just wanted some lovin’—”

“Classic case of delusion—”

“—shoving even his most horrifying actions under the rug—”

“People do the same for corrupt politicians, don’t they? One just needs enough charisma and lying skills, so I doubt—”

“—and twisting everything I write for their own sick purposes and—and they’re saying that I meant things that I most definitely didn’t mean! They’re seeing clues and parallels where I didn’t intent them to be at all and now... now everything is fucking fuel!” Stan was aware his desperation was seeping into his voice, but he didn’t care. Ford had to know. “No matter how much I try to make it obvious that you are totally over Bill! For real, Poindexter, I tried, I swear I did! I tried answering their comments, I tried making a disclaimer, I tried—”

Ford started laughing again, now, which was more annoying than endearing.

“I take fandom very seriously, okay?”

“I can see that.”

“Their arguments started getting to me! Some of them were really well-worded and smart-sounding! Like as if it was you talking to me, with ‘evidence’ and stuff! So I thought that maybe, just maybe, they knew what they were talking about, perhaps...” perhaps more than me, he didn’t say, because that would be ridiculous. They couldn’t know Ford more than his own twin brother and lover, right? Even though Stan hadn’t lived with Ford for four entire decades...

“Hm-hmm.”

“And I answered your questions, so now get back on track, nerd.”

“Are you sure I am the nerd here?”

“Stanford.”

“Alright, alright. Just looks like you’re stressed over nothing, that’s all.”

“Stanford, you don’t understand! They seemed to consider your relationship with Bill more important than your relationship with... with your family!”

Ford raised an eyebrow. Ugh, his brother knew him too well.

“... Than your relationship with me,” Stan admitted through gritted teeth. “Yes! You were right! I was feeling insecure all along and Stanford Pines is always fucking right! Satisfied?”

“Not if it makes you suffer, no. You do know they are wrong, certainly...?”

“Well, y-yes, but...”

“In my own experience, it really is like you said—some abuse victims do feel like that, and it’s... it’s ‘valid,’ or whatever the kids are saying. It’s valid if you feel this way about Pa! But the contrary is also true and also valid. I am being completely honest with you when I say I do hate Bill.”

“You know what they say, though, right? People in general, I mean, not just on the internet. Hatred is close to love and all that. The contrary of love is not hatred, but indifference.”

“Oh, yes, and what an indubitably sensible perspective that one is. I was feeling very loving towards Bill when I was fantasizing about and orchestrating his death and humiliating downfall at my hands, and similarly, naturally, feeling very hateful towards the you and the children when I was willing to give up the entire universe for a slim possibility to save you.”

“You... you did hate me, once!”

Ford sputtered.

“Hate you? Hate you? Are you insane? I have never hated you, nor Fiddleford, for even a second! Nor did I ever thought I did!”

Oh.

Those were news. Stan could address them later, though.

“I’m not that emotionally unintelligent, Stan.”

“Ford—Sixer—can I call you Sixer?”

“Of course you can. And Fordsy, too, even though it annoys me. I’ll be damned if I let Bill ruin anything else for us. I don’t want nothing related to him ever remaining a taboo.”

“Sixer. Can you, uh, explain exactly how you feel about him as if I’m dumb? ‘Cause I kind of am.” Ford opened his mouth, probably to reassure Stan of his nonexistent intelligence, but he continued. “Just... be clear. No sarcasm, okay? It would put an old man’s mind at ease. You know what Mabel would say to that, too.”

His brother didn’t miss a beat.

“Stanley. Stanley, I loathe him. I fucking despise him. I’m over him, but I’m not indifferent. You saw, with my initial reaction to his book, that I’m not indifferent. I can’t bring myself to be indifferent, even if indifference is the commonly accepted ‘opposite of love,’” he included air quotes, then, also rolling his eyes to make sure Stan knew how stupid he thought that was, “because he utterly and thoroughly ruined my life and traumatized me. I’m but human. He made me afraid of my own shadow for decades. He will always remain my enemy, it would be foolish to pretend otherwise. It’s really that simple.”

“And... and before the betrayal?”

“It’s complicated. Have you ever had a religious experience?”

Stan shook his head no.

“Do you even have to ask?”

Unless the whole thing with Paul Bunyan counted, that is...

“He was like a god to me, and not only in the ‘powerful’ sense. He was my Muse. I worshipped him. I was obsessed. I don’t know if that counted as love, Stan, but let’s say it did, for the sake of simplifying things. Let’s make it easier for you to follow, let’s say I ‘loved’ him.” He sighed. “I thought I loved him religiously at least, and... after reading his book, looking back...” His voice grew quieter.

Stan understood. The romantic “rejected ex” undertones of that book were very hard to miss. Bill was about as subtle as a bull in a china shop.

“I might indeed have loved the person—sorry, the triangle—I thought he was, once, and he was the center of my stupid galaxy, and that—that was a beautiful but cheap illusion. An illusion that was very, very painfully shattered and cost me very, very dearly.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Any love that I could have retained for him in spite his initial deception—any sympathy in spite of his gut-punching betrayal—was gradually but completely destroyed by Bill himself, poisoned by my own hatred and resentment, and eroded until nothing was left. I have loved him for two years, and hated him for thirty. Now I look back and only feel pity for the wide-eyed, dreamer boy that I was. I mourn what could have been, had Bill not been... well, had Bill not been himself.”

“He didn’t get over you, y’know. Bill, I mean. His pathetic little book left that very clear.”

“Oh, yes. I do know. Thanks to you, I now see that it was pathetic. And desperate. And deluded. Guess he finally realized what he lost.” He smiled again, although it looked more like baring his teeth, and something cold flashed in his eyes. “Good. I want him to suffer.”

Perhaps Stan should be alarmed, but he wasn’t. He felt like he was truly relaxing after a good while, a knot undone in his stomach.

“I did wonder, you know. While in the multiverse, I hated him so much, and I often wondered if I hated him only because I didn’t allow myself to feel nothing else. I am very, very good at ignoring and repressing my feelings, Stan.” His brother chuckled, as if he and Stan were sharing an internal joke. His feelings for Stan, he realized. Those were the ones Ford repressed. “So, deep down, I wondered and wondered and wondered. I wasn’t sure I didn’t love him at all anymore until the moment I had to kill him. I was shocked to look inside and find no regret, no fear, no remnants of love. All that was gone, lost forever in a distant past. There was only the bleak determination to rid the world of his evil. You weren’t there, of course, but Dipper was. You can ask him. My hand didn’t tremble. I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t flinch. I was proud of myself for that.”

“I just—Dipper mentioned once as we were having breakfast that... that you cried after his defeat, and I thought... maybe... I didn’t know what to think, really, but after all I saw and read in the Duchess fandom... I was feeling unsure.” It was still hard to talk about his feelings. “That’s why I came to ask you.”

“I did, Stanley. I cried for you. It was a bitter victory, because I loved—I love you—way more than I have ever hated him.”

Woah. Stan could feel the glitter of those damned scales getting to his eyes. They were watering.

“I supposed I shouldn’t have given him the honor of a funeral, even a mock one with dear Mabel’s witty disrespect, but... I wanted to. I wanted closure. To revolve my life around my loathing towards him was to revolve it around him all the same, but I wanted visual proof that this chapter of my life was over—dead along with him. It might not be over for him, but hah! That’s not my business. Not anymore.”

Stan didn’t think it was possible for him to relax more, but it was. Oh, thank Paul Bunyan.

“And Stanley... promise me you won’t give those people on the internet the time of day, alright? If there’s one thing I learned the hard way, it’s that human beings, smart or not, always see what they want to see. I have been exactly like this once, remember? Twisting everything in my reality to fit my worldview. You could make my post-Weirdmaggedon character—”

“The term is ‘post-canon’... by the way.” Stan supplied, trying to sound casual and non-nerdy. “And his name’s Duke Oglebottom.”

“Alright. You could make my... ‘post-canon’ character... Duke Oglebottom... hunt down and viciously stab Bill’s character—”

“Count Billiam—”

“Count Billiam? Seriously, Stan? Anyway, you could make post-canon Duke Oglebottom hunt down and viciously stab Count Billiam twenty-three times and they would still—”

“—ship them, yeah. And think they’re meant to be.” Stan sighed. “They would.”

“Ship them? Ship them to where?”

“It’s, like, wanting them to be together. People just really, really like yaoi.”

He didn’t tell Ford, but there were definitely people shipping Duke Oglebottom with his long lost twin brother, the humble but dashing stable boy, too. Those freaks. He was proud of them.

“Yatch? Like a boat? Are they that interested in sea adventures?”

Stan sighed.

“Forget it.”

“Well. No matter. My point is that people would still see what they want to see.”

Ford get up from his chair, then, holding Stan’s face with both of his wide hands.

“Stanley, you might not believe this, but the void left in my heart by Bill, if there ever was any, has long been filled. By the children. By you.” He pressed a chaste kiss to Stan’s forehead, then to both his eyes, then his nose, and finally, his lips. “And if you can’t believe that, believe this, at least: even if I ever forgave him for the innumerous, terrible things he did to me—which, rest assured, I sure as all hell won’t—I’ll never forgive what he did to whom I love. If he ever attempts to hurt you, Mabel, Dipper, or Fiddleford, any more than he already has, I’ll rip him apart.”

Stan shuddered. His nerdy brother really could be scary when he wanted to, not that he would ever admit it. Again, privacy of his thoughts and whatnot.

“Is that good enough for you, my love?”