#I should know from gravity falls….estranged brothers

[wasted-wallflower-blog]

Reprieve

I'm still finishing up Chapter Nine for TWtIWY, but I figured I would work on some Omegaverse Stancest trash and see if y'all want some more. I'm back on my bullshit besties.

Stanley looks awful. Dreadful. Terrible. 

Multiple synonyms arise in Ford’s mind, but it doesn’t change the fact that his twin is currently lying in a hospital bed, beaten within an inch of his life, covered in mottled bruises, and far too thin. 

“Stan, you idiot,” Ford breathes. It’s been years - ten long, tortuous years to be precise - and Stan’s living situation must have been far worse than his own. Briefly, he had wondered what Stanley was up to, before pushing that thought down into the depths of his subconscious. God. This is his fault. If only he had listened, if only he hadn’t been so convinced of his superiority that Stan deserved a good punch to the face. If Ford wasn’t such a fucking imbecile, Stan wouldn’t be here. 

He tastes salt. When did he start crying? Ford wipes his face hastily. The beep of the heart monitor goes on, droning in and out along with the sound of Stan’s breathing. 

Stan appears to open his mouth, attempting to get more air into his undoubtedly crushed rib cage. And then, a weak “Stanford?” reaches his ears. 

“I’m here. I’m - Stanley, I’m so sorry -” 

“You came.” Stan’s eyes flutter open, bloodshot sclera doing nothing to hide the deep, rich, awe-filled brown of his irises. 

“Of course I did.” 

““Didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” Stan slurs, the words stumbling over one another. “You’ve grown up.” 

Ford lets out a shaky, almost timid laugh. “It’s been a while. You have as well.” 

“No, I mean,” Stan squints, attempting to move his arm - the one not in the cast -  and says, “you’ve gotten, y’know.” 

“I don’t know, actually.” 

“Pretty.” The word leaves Stan’s lips carelessly. “Prettiest O I’ve ever seen.” 

Ford blinks, stares, and blinks again. What? “Stanley, I think you’re -” 

“Stanford Pines?” 

He turns, facing the doctor that called earlier. Dr. Maheswaran, according to her badge: tall, thin and beta. Utterly professional. “It may be best to discuss your brother’s condition outside.”  

Stan makes a discontented sound, nearly a growl, and the hair on the back of Ford’s neck stands up. This is … not good. Not good at all. 

"I'll be back."

The hallway of the hospital, small and sterile, has a tile on the floor out of place. Ford stares at it, feeling suddenly tired, his earlier manic, desperate energy fading. It powered him through the drive from Gravity Falls to Sacramento, but every energy reserve has to run out sometime.

“He’s stable, much more so than when he first came in. His injuries will take a while to heal, but there’s no internal hemorrhaging or organ failure, and he’s not concussed. However,” Dr. Maheswaran's tone grows serious, “he’s been skipping suppressants. I assume it has to do with lack of coverage by insurance, but he should be taking ten milligrams of AR daily -” 

“AR?” 

“It’s the brand name, but any suppressant will do. Given your twin’s decreased medical access, it’s imperative that he take a form of suppressant, ideally with scent blockers or synthetic hormonal contraceptives.” 

“I don’t understand,” Ford says, helplessly. “I haven’t seen Stanley in ten years. We were estranged. The last time we talked, he hadn’t even presented, and even then, his test results indicated he would be beta.” 

“Stanley is an Alpha. It’s not too uncommon for Alpha presentations to occur later than those of beta and Omegas. You’re an Omega, unbonded and unmated. Stanley has indicated his preference to stay with you during his recovery. Given his age and presumably close proximity to you, pre-Rut symptoms will most likely occur within the next few weeks.”

Ford swallows. It all makes sense. Stan’s sudden displeasure when he left, his immediate detection of Ford’s own status (no doubt due to increased olfactory senses), how, despite his current condition, he’s broad and retained some muscle in his arms. Alpha.

He’s in over his head. 

Dr. Maheswaran regards him, her gaze softening. “This is a lot to take in at once. I … heard the comment he made towards you. If you would prefer to have him stay elsewhere -” 

“No, it’s just,” he feels his cheeks heat, “it’s probably the painkillers. He didn’t mean that.” 

“If you’re certain.” 

“I am. No one would mean that, not with my hands.” Omega and unable to be courted, what an ironic twist of fate, Ford thinks, bitterly. He doesn’t want Stan to say sweet nothings. Not if he’s the only, or rather, only convenient Omega around. 

That settles it. 

“Stanley can stay with me. I assure you, nothing will happen.”

#stancest #my writing #a/b/o au #should i continue?

[breezy-cheezy]

I’m luv….brothors……they dumb and pretty and I’m luv them…..how on earth do I draw themb…..

Please don’t tag this with ship tags thank YOU!

#my art #genshin impact #get along shirt #Kaeya #diluc #kaeya ragnvindr #kaeya alberich #diluc ragnvindr #ragvindr brothers #if I see this tagged as ship I will break into your house and steal your kneecaps #anyway we inturrupt the whumptober broadcast to bring you…..this #unfortunate genshin detour here #I am sorry #I should know from gravity falls….estranged brothers #a weakness #doesnt help they are very pretty #love drawing Diluc’s fluffy hair #and some freckles as a treat…. #and Kaeya in general. pretty man #he turned out better and tbh that’s on brand #lighting fun #the headshots are loosely based on panels from the webtoon! #because the design details….make no sense as of yet #help #aether #paimon #the traveler #jean gunnhildr #they are there….kinda

[orikeepitasecret]

Do we talk about where Ford hides the Journals?? Because if not we should like:

Journal 3 is hidden near the bunker in the woods and the bunker was shared between him and Fiddleford.

I mean this machine in Tourist Trapped is clearly the same one from Into the Bunker

Journal 2 was hidden near the elementary school. Who would Ford know and trust in Gravity Falls that would be in elementary school in 1982? His best friend’s son, Tate McGucket. (Even if Tate isn’t in Gravity Falls at the time, Ford’s still connecting that hiding place with him).

And Journal 1, of course, was supposed to be hidden by Stanley, far outside of Gravity Falls. 

So basically, the three people Ford trusts most when he’s on the brink of insanity is his estranged brother, his ex-best friend, and said friend’s son. That is also indicative of who Ford loved most at the time.

#gravity falls #gravity falls meta #gf #stan pines #stanley pines #ford pines #stanford pines #grunkle stan #grunkle ford #the journals #tate mcgucket #fiddleford mcgucket #fiddleford hadron mcgucket #is this silly? #yes #does it make me emotional? #also yes

[dragonrajafanfiction]

The Red Well (Part 3) Hearts and Minds

This is it folks! The MC is EMPOWERED! @rurifangirl

The smoke of liquid nitrogen was gone and people finally saw the true appearance of the holy skeleton. It looked like a crippled embryo. Its swollen head had a large single eye. What looked like a tail was actually a flesh-wrapped spine. Its ribs protrude outside the flesh layer, so it must have used these sharp ribs to insert into the host's spine and manipulate the body when it was parasitic. The holy skeleton did not die under the blade of Gathering Clouds. It twisted and made a "hissing" sound. The golden eyes flash at you, but in the glass capture chamber it could not touch any host that could be parasitized. Without the power of a body it was so weak it couldn’t escape through glass.

King General used a strong flashlight and peered through the outer layer of flesh of the skeleton. Inside the half-developed organs were faintly visible.

You could still feel yourself shaking, not only in fear of this thing and its hunger for you, but in fear of Ruri Kazama who was even stronger. Now you finally understood why Ruri Kazama offered to take you here, rob Herzog of the fetal blood and give it to you. It wasn’t just about saving your life. When you stared into his swirling pupils of red and gold, you finally grasped that this was about more than just survival. He wouldn’t stop at Herzog and Chisei. 

World Domination.

With you.

You have a nightmare vision of this unstoppable hybrid, killing everyone you know, piling them up like hay. Z understood his true nature. He warned you several times and each time you felt you had a reason to ignore him. His last words were “This one’s on you.”

You thought you were smart, strong, and quick enough to change and control your situation. But you were nothing compared to Ruri Kazama. Nothing!

There was only one way to free yourself...

"Look at it, how beautiful it is! What a perfect way to evolve! Before it was executed by the Black King, it actively evolved to live in parasitic form! It perpetuated its existence in this way!" The king pressed his hands on the capture pod and glorified the ugly parasite.

"Ah Excuse me!.” A voice from somewhere in this massive cave spoke up.  “..if the god is a parasite ...... then how does it help us evolve?'' 

 "It's not enough to find a parasite, you also have to find a host and food for it." The King smiled, "Only a very few hosts in this world can be parasitized by the god, such as Izanagi and Susanoo, but unfortunately the ancient descendants did not understand the great meaning of this parasitism and killed the god before it completely evolved into the new white king. It is not the god in this form that can give us the path of evolution, but the White King after the evolution is complete! We will see the new king ascend the throne and open a new chapter in the world!''

Pillars of light descended from the sky, enveloping you, the King General and Ruri Kazama in them. The helicopter's rotor blades cut through the rain curtain, a loud roar echoing through the well. It was a black helicopter with the cabin door open, and Gen Chisei sitting in the cabin, his long black trench coat whipping and flying.

At the last moment, Hydra arrived on the scene.

 Ruri Kazama, who had been silent, seemed to wake up from a deep sleep. His eyes lit up, and golden mandala-like patterns seemed to turn under them. He slowly lifted his head and looked up at the black shadow that had fallen from the sky, the gale blowing away the fringes of his Kimono to reveal his ribbed chest.

"Brother! Brother! You've come to see me? Are you here for my graduation?" He laughed wildly in the wind.

"Or have you come for my enthronement ceremony?" His smile tightened into a malicious grimace, leaving only biting ferocity, "With your blood to stain my vestments with your sacrificial red?"

Just like that, Ruri seemed to have forgotten about you. But he already told you what to do. 

Hide.

The ancient and stern language descended from the sky, just like the language of God echoing in the sky. The field of “Majesty" enveloped the Red Well, and tens of thousands of stainless steel wall panels fell off the well walls, pressing the king's wrath on everyone's head. The rules of gravity were forcibly changed. Everyone felt ten times their weight on their bones. 

You flee. You flee like you fled the soldiers in Black Swan Bay. The huge metal plates smashed down on the helpless Devil Clan elites. But you were not affected and you had the Sword of the Gathering Clouds to aid you. The super sharp master blade cut through the thick steal plates like paper as you headed for the safety cabins. You didn’t understand why you were spared Majesty’s influence. Was this payback for rescuing Sakura on the Tokyo Tower? Or did Chisei understand that you weren't exactly a willing participant in all this?

All around you the moans of the members of the Devil Clan were echoing. They were like souls trapped in hell.  You pause in your flight.

A young man had managed to grab your heel. His tears were pooling under his eyes. They were tears mixed with blood. His jaw looked distorted and broken. His chest was whistling with blood. He couldn’t have been older than you were, but he struggled.  “Help… me…”

Before you could answer a massive shadow loomed over you and a steel plate came down and smashed through his neck like a guillotine, sending his head flying clear off the platform into the well below.

This wasn’t fair. These were people. They didn’t know Herzog was bad any more than you did as a Black Swan Bay orphan. Again, your mind superimposes Black Swan Bay onto the Red Well. If Herzog had taken you to the capitol as promised, wouldn’t he still be your beloved father? Would he not have infected you with his distorted visions of evolution? These people were just trying to survive! They were all that was left of the Devil Clan. Everyone else was in prison!

What was the difference between them and you? They were just like you! They were being slaughtered like animals and they were just like you!

The Red Well suddenly echoed with a mighty roar that came from your wide open throat. It was plaintive and piercing like the cry of a lonely wolf or a mourning mother over her fallen child. It was full of sorrow but also fierce frustration that this shit keeps happening and you want it to fucking stop! Your throat stretched and rattled painfully. If you could stop the world with your voice, you would roar until your voice gave out!

Your eyes explode into a kaleidoscope pattern of black red and gold as the blood in your body finally takes full hold. Ruri’s blood has replaced your own. That blood was yours now and all the power that came with it!

Ruri was laughing wildly from somewhere in the cave. “Do you hear that brother! It’s just as it’s written! A rib was taken from a man and from it was formed into a woman! See! I can quote fairy tales too!”

Your hands seize a firm hold of Gathering Clouds and you spin and a dazzling horizontal arc! The secret of this mighty sword is that it could control the wind. One of the first emperor hybrids wielded it to push a wildfire set by his enemies back into them, burning them to ash. In this case, the sword produced a wind so powerful it knocked back all the massive steel plates. Even though they were heavy in normal gravity and ten times heavier under the influence of Majesty, this dragon-tail sword blew those plates away like they weighed no more than feathers! They scattered like dandelion tufts blown by a child!

There was nothing in your mind other than stopping this mindless slaughter. You didn’t care about the Devil Clan versus Hydra. In this matter, you had to agree with Ruri Kazama. There were no good guys versus bad guys. There were good guys in Hydra like Sakura Yabuki and there were good people in the Devil Clan, like Chime and Chance. The only evil that led both astray were Herzog and Bondarev. They should be turning those weapons on them! 

Chisei did not come alone. The heavily armed Hydra members followed Gen Chisei out of the cabin of the helicopters. They fired at the shaft wall with grapple guns and hung high from them, but Chisei Gen fell straight down. Kazama Ruri stretched the fuchsia-red sword in the air, Chisei’s twin blades made a dazzling ray of more than ten meters long, and the three blades fought against each other. The violent sparks illuminate the faces of the estranged brothers. Chisei’s  face is indifferent like a stone carving, but Kazama Ruri’s is like a bloodthirsty evil spirit.

Around them, gunfire and explosions continued. The Hydra Elites hung in the air by their grapple guns and pulled the trigger before they had even completed their fall. A hailstorm of bullets fell from the sky. The moment Chisei jumped out of the cabin, “Majesty” was lifted, but the engineering team and gunmen of the Devil Clan were cut down and suppressed by gunfire before they could get up and dodge. The Hydra elites were not going to spare anyone in the well. They were thugs among thugs, and now, even though they dangled from ropes, they hold their weapons as still and stable as professional assassins. 

A hurricane of violence had erupted in the Well of Bones. Ruri and Chisei’s blades were like lightning, the gun battles were like thunder, and you were howling like the wind.

You ran straight towards the wall, and then straight up the wall. Your face is like the mask of Medusa and your hair quivered like black snakes. You didn’t care how fast you were running, it wasn’t fast enough! People were still dying! If this were just up to you and just about you, you probably could have killed everyone in this well much more easily. That was how you were taught in Black Swan Bay. But now you’d been infected with a new philosophy.

The righteous philosophy of Caesar Gattuso! What was right mattered more than what was efficient. Human lives were worth more than the blood of gods! Your whole body felt like it was on fire as you cut through all the weapons of the Hydra members hanging on the walls. You were just as fast as Ruri was. Hydra leaders took aim at the Devil clan only for the muzzles of their guns to fall off and a strong breeze to shake them from the wall. You were able to easily outrun the bullets that strafed after you as you cut heavy weapons to pieces and cut them from their wires so that they would fall to the maintenance platform.

The surviving Devil clan members cheered as they crawled out from cover and picked up weapons to counterattack, and they aimed at the vital parts of the Hydra assassins, giving them fatal injuries while they were hanging in the air. But then those cheers changed to fearful confusion as this whirlwind of a woman descended on them and their weapons split in half even though they never saw you cut them.. “Stop fighting! Don’t you realize who the real enemy is?!” Your voice doesn’t sound like your own. It sounds like a mix of Ruri Kazama’s voice and yours, speaking double toned, like someone possessed.

“Traitor! She’s a traitor!” Someone yelled among the Devil Clan ranks

“Kill that Devil woman!” Came shouts from the Hydra elites on the wall.

Yelling erupted from every side of the well from both the Devil Clan and the Hydra elites. You’re suddenly enveloped by a hail of bullets from both sides who now viewed you as a dangerous enemy and united to fight against you. A rueful bitter voice echoed in your head. “Well, at least they answered your question. Their real enemy is you… apparently.” A strong wind burst out and the bullets of the Hydra and the Devil Clan shot back into their faces. Dozens of men on both sides on the conflict fell dead or seriously wounded in an instant.

You put one hand over your eyes. You cackled at your own despair. You couldn’t stop yourself laughing uproariously. Your laugh rose to an insane screaming pitch as you rose above the floor of the maintenance platform on a gale of wind like some sort of evil witch. “Fine… Fine! Have it your way. Tear each other’s throats and die here with no one to mourn you!” While you felt the evil of Herzog and the justice of Gattuso, you still had little patience for idiots.

“Leave her to me! I’ll take care of the rest!” A man darted forward. You could tell by his speed and the ferociousness in his eyes that this one was different. The sword he carried glow brilliantly as though it had been superheated. But to you he was just running like a child with a toy light saber. What mattered more was that he was a leader. He had influence.

You met him, but not blade for blade so as not to smash his weapon by accident. Instead you dodged while he struck at you again and again but you were like a ghost in the air. “Tell your men to stop fighting!” You say.

“I will not let you resurrect the god!” His blade suddenly burst into flames, extending its reach and sending a wave of fire at you. The fire ignites your dress, turning the white fabric to soot and exposing your midriff. Delicate white scales sparkled on your abdomen in the rain as though you were made of diamond. The man’s eyes widened in horror as you just absorbed what should have been a devastating blow.

“The god is already resurrected.” You tell him, your voice is shaking, pleading. The rain drops run down your face in a torrent. “You don’t understand its nature. I don’t think you can control it. If you don’t work together with the Devil Clan, you’ll never-”

Now it was the senior member’s turn to laugh. “Ha! Work together? Work with the greedy people who got us into this mess in the first place?!” He pointed the sword at you. His eyes blazing gold. “You’re just a child. We’ve been fighting this war for all our lives. Our sides were determined on the day we were born and I have sworn to follow my righteous path until I die!”

“These people are your family!” You scream desperately. “Chance’s real name was Ichirou Inuyama! He was Inuyama!”

You suddenly see his whole body glow like fire and his clothes burned away. Under his combat suit he was strapped head to toe in layers of plastic explosive! He’d prepared to meet a super-Devil like you or Ruri.

He howled against the wind. “DIE! DEVIL SCUM!”

Time seemed to slow as the raging ball of flame burned his body to ash and came towards you, and the roaring gale of Gathering Clouds bubbled outward to meet it. The force of the suicide vest was so powerful, the flames licked around your body, surrounding you in fire. But eventually, just as in the legend, the wind won out. The full force of the suicide blast flew away from you. Not only that, the blast was fed and accelerated by your ferocious wind until that fire  expanded into a fireball a hundred meters wide and heated up to nearly 2,000 degrees. It engulfed men and women who had thrown away their broken guns and pulled out knives and swords. If they didn’t have knives and swords, they fought with fists, feet, and bits of debris. They didn’t even look up when the ball of fire took them over and snuffed out their lives. The massive fireball left corpses and flames and devastation in its wake. 

But you didn’t mean it. You were just defending yourself.

A loud crash interrupted you before you could panic.  You jerked your head around and saw Chisei Gen standing under a shower of burning wreckage from a helicopter that was rolling down the wall. Gen Chisei did not dodge and it was too late to warn him.

 You run forward a few steps but the whirling blade that had broken off from the wreckage already chopped into Chisei’s shoulder, crushing the man flat to the ground as the rest of the blades cut in turn. Immediately afterwards, the crumpled black fuselage hit him and slid across the ground before finally crashing into the tall steel liquid nitrogen tank. Huge amounts of liquid nitrogen poured over the wreckage of the helicopter, frost spreading along the surface of the wreckage and rising up as a thick mist.

 The fuel tanks ruptured and the fallen wreckage was ignited. Electric sparks flashed and buzzed as if a thousand suns were burning at the bottom of the well, a wave of gas forcing everyone still alive apart.  Columns of light swept across the bottom of the storage well with columns of dust, fiery air currents and flying debris blew across the area.

The Hydra and engineering teams  of the Devil Clan were still fighting. They didn't even realize that the leader of the Hydra group had been killed in action. All of them were immersed in a great sense of mission and anger. No matter what the outcome of this fight was, no one could stop anymore. Even though you had the blood, the power, and the faith in justice, you felt lost and without any hope of victory.

You’re not even sure you wanted Chime to come back any more. Maybe this is for the best that he sleeps forever with his brother.

This was not Black Swan Bay. These weren’t little children running from explosions or cold-blooded men. These were adults. These people were choosing to kill each other. Even if they were deceived, they truly believed the deception. Even if you took all their weapons and tied them all up, they would still move and crawl on the ground in an attempt to tear at each other with their teeth.

The trap that Herzog had set was not this well. The burning man was right. The trap had been set and carefully laid in their minds and cultivated from the day of their birth. Just like the trap of the suicide pills. These people had to, not only choose to live and not seek death, but also choose to let others live and not seek the death of other people.

"So sad the end, ah... the family line that stretched for thousands of years, the guardian of Japan, just ended its mission.'' Herzog stands by the burning wreckage and laments in a poetic voice, "From now on in the world, there will no longer be any such thing as Emperor.”

"But no matter," he smiled faintly again, "Emperors were outdated anyway."

Ruri was strangely silent. With his brother gone, shouldn’t he be attacking Herzog?

Herzog hoisted the carrying case in his hand, the glass capture capsule is contained in that case. He has got what he dreamed of all his life. It is time to leave this well. You huff. What a magnificent bastard. He didn’t have to do anything to kill anyone here. Everyone was happy to do it for him, yourself included.

You stare at the sword in your hand. What a poisoned pill that sword turned out to be!

At that moment, a loud heartbeat came from behind him, like a sudden booming death knell, like something returning from hell! Hands covered in white scales pierced the metal skin of the wreckage of the helicopter, and crystal clear claws snapped around the head of the King General!

The flames in the wreckage sucked in and out, getting more and more fiery, as though something huge was breathing in the cockpit. Each time it inhaled a huge amount of air from within the wreck, it exhaled a gushing fire from it.

The suitcase fell to the ground. The King kicked and struggled. Not only is the pressure on that sharp claw increasing, but the sound of breathing was taking on a threatening aura. Kazama Ruri didn't move. Those dull, soulless eyes lit up again, and he watched with interest as the claw slowly tightened. The king's mask was crumbling, blood dripping down from the cracks.

The wreckage suddenly burst apart! The few people who approached the wreckage were immediately killed by the flying flames and debris.

Out of the firelight came the dazzling white shadow, someone who could no longer be called human. He was such a beautiful and hideous creature. He possessed gnarled muscles and rippling sinews that proclaimed what power was in this incredible body. The surface of the scales of his skin were like golden-red brocade in the firelight. The skin on his back split open. Slender bones opened up. Bloody wings stretched themselves out for the first time He was drenched in blood from this wing beat but the wounds on his back healed at a speed visible to the naked eye, after which the fierce and savage back muscles bulged.

The exoskeleton-encircled face could no longer smile or frown, and the newborn Chisei breathed up into the sky with a windy roar in his throat.

He was something between an angel and a devil, a mistake that should not have been made in this world.

 "Dragon's blood! You ...... you used dragon's blood?!" The General exclaimed.

Chisei’s voice was deep and echoing. "Yes, as an emperor, I can't kill you, but as a ghost, I can surpass the limits of an emperor." He said softly, "I've been a ghost slayer all my life, yet I didn't understand until this moment why those ghosts crave for power.''

He looked up at the dark night sky, rain pattering on that hard face: "When there is already boundless darkness where you are, how can you not fly to the flame?"

You gasp. Those words. Not those words! Those are Herzog’s words! Why was Chisei quoting the words of the dying Devil Clan? You reach out your hand. And then stop.  With a slight popping sound, the skull of Herzog broke like a water pipe. He threw the King's body on the ground and lowered his emperor-like golden eyes to observe. The corpse never moved a single bit.

The King surprisingly just died. And suddenly everything made sense. You were too occupied to think about it before. Didn’t Chisei fall helplessly before Ruri Kazama just hours ago? Didn’t Chisei always save Majesty to the end of the battle as an escape plan because it rendered him as helpless as a newborn kitten? In this instance, he’d thrown it out at the beginning! But he suffered no side effects. He wanted to kill Ruri Kazama so badly that he went against his own morals and principles.

Morals and principals were so troublesome. You think to yourself bitterly. They get in the way of efficiency. 

After what you’d seen of Ruri Kazama and after what you’d seen of the god. You didn’t believe you could survive here much longer and you didn’t think Chisei would win. It was best to escape while these two musclebound idiots solved their differences. Knowing them… they’d kill each other and you never got in the way of that before, and bitterly decide not to get in the way of that again.

Since Chisei didn’t suffer any from using his Soul Skill you decide to use your own Soul Skill. You press your foot to the ground and let the spiritual roots take hold without reservation. Mental filaments spread like vines and touch every part of the Red Well until you feel like you wear it as a second skin. You needed a way out. Then you could bury this place in magma. The magma wasn’t far from here. After all, it fed the god that caused all this. You would simply return it to its place.

A strange signature, like three footsteps, catches your attention. Someone had walked up near the rim of the well close to the machinery lift platform. You can’t see anyone, but they’re there. Who could be up there?

Your heart suddenly leaps into your throat and your memory throws up the scene on Tokyo Tower of Ruri beheading and then severing the body of the King in two only for it to pop up again in a second place! The person standing up on the platform was likely the real King! This body is a fake!

“Ha!” You snarl and take the Heavenly Cloud blade and strike the ground. It summons a huge tornado that lifts you off like a rocket. You really did have wings and you were going to  pounce on this King creature like and eagle and kill him for real. 

But this man was always prepared. What would he have for you? Bombs? Hah. Deadpool? Hah! There was nothing that could save him!

When you approach the rim of the well, it’s too late that you see the fine nano-fiber mesh that surrounds it. It wraps around you like a spiderweb, and clings tight as you collide with it and push with forward momentum. The Sword of Gathering Clouds slips from your grasp and goes falling back towards the well. Immediately your upward momentum comes crashing down onto the flat land that surrounds the Red Well and you roll several feet before coming to a stop next to an armored boot. Your hands are bound, your legs are bound. The nanofibers are crushing into your skin.

You stare up into the sky and a pistol is pointed right at your forehead. Herzog’s masked face comes into view. He waggles his fingers in greeting. “Hello.”

#Dragon Raja

[killingeveperspectives]

Perspective: Killing Eve Season 3 Retcon – Can a show Retcon itself into a different genre?

Recently, I learned about the term ‘Retroactive Continuity’ and I am pretty proud of it because now it sounds like I know what I’m talking about. Retroactive Continuity, or retcon for the intimate like me, is the addition of new information that changes or reinterprets events/narratives previously established, therefore opening new possibilities for the future. It can correct inconsistencies, change world/character limitations, or allow for a dramatic plot twist. For example, a character previously established as an incurable psychopath goes on an emotional growth journey. Killing Eve got fundamentally retconned season 3 and it changes everything. And I need to talk about it. (Look, it’s been a while I wrote this and re-addressed some points here :) )

Villanelle is not a psychopath anymore, I guess

Villanelle was written explicitly as a primary psychopath meaning she was mainly born this way®. Which is different from a Secondary psychopath, whose emotional developmental arrest is caused by disturbingly severe neglect and abuse in early infancy. The impairments in their brains and psychological development prevents them from thinking and, most importantly, feeling like a regular person do. They have a different subjective experience. Psychopathy is incurable in adults, which sets limitations to character development.

Villanelle can’t empathize, perceives people as objects and is very utilitarian. She doesn’t know how to show people she likes them, and her idea of love is possession. Endearing as she is, this is the character the writers wrote. And this is the character portrayed to us in the show. Villanelle is unapologetically a psychopath. She is remorseless, amoral, derives pleasure from killing, all the better to get paid for it. She is basically a self-indulgent goddess. This is enunciated repeatedly in Season 1. Of course, we are not just told, we are shown. Her face glimmers in every kill with enjoyment and cruelty. She is able to conjure any emotion to manipulate – depicted more terrifyingly with Nadia. She emulates emotions from others to connect with people like depicted in the opening scene. My favorite chilling moment is when she gives the “what it is like to die” monologue to Frank, just to terrify him before killing him. Or this face:

Season 2 dives deeper into her psyche where she tells us how she feels, or better yet, doesn’t. We establish she feels this overbearing boredom and seeks to feel anything, so she collects things (or people, no difference) that make her feel something and these things she cherishes by possessing them. The poverty of emotion is reiterated. Again, we are shown, not only told, time and again. The writers are quite clearly asking us to just accept Villanelle for what she is: a psychopath. Like Jodie Comer said herself during that season: “I think some people are bad and that’s what they are, and I don’t think she should be redeemed.” It felt impossible to make it more established within the narrative and the world building. She is, like all adult psychopaths, incurable. These are the character’s limitations, in a purely storytelling sense.

Then, Season 3 happened. In season 3 Villanelle’s character’s development is irreconcilable with the previous seasons. Much of the character’s limitations were simply erased to give her room to “grow”, starting early with one of my favorite scenes of the entire season:

It was marvelously shot and so symbolic. This time around she is gifting Eve something intimate and safe: a teddy bear. Then we have Villanelle by herself and vulnerable, stripping the layers of her feelings towards Eve, the mask of anger cracking as she tries to convince herself she wanted Eve dead, to finally giving in to longing. Her own words are repeated back at her in a loop in a little booth. It was an admission. The booth, the privacy, the lighting, the acting: It was a confession. More than that: it was a love confession. As if falling in love was something she could now do? I don’t want to entertain the actual nature of her feeling, but this is a level of emotional complexity she is just prohibited of displaying by the character’s limitations. And yet, it happened. And I will argue, all the elements of this scene deliberately lead the audience to believe these were romantic feelings.

But this is foreshadowing, and the major shift in perspective happens in her bottle episode. In this episode we see Villanelle display genuine empathy and care for her brothers, not only by sparing them but by giving them more than enough money to go see Elton John. A bonna fide display of correctly conveyed affection and consideration. Which, again, is prohibited by the characters limitations. Then the episode builds the narrative that her “psychopathy” was the result of her abusive upbringing, especially in the confrontation with her mother, when we are clearly asked to side with Villanelle.

Here is where the show subtly retcons Villanelle’s character. It cleverly never denies she is a psychopath. It retcons her ability to emotionally grow, by shifting the emphasis to childhood trauma. Nevertheless, for Villanelle as a character, the emotional growth is still prohibited – despite of trauma. The sleight of hand is passable because audiences (actually, any empathic human being) find it incredibly hard to grasp that trauma cannot be overcome. That’s why it feels plausible she has a very complex, deeply transforming emotional response to killing her mother, despite still being a psychopath. Because that is a response that feels plausible to us, the audience, despite being inconsistent with what is plausible for the character’s the inner experience of reality.

This shift not only changes all the interpretation of her character that was previously established but also changes all future interactions. Here is where we see Villanelle getting conflicted about killing, not in a utilitarian sense of it being impractical or boring, but in an emotional struggle. She starts to worry about how others perceive her, and specially that she is perceived only as a “monster”, pointing to a development of a moral compass, deeper self-awareness, self-evaluation and ability to feel remorse. This is all not only incredibly far-fetched: it was prohibited. This is a clear break in continuity from the character of previous seasons. However, after S3E05 it feels plausible.

Villanelle is a carefully crafted monster

We are, then, asked to believe that Villanelle was made into a ruthless killer, which logically follow can be unmade. Hence, her past needs to be explored so it can also be somewhat resolved, symbolizing the undoing of her atrocious (but delightfull?) persona “Villanelle” (the distinction between Oksana and Villanelle was useless before and should still be. But now it feels like it makes sense). Initially, it was established that her mother died, and she had an abusive drunk father who abandoned her in an orphanage. While I believe there was potential in creating a convincing traumatic abusive background from the established narrative, it may have seemed too unsettling to have a man mistreat an infant, which might explain the writers choice for such through retcon. Transferring the source of the neglect to the mother, might heighten the stakes, since daughters are expected to develop a strong bond and mirror their mothers. Thus, adding depth to their face-off and making her murder more symbolic. Addicionally, a full house – with her mother, stepfather and brothers –would allow Villanelle to flesh out her relationship to family and explore the conflict more thoroughly before confrontation. Despite the symbolic tension, in the end we have no definitive answer to the nature x nurture question, nor to what happened in Villanelle’s infancy, except that the metaphorical darkness may have been passed on from her mother.

Villanelle’s joy in cruelty is the most alienating aspect of her character – also the most gripping – and thus, in order for her arc to be more digestible and relatable, it also needs explicit retconning, which is mostly explored through her relationship with killing. Therefore, her cruelty is also displaced to her abusive upbringing. Most specifically, displaced to another character: Dasha. She is the source of the cruelty transmitted into Villanelle through severe trauma during her teenagerhood, ingeniously avoiding the gravity of discussing infant abuse (Dasha brings a downpour of plot inconsistencies). This is unmistakably conveyed in this scene:

Villanelle was something soft and whole that got broken and reshaped into steel, into a stone cold killer, by external forces. Thus, Dasha is an estranged mother figure from the past who tortured Villanelle into a killer, mirroring the dynamic between Villanelle and her mother. Since there is no clear narrative surrounding her early infancy, and her mother needed to be killed to spark the transformation, Dasha becomes the surrogate through which the conflict of Villanelle’s transformation can be explored. The story doubles its efforts to get the audiences to not only believe Villanelle can change, but also that she deserves to change. And here is where we enter dangerous territory.

 Killing Eve is not a spy-drama anymore, it is a rescue romance

I stand with the writers, Killing Eve was not a romance. Not until Season 3. The topic of how audiences, especially queer fans, perceive the show as a romance is worth a whole essay on its own. However, in Season 3, audiences are treated with a romantic atmosphere (remember the teddy bear scene?). Everything is toned down; the pace is slower and the investigation is put to the side. The cat-and-cat game is replaced with this reinforced sense of destiny, of fate, where characters seamlessly come together, as if all their actions were just leading them up to that moment. Their approach carries no sense of danger, their obsession is replaced with anticipation. Characters stop thinking about each other neurotically, that scrumptious voyeurism is gone. Character’s don’t need to be reminded of each other. There is no need for it anymore, it has been written for them. They will meet each other, no need to pursue.

Gone is also Eve’s curiosity and intrigue about Villanelle, along most of her character’s motivations, with one simple retcon: Eve wants to rescue Villanelle.

To which Eve replies: I don’t think so. Meaning “I believe there is more to Villanelle than killing and I will cling to that” (Why, we don’t know. But that’s for another time)

Previously, despite the irresistible attraction Eve felt for Villanelle, the story never portrayed Eve as trying to redeem her. It was precisely the fact that they are polar opposites that brings them together, each trying to quench a deep hunger through the other, in all the wrong ways. Eve pursues in Villanelle much of her unfulfilled impulses and is challenged to embody them herself. Eve’s never been attracted to what Villanelle might have of redeemable, she was drawn to what Villanelle had of profanely feral. On the other hand, Villanelle longs for the safety and intimacy she sees in Eve but has no way of even comprehending what it means.

This honesty to the character’s true desires and realities is what has allowed the show to explore an enticingly destructive dynamic while avoiding romanticizing it, which would downgrade the show to a disservice. However, ultimately, there is a writer trying to sell a story. And in this case, they are setting up a redemption arc within a romance, despite character desires and realities not aligning with that. But in season 3, Villanelle’s psychopathy got retconned to make her crush on Eve without it being too problematic and Eve’s past season character development got simply blissfully ignored so her crush on Villanelle could flourish without it being too problematic, and in the end, their attraction got stripped away from all it’s complexity and danger so they could bring characters together without it being too problematic. These characters got rewritten to give us the tease of a romance we have seen iterated one million times elsewhere.

The premise of the show was to explore the dangerous temptation to bite the proverbial apple. Still, at some point the tension needs to be resolved, and the writers decided to shift it to a rescue romance. A very slippery slope. A slippery slope to romanticizing disturbingly destructive relationships, to perpetrating the cliché that “Love redeems all”, even psychopaths can change if they have someone who believes in them – not only dangerously dishonest but painfully dull.  As if somehow having your life and your sense of self ruined for a person is some sort of martyrdom to match the person’s redemption itself. What a beautiful pair they would make, cozy in heaven. But damned be the day Killing Eve becomes cozy. While writing the redemption of the serpent and the power of female love despite the obliteration of Eden; they forgot the most delicious part of the story was the apple.

#killing eve #killingeve #killingeveperspectives #killing eve season three #killing eve s3 #killing eve review #killingeve retcon #villanelle #villanelle retcon

[satonthelotuspier]

XichenWeek Day 2 - we’re onto XiCheng, because of course! Please enjoy 2k of Modern Soulmate AU with Dark!LXC, a handsome crimelord, and Cop!JC, a plucky sasslord who somehow ended up married to (then estranged from) a man he should have arrested on sight.

Prompt Palette for the day is Weapon - Soulmate - Regret.

CW for mild spice, inferred (consensual) choking, kidnapping.

I’m My Soulmate’s Regret  - XichenWeek Day 2

A soulmate was meant to be the other half of a person’s soul. The bond was instant, it was true love, and it was meant to last a lifetime. It was indicated by a mark on the skin in the shape of an animal which best represented the other half’s personality; a mark which appeared on a person’s hip in their teens. When someone first met their soulmate it would burn a little and itch to indicate the nearness of their intended match.

However, even if a person was lucky enough to find their soulmate, to fall in love and marry them, it didn’t always work out for every pair.

And when it fell apart it did so spectacularly, and it left a hole behind that couldn’t be filled, one which he was reminded of every time he looked in the mirror and saw that sturdy dog outlined on his hipbone.

It left regret.

Lan Xichen rubbed absently at his chest, right over his heart, as he stepped away from the door and moved into the room.

He made a silent gesture to the others there; that they should leave and let him alone with their guest.

His guest.

A no doubt unwilling guest.

A no doubt abrasive and unwilling guest.

Everyone in the clan knew this person had to be treated with the utmost respect and not thrown about like a parcel; therefore he had been placed (perhaps inexplicably) on the dining table. Lan Xichen rather liked it.

From the tentative movements being made that person was beginning to regain consciousness.

If, when Lan Xichen finally had a chance to do a once-over, he found a single bruise, cut or bent fingernail on that person, there would be hell to pay.

Unless he was the one to cause it, of course.

He came to a halt in front of the table, then reached out a hand to catch the figure by a slim, skinny jeans-clad leg, just above his chunky biker boots.

There was a brief struggle, but he yanked the figure over to the edge of the polished wooden surface, using a hand behind a flailing knee to tip him into a sitting position. There were muffled shouts to accompany his manhandling.

That Lan Xichen had yanked him close with his legs a-splay and planted himself firmly between them; well there had to be some benefits to having the upper hand right now.

His fingers worked nimbly to untie the chord holding the hood in place, and he pulled it off the other’s head, revealing a face like thunder beneath.

If this had been a comedy movie, or a cartoon, that would have been the point at which the bag was replaced; but Lan Xichen was more interested in testing whether the black smudge on his sharp cheekbone was a bruise or just a trace of dirt.

The tied up man had gone very still when he realised that it was Lan Xichen who had hold of him, and he sat with a darkly resentful yet watchful look on his face.

The gravitas of the expression was somewhat lessened by the fact his silky black hair had been ruffled into a bird’s nest by the hood and Lan Xichen’s removal of it.

“A-Cheng” he murmured, running a soft hand over that ruffled hair, stroking it down gently.

If he hadn’t been gagged Lan Xichen had no doubt the other would have bitten him by now; his fiery, aggressive husband was nothing if not predictable, (note the lack of ex, despite Jiang Cheng’s efforts).

Instead, all Jiang Cheng could do was make a muffled noise of complaint, throwing his eyes in the direction of the gag in a very pointed demand for action.

“I know, I’m just considering the pros and cons” Lan Xichen lifted a finger to trace the shape of Jiang Cheng’s nose. “Untying you so soon just seems to be a shame when you were delivered to me packaged so very nicely, like a present. And it’s not even my birthday yet”

The other made an outraged noise through the gag.

“Alright, alright, you know I’m just teasing you, Sweeting” he stepped a little closer, almost pressing their chests together as his hands moved to the back of Jiang Cheng’s head to work open the knots of the gag.

Once he had been freed Jiang Cheng jumped to the attack, as expected.

“Did you do this, you bastard? Is this your latest sick attempt to try to get me to come back to you? Because if so, its a fucking stupid idea. I should break your legs”

Lan Xichen watched him with an almost indulgent look. This only served to enrage the still-tied Jiang Cheng more.

“Take that fucking smirk off of your face” he snarled. Lan Xichen responded by resting a hand against his neck; his thumb rubbing gently at the hollow at the base of Jiang Cheng’s throat. Lan Xichen’s hands were slender, with long, sensitive fingers, and the touch of them seemed to freeze the other into place. He went quiet, and licked his lower lip, eyes widening a little, all done unconsciously. Jiang Cheng would hate to know how obviously he had been affected by the move. He reminded Lan Xichen of a rabbit caught in headlights, because if Lan Xichen had learned anything about his husband over the years it was how to effectively silence him. It definitely wasn’t with fear, because that would evoke the exact opposite effect.

“I didn’t do this, A-Cheng, my boys rescued you. You need to look at what you did to annoy the Wens”

Jiang Cheng seemed to return to his senses, then, and snorted, “That’s easy. I dragged Wen Xu in for questioning three times last week” Jiang Cheng wriggled a little closer to the edge of the table, but it was a mistake with his legs wedged either side of Lan Xichen’s hips. “Can you back off? And untie me, please?”

“I can’t do both, A-Cheng”, Lan Xichen bent to remove the knife from the sheath at his ankle, then stepped in close to Jiang Cheng again, wrapping his arms around his prickly husband in an almost-hug as he reached behind him to cut through the plastic zip ties.

He would have been pushed away almost immediately, except Jiang Cheng’s arms had been bound for quite a while and he had to rub some feeling back into them.

Lan Xichen picked up one of his wrists and began to massage it gently. “If they come for you again, A-Cheng, I’ll have to act. I didn’t put my ring on your finger to then just allow transgressions like this against my husband”

“Do you think I’d have allowed you to put that ring on my finger if I’d known who you really were at the time?”

Although he had been fully aware of Jiang Cheng’s stance, it still cut Lan Xichen to hear the words.

“It doesn’t matter, the fact still stands. You’re my soulmate A-Cheng, and I will protect you with everything I have at my disposal. The Wens have grown too bold, and I’ve been too lenient this time, only because you weren’t hurt before my men got to you. There will be consequences next time”

Unusually Jiang Cheng stopped arguing, this was all ground they had covered before, time and time again.

No matter how many times they argued about it, however, it would never change the fact that Lan Xichen was the head of the city’s most influential organised crime family, or that Jiang Cheng was a lieutenant in the organised crime unit meant to be bringing people like Lan Xichen down. They stood on opposite sides of the battle, and how was a marriage, even one Lan Xichen refused to agree to end, meant to survive that kind of divide?

“I wish you’d transfer departments, A-Cheng” Lan Xichen said as he moved away to pick up Jiang Cheng’s belongings, ones his men had collected during the rescue. He passed the police issue weapon and his badge to Jiang Cheng, who checked them over, pushed the badge into his pocket and wrapped the holster belt around his gun. The Lan mansion was the last place in the world he needed to actually wear his weapon for protection.

“I wish you’d leave the family” Jiang Cheng returned eventually, and shook his head; they both knew neither would ever agree; the biggest regret either held was their inability to give in to the other’s request.

“Shufu would probably like to see you before you leave” Lan Xichen’s uncle, Lan Qiren, had always seemed to be fond of the younger man, and he would be sad if Jiang Cheng left without paying his respects.

***

They spent some time visiting with Lan Qiren, drinking tea, and chatting amicably; two of the most powerful men in Shanghai’s criminal underworld, and the police detective who should hunt them made odd tea mates. But eventually Jiang Cheng had to excuse himself.

Lan Xichen offered to show him out, but there was a tension between the two of them, an understanding of what Lan Xichen might ask instead as he closed the doors of Lan Qiren’s study behind them.

“Stay the night, A-Cheng” he let a note of pleading enter his voice as he reached out and brushed his husband’s cheek gently, capturing his gaze, “It’s getting late, and we could use your time in a much better way” his voice was low, husky, and designed to curl down the other’s spine.

He felt Jiang Cheng’s shudder, saw the war in his eyes; by now they both knew which side would win, however.

“We could try your favourites” he bent close to Jiang Cheng’s ear to whisper his promise, then he pulled back a little, before moving to swallow the soft keen of surrender the other made beneath his lips.

Lan Xichen lifted his head a while later, eager to hear Jiang Cheng’s verbal agreement. He sounded breathless, hungry and despairing in equal parts as he nodded, “I’ll stay the night”.

***

Wei Wuxian cornered him in the division’s kitchen the next morning as he was pouring a cup of coffee black enough to have its own gravity field.

What was his homicide detective brother even doing in their department? He really didn’t have the energy to deal with Wei Wuxian today.

“Jiang Cheng” his voice was unusually quiet, “Lan Zhan said their men had to extricate you from a Wen kidnapping yesterday. Are you hurt?”

“I’m fine” he snapped irritably, trust that blabbermouth brother-in-law of his to drop him in trouble with Wei Wuxian, who engaged over-protective brother mode. “Nothing happened”

Wei Wuxian raised a disbelieving eyebrow and reached over to tug the scarf he’d worn this morning down a little to reveal the bruises around his throat.

“No?”

“Those are fully consensual, and you well know it Wei Wuxian, now mind your own fucking business, I don’t ask you about your sex life” Wei Wuxian opened his mouth to respond but Jiang Cheng held up a hand to halt him, “And please don’t volunteer that cursed information, I do not want to hear it”

Wei Wuxian caught his wrist, “Shut up for a second, Jiang Cheng. I was only going to say the sex life I engage in is with my husband-”

“As is mine” Jiang Cheng snapped before he could stop himself.

There was a grim, yet satisfied look in Wei Wuxian’s eyes, “With your estranged husband. The one you keep claiming that you’re trying to divorce. Continuing to let him fuck you isn’t going to get him to sign on the dotted line any time soon, Jiang Cheng”

He really had no response as he let that information permeate into his brain. Wei Wuxian was probably right.

“Why don’t you try to work it out Jiang Cheng, you’re obviously still invested in that relationship, whether you want to admit it or not. And it’s an impossibility that you don’t love him still, because he’s your soulmate, check the tiger mark on your hip, babe”

Wei Wuxian walked away soon after dropping his opinion bomb on his exhausted, emotionally wrung out younger brother, and it left Jiang Cheng with a lot to think on.

#XichenWeek2020 #XiCheng #Lan Xichen #Jiang Cheng #Lan Qiren #Wei Wuxian #Modern AU #Soulmate AU #Choking #mdzs fanfic #mdzs fic #grandmaster of demonic cultivation #mo dao zu shi #the untamed #mdzs #Shay's stuff #kidnapping

[theomnilegent]

2019 Upcoming YA Fiction With Transgender, Nonbinary and Gender Non-Conforming Characters!

My last list focused on LGBTQA Fiction with female-led characters. There aren’t many of those this year that also happen to have transgender characters, so I’ve decided to put all the novels covering this topic in one list. It’s unfortunate there aren’t as many stories about transgender characters, let alone #ownvoices stories, but we can all hope that in the next year we’ll see even more! There are a few coming out stories, and a couple of romances in this batch of 2019′s LGBT fiction.

Below you’ll find titles, summaries, and goodreads links. Warning for mentions of transphobia and transphobic violence.

The Hand, The Eye & The Heart by Zoe Marriott Zhilan was assigned female at birth; despite an unusual gift for illusions, they know they will live out their life in the perfumed confines of the women’s quarters. But when civil war sets the country aflame, Zhilan is the only one who can save their disabled Father from death on the battlefield. By taking his place. Surviving brutal army training as a male recruit – Zhi – is only the first challenge. Soon Zhi’s unique talents draw them into an even more perilous fight, in the glittering court of the Land of Dragons, where love and betrayal are two sides of the same smile. The fate of an Empire rests on Zhi’s shoulders. But to win, they must first decide where their loyalty, and their heart, truly belongs. 

Zenobia July by Lisa Bunker Zenobia July is starting a new life. She used to live in Arizona with her father; now she's in Maine with her aunts. She used to spend most of her time behind a computer screen, improving her impressive coding and hacking skills; now she's coming out of her shell and discovering a community of friends at Monarch Middle School. People used to tell her she was a boy; now she's able to live openly as the girl she always knew she was. When someone anonymously posts hateful memes on her school's website, Zenobia knows she's the one with the abilities to solve the mystery, all while wrestling with the challenges of a new school, a new family, and coming to grips with presenting her true gender for the first time. Timely and touching, Zenobia July is, at its heart, a story about finding home.

In The Silences by Rachel Gold When did life get so dangerous? Kaz Adams just wants to read comic books with her best friend, Aisha Warren. And maybe get up the nerve to ask her out, if Kaz turns out to be a gender that Aisha’s into. Kaz figured she’d be the target of violence for her gender nonconformity, but a fatal police shooting thirty miles from their town opens her eyes to the realities of racism. She watches as pressures at school and in their social group mount against Aisha. Kaz would try to stop a bullet for Aisha if she had to, but she has no idea how to stop the waves of soul-crushing disapproval and judgment. When she talks to the other white students and adults in her area, they don’t seem to understand what she’s talking about. Aisha has helped Kaz find a place in the world, but that was about Kaz’s gender expression. Kaz can’t magically change the world for Aisha, but something has to change in their school system or she’ll lose the girl she loves.

I Wish You All The Best by Mason Deaver When Ben De Backer comes out to their parents as nonbinary, they're thrown out of their house and forced to move in with their estranged older sister, Hannah, and her husband, Thomas, whom Ben has never even met. Struggling with an anxiety disorder compounded by their parents' rejection, they come out only to Hannah, Thomas, and their therapist and try to keep a low profile in a new school. But Ben's attempts to survive the last half of senior year unnoticed are thwarted when Nathan Allan, a funny and charismatic student, decides to take Ben under his wing. As Ben and Nathan's friendship grows, their feelings for each other begin to change, and what started as a disastrous turn of events looks like it might just be a chance to start a happier new life. 

My Brother’s Name is Jessica by John Boyne Sam Waver's life has always been pretty quiet. A bit of a loner, he struggles to make friends, and his busy parents often make him feel invisible. Luckily for Sam, his older brother, Jason, has always been there for him. Sam idolises Jason, who seems to have life sorted - he's kind, popular, amazing at football, and girls are falling over themselves to date him. But then one evening Jason calls his family together to tell them that he's been struggling with a secret for a long time. A secret which quickly threatens to tear them all apart. His parents don't want to know and Sam simply doesn't understand. Because what do you do when your brother says he's not your brother at all? That he thinks he's actually... your sister?

Something Like Gravity by Amber Smith Chris and Maia aren’t off to a great start. A near-fatal car accident first brings them together, and their next encounters don’t fare much better. Chris’s good intentions backfire. Maia’s temper gets the best of her. But they’re neighbors, at least for the summer, and despite their best efforts, they just can’t seem to stay away from each other. The path forward isn’t easy. Chris has come out as transgender, but he’s still processing a frightening assault he survived the year before. Maia is grieving the loss of her older sister and trying to find her place in the world without her. Falling in love was the last thing on either of their minds. But would it be so bad if it happened anyway?

Everything Grows by Aimee Herman Fifteen-year-old Eleanor Fromme just chopped off all of her hair. How else should she cope after hearing that her bully, James, has committed suicide? When Eleanor’s English teacher suggests students write a letter to a person who would never read it to get their feelings out, Eleanor chooses James. With each letter she writes, Eleanor discovers more about herself, even while trying to make sense of his death. And, with the help of a unique cast of characters, Eleanor not only learns what it means to be inside a body that does not quite match what she feels on the inside, but also comes to terms with her own mother’s mental illness. Set against a 1993-era backdrop of grunge rock and riot grrl bands, EVERYTHING GROWS depicts Eleanor’s extraordinary journey to solve the mystery within her and feel complete. Along the way, she loses and gains friends, rebuilds relationships with her family, and develops a system of support to help figure out the language of her queer identity.

Kings, Queens, And In-Betweens by Tanya Boteju Perpetually awkward Nima Kumara-Clark is bored with her insular community of Bridgeton, in love with her straight girlfriend, and trying to move past her mother’s unexpected departure. After a bewildering encounter at a local festival, Nima finds herself suddenly immersed in the drag scene on the other side of town. Macho drag kings, magical queens, new love interests, and surprising allies propel Nima both painfully and hilariously closer to a self she never knew she could be—one that can confidently express and accept love. But she’ll have to learn to accept lost love to get there. 

What Makes You Beautiful by Bridget Liang Logan Osborne knows he likes boys, but has not come out to his family or at school, and no one knows that he likes to sometimes wear girls' clothes and makeup. When he starts at a school for the arts he finds a wider range of gender and orientation being accepted. Logan is attracted to Kyle, who has gay dads. But Kyle is straight. Logan finds he doesn't like the way gay boys treat him, and a disturbing hookup with a boy who is fetishistic about Logan's half-Asian background makes Logan even more confused about what he wants and who he is. Encouraged and supported by his friends at school, Logan experiments with nail polish and more feminine clothes in public. Logan begins questioning his gender and decides to use they pronouns while trying to figure things out. Logan meets a classmate's chosen mother, who is a transgender Chinese woman, and begins to come to terms with their gender identity. Realizing they are not a gay boy, but a transgender girl, Logan asks for people to call them Veronica. As a girl, does Veronica stand a chance with Kyle?

#trans literature #transgender literature #lgbtqa literature #lgbt #book recommendations

[detectivejigsawpines]

ORN-Part 2 (Reaching Out)

Trigger warning: reference to suicide (very brief).

Ford stared at the phone, still clutched in his hand, in astonishment.

The mystery caller who had spent years (somehow following his trail from Backupsmore all the way to Gravity Falls, no less) contacting him, only to hang up without speaking, had finally said something.

And even though the words he’d spoken were in Spanish, which Ford had never learned (why bother when Latin and Ancient Greek were available?), the voice sounded very familiar, which was the tiniest bit reassuring for some reason.

Unfortunately, even though Spanish was derived from Latin because it was a Romance language, he was stumped as to what those words had actually meant.

Ford realized with a growl of frustration that it was late, and the town library (which was probably the best place he could go to get them translated) was therefore closed.

It would certainly be nice, he mused to himself, if there was a way to readily find information from the comfort of your own home in situations like this.

The next day he put aside his research on the weirdness of Gravity Falls, which was hitting a bit of a roadblock anyway, and headed straight for the library.  He was eventually able to locate a good Spanish-to-English dictionary and start reading through it.

It would have made things easier if he’d been able to actually see the words the mystery caller had spoken, and how they were spelled, but he was able to make a few educated guesses.  About ten minutes later Ford wrote out what he thought was the correct translation in his journal, under his entry on the silent phone calls-and at once his pen fell from his suddenly nerveless fingers.

Lo siento, hermano.

I’m sorry, brother.

********

There was only one person in the world who it could possibly be.  Well, technically there were two, but only one of them would have a good reason to say that to him.

Slowly it sank in that his mystery caller was the one person he never expected to hear from again, and that he had just told Ford the one thing he never expected to hear from him.

He noticed that his hand was actually shaking a little, and his stomach churning with multiple emotions.

Frustratingly, until or unless Stanley called him back, there was nothing he could do to reconnect with him, because last he’d heard from Mom, Stan didn’t have a phone number.

He went home and spent the rest of the day shooting anxious (or alternatively baleful) glances at the phone as he tried to go through his normal routine, torn between willing it to ring so he could get some answers, and kind of hoping that it wouldn’t.  And then feeling horrified and disgusted with himself for the latter because what if that message had been some kind of final goodbye?  Like maybe Stan was planning to never contact him again, or was about to-

No, he couldn’t think like that.  Stan was incredibly fond of life, he’d never-

But there was no way he could be sure of that, was there?  There were probably lots of suicide cases (just thinking the words made him cringe) where the...victim was one of the last people you’d expect to do something like that.

But come on, even if Stan did feel guilty about what he’d done all that long ago, which he apparently did, surely he wouldn’t feel bad enough to do that.  Even if Ford could hold onto old hurts for so many years, that didn’t mean Stan would-

By the time his phone finally rang again, nearly two whole days later, Ford was a bundle of frayed nerves.

Hurriedly he snatched it up and practically yelled into the receiver, “Hello, this is Stanford Pines!”

There was another silence at the other end of the line.  After a second it occurred to Ford that there was a chance it was someone else entirely, like maybe his mother or a telemarketer (the only other people who called on a regular basis), and he had just frightened them by shrieking into the phone.  He cleared his throat awkwardly, and said in a more civilized tone, “...Um, hello?  Sorry about that.”

There was no reply, but whoever it was hadn’t hung up yet; he could faintly hear what sounded like a car driving by on the other end of the line.  Ford swallowed and decided to take the plunge.

“Stanley?  Is that you?”

This time there was a small gasp, one that sounded familiar now that he was looking for it.

“Don’t hang up!” Ford said quickly, just in case.

Another pause...and then a (maybe more gravelly than he remembered, but still recognizable) voice said softly, “...Hey, Sixer.”

There were a hundred things that Ford wanted to say.  And ask.  And yell.  And probably curse.

He chose to go with, “How did you get my number?”

“Mom,” Stan replied simply.

Ah.  Of course.  She had brought up Stanley a few times, telling him how his brother was doing even when he insisted he didn’t care and didn’t want to hear it.  It sounded like she’d been trying to persuade Stan to reach out to him too.

He chewed his lip, searching for more words.

“I, um-was waiting for you to call back sooner.”

“Sorry.  I got...caught up.”  More cars were in the background; was he next to a road?

Another pause.

“...What did you want?” Stan finally asked.

“You’re the one who called me, Stanley.”

“Oh.  Right.”  An awkward cough.  “Guess I just...wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

“Is there a reason why I wouldn’t be?” Ford asked, still trying to process that.  That meant that all those phone calls were his brother’s own unique way of checking up on him?

“I dunno.  Besides the fact that you suck at taking care of yourself.”  A half-hearted laugh, probably accompanied by him sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck; he tended to do that when he was uncomfortable.

He was hiding something.  Stan was a much better liar than Ford nine and a half times out of ten, but he could tell he was hiding something.  All he said in return, though, was, “Listen to the pot calling the kettle black.”

More awkward laughter from both of them.

Oh geez, they were actually doing small talk.  That felt so wrong; neither of them had ever needed to do small talk with each other.  The alternative, however, was to rip the bandage off the wound that he had to admit to himself had never actually healed, and he didn’t know what would happen if he did that.  Most likely Stan would hang up again and this would be the last conversation they’d ever have.  And while the more self-righteous part of him said that was fine by him, he didn’t need anybody either, the rest of him was frantically whisper-screaming for that to not happen, please please please no-

“So you’re doing okay?  Mom says you got a house.  And a research grant.”

Ford shook his head, bringing himself back into the moment.  “Yes.  It’s in Oregon.”

“Whoa.  You got all the way away from Jersey.”

Ford’s jaw clenched a tiny bit.  “Yeah.”

“Good job.”

“...Thanks.”

And then, out of the blue, he said, “You should come visit.”

“Just take some time off-” Mom told him once while he was in college that Stan had started a sales business of some kind, maybe he was still doing that, and surely it wouldn’t be hard to take a break- “and drive up and see it.  It’s a nice town, very interesting, has all kinds of unique phenomena.”  Ford realized that he was starting to babble and shut his mouth.

A longer silence lasted between them, long enough for him to ask, “Stan?  You still there?”

“I’m here.”  To his surprise, Stan sounded...apprehensive.  Afraid, even.  Something Stan never was, except perhaps in situations regarding Pa.

“I-I don’t-you’re probably real busy doing important science stuff, I don’t wanna bother you.”

“You wouldn’t,” Ford insisted.  “I’m...kind of in a roadblock in my research, actually.  Maybe it would do me good to take some time off.”

“You don’t need me for that.”  Somehow the resignation that entered his brother’s voice now hurt worse than the fear had.

“Just think about it.”  Even though before today the idea of inviting his estranged twin to come visit him would have been the last thing on his mind, suddenly Ford very much wanted it to happen.

Maybe it was the fact that Stan had been sort of reaching out to him for almost five years now, even if he’d never actually spoken to him.  Maybe it was because he’d said he was sorry, even if it was in another language.

Maybe it was lingering fear and not wanting to never hear from him again, as ridiculously sentimental as that probably was.

“...Maybe,” Stan finally said.  “S’not like I’m that busy right now.”

Ford exhaled, trying to think of a way to be more persuasive without being pushy.

“Do you need my address?”  Seconds later he wanted to kick himself; too eager, that was way too eager.

“Nah, I got it written down somewhere.”

“618 Gopher Road,” Ford said anyway.

“Yeah, that sounds right.”  Stan swallowed again, loudly.  “I, um, I gotta go.  These calls aren’t cheap.”

Then all that was left was the dial tone buzzing in Ford’s ear.

#Gravity Falls #flipside AU #stan pines #ford pines #young stan and ford #knuckleheads reconnecting #phone conversation

[yougotmyshareofit]

January Book Reviews

 So I inhaled a lot of books in January despite school starting back up again (not good for my productivity that’s for sure), so I thought I’d give some quick book reviews on them because a lot of them were real winners.

1.  Ziggy, Stardust, and Me // By: James Brandon

Ok this book was absolutely beautiful. After finishing it, I couldn’t do anything but sit there completely in awe. The characters are amazingly written and the author portrays the difficulties of being LGBTQ+ as well as a person of color in the ‘70s with such cutting emotion. It brings up a lot of issues and prejudices that were prevalent at that time, which was really enlightening. All in all, it was probably my favorite book out of all of them this month and I couldn’t recommend it enough. 

Summary: “ The year is 1973.... And homosexuality is still officially considered a mental illness. In the midst of these trying times is sixteen-year-old Jonathan Collins, a bullied, anxious, asthmatic kid, who aside from an alcoholic father and his sympathetic neighbor and friend Starla, is completely alone. To cope, Jonathan escapes to the safe haven of his imagination, where his hero David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust and dead relatives, including his mother, guide him through the rough terrain of his life. In his alternate reality, Jonathan can be anything: a superhero, an astronaut, Ziggy Stardust, himself, or completely “normal” and not a boy who likes other boys. When he completes his treatments, he will be normal—at least he hopes. But before that can happen, Web stumbles into his life. Web is everything Jonathan wishes he could be: fearless, fearsome and, most importantly, not ashamed of being gay. Jonathan doesn’t want to like brooding Web.... But he’s drawn to Web anyway. Web is the first person in the real world to see Jonathan completely and think he’s perfect..... For the first time in his life, he may finally feel free enough to love and accept himself as he is. ”

2. Something like Gravity // By: Amber Smith

This book was pretty heart-wrenching and also very beautiful. I liked how real and honest the author was at portraying Chris’s struggles with being out as transgender and the amount of trust he had to have to open up to Maia. It was a lovely story that showed that someone can be in your life for a short amount of time, but still change it in ways you never thought were possible. Highly recommend as well.

Summary:  “Chris and Maia aren’t off to a great start. A near-fatal car accident first brings them together, and their next encounters don’t fare much better.... But they’re neighbors, at least for the summer, and despite their best efforts, they just can’t seem to stay away from each other. The path forward isn’t easy. Chris has come out as transgender, but he’s still processing a frightening assault he survived the year before. Maia is grieving the loss of her older sister and trying to find her place in the world without her. Falling in love was the last thing on either of their minds. But would it be so bad if it happened anyway?”

3. Frat Girl // By: Kiley Roache

So this book was a pretty entertaining and humorous read. I really liked the trope that the author used -- a feminist girl dealing with all the crap that goes down in a frat house. It was also pretty enlightening for me and showed the different sides of feminism, as well as struck down lots of stereotypes that both feminists and anti-feminists have, which was really cool and interesting. Although I enjoyed this book, at times I felt that I was just reading the same scene over again, so I feel like the author could’ve been more concise. However, I still liked it a lot and thought it was an entertaining read.

Summary: “For Cassandra Davis, the F-word is fraternity—specifically Delta Tau Chi, a house on probation and on the verge of being banned from campus. Accused of offensive, sexist behavior, they have one year to clean up their act. For the DTC brothers, the F-word is feminist—the type of person who writes articles in the school paper about why they should lose their home. With one shot at a scholarship to attend the university of her dreams, Cassie pitches a research project: to pledge Delta Tau Chi and provide proof of their misogynistic behavior. They’re frat boys. She knows exactly what to expect once she gets there. Exposing them should be a piece of cake. But the boys of Delta Tau Chi have their own agenda, and fellow pledge Jordan Louis is certainly more than the tank top wearing “bro” Cassie expected to find. With her heart and her future tangled in the web of her own making, Cassie is forced to realize that the F-word might not be as simple as she thought after all.”

4. I wish you all the best // By: Mason Deaver

UGH THIS BOOK!! I inhaled it in literally less than 24 hours and I LOVED it. Classic angst (like a lot of angst) with a happy ending and it was so so good. Definitely a close second for my favorite this month. I just loved all the raw emotion that the author portrayed and how real they were with the mental and emotional struggles the characters faced. So amazing, highly recommend.

Summary: “When Ben De Backer comes out to their parents as nonbinary, they're thrown out of their house and forced to move in with their estranged older sister, Hannah, and her husband, Thomas, whom Ben has never even met. Struggling with an anxiety disorder compounded by their parents' rejection, they come out only to Hannah, Thomas, and their therapist and try to keep a low profile in a new school. But Ben's attempts to survive the last half of senior year unnoticed are thwarted when Nathan Allan, a funny and charismatic student, decides to take Ben under his wing. As Ben and Nathan's friendship grows, their feelings for each other begin to change, and what started as a disastrous turn of events looks like it might just be a chance to start a happier new life.”

5. All for the Game Series (The Foxhole Court, The Raven King, and All the King’s Men) // By: Nora Sakavic

So I downloaded these as ebooks on my iPad, which turned out to be a terrible idea because they ruined my productivity at school for a literal week. A. WEEK. Basically I would read these in class rather than pay attention, but you know whatever it’s fine I’m fine. Anyways, I loved this series so so much. I wil say that the first book was good, but kind of confusing for me because there were so many different names and backstories that I literally could not keep track of all of them. However, it gets better as the series goes on and I inhaled all 3 of these books pretty quickly. I loved the main characters and even though the backstories were kind of confusing at times, they also made the plot super interesting and intricate so I guess you win some and you lose some. All in all, you gotta read this series cuz it has all the best trope and there’s lots of angst (seriously SO much)  and lots of mystery. Good stuff.

Summary (book 1): “Neil Josten is the newest addition to the Palmetto State University Exy team. He's short, he's fast, he's got a ton of potential—and he's the runaway son of the murderous crime lord known as The Butcher. Signing a contract with the PSU Foxes is the last thing a guy like Neil should do. The team is high profile and he doesn't need sports crews broadcasting pictures of his face around the nation. His lies will hold up only so long under this kind of scrutiny and the truth will get him killed. But Neil's not the only one with secrets on the team. One of Neil's new teammates is a friend from his old life, and Neil can't walk away from him a second time. Neil has survived the last eight years by running. Maybe he's finally found someone and something worth fighting for. ”

#seriously tho read these guys #they were all so good #also sorry for the long post #like yikes man #january book recs #book recs #recommended #recommendations #books #reading #lgbtq #book recommendations #book reviews #book review #review

[orangeoctopi7]

Responsibility

What am I doing? Stan asked himself for the umpteenth time that morning. He was sitting in the parking lot beside the hotel Ford was staying in, fidgeting restlessly as he waited for them. He’d gotten impatient and just drove over at 10 am, even though he knew they probably wouldn’t be leaving for another hour.

Maybe he’d come here because being so close made it just a little harder to run away. And there was a big part of him that wanted to run away. Who was he fooling? Things were never going to be the same between him and Ford. He was just setting himself up for disappointment, he should know better by now.

But Ford asked me to come. He reminded himself. He asked me. He's a straight-forward guy, he wouldn't ask me to come if he didn't actually want me around… Still, the doubts in his mind persisted. If I bail on him now, after he asked me to come with him and I said yes, that'll just give him one more reason to hate me. The second he doesn't want me around, then I can leave. That was reasoning both his hopes and his fears could get behind.

Finally, just ten minutes before check-out time, Ford and his assistant, Mc-Whats-his-name, rolled into the parking lot with their luggage. They loaded it into a small pickup truck parked just a few spaces away from Stan's car. The assistant got into the driver's seat, and Ford walked over to Stan’s already rolled-down window.

“Gravity Falls is pretty far out into the backwoods. It’s hard to find if you don’t know where to go, so follow Fiddleford closely.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know how to find my way around.” Stan schooled his expression to be as disinterested as possible. The last thing he wanted was to seem desperate.

Stan followed the little truck out of the parking lot and onto the interstate. With every exit they passed, that rebellious fear inside him whispered: You could just turn off here, and by the time they notice you’ll be long gone. Each time Stan shook his head and pushed a little harder on the accelerator. I’m not turning back now. These nerds need someone with sense to look after them.

And gradually, as he passed by more and more exits, his fears quieted and his hopes grew. Here he was, going on a road trip with his brother! Sure, they were in separate cars, but still! They’d be living together for the first time since the science fair incident. Maybe this was exactly what they needed to finally make things right between them.

He clamped down on the growing hope just like he’d clamped down on the whispering fears. Don’t get your hopes up. No matter what I hope might happen, the only reason I’m being invited out here it to be a glorified science experiment.

-_-_-

After a couple of hours on the interstate, they finally reached the exit that would take them to Gravity Falls. Of course, there was still a good hour of driving down the winding timber roads of Roadkill County before they reached the cabin. Ford glanced into the rearview mirror to make sure Stan was still following them. Yes, there was the STNLYMBL license plate, right on their tail.

“You been checkin’ that rearview mirror so much, you might as well’ve sat backwards the whole trip.” Fiddleford joked.

“Just… making sure he made the exit.” Ford said stiffly.

“Don’t worry, if’n he makes a break for it, I’ll let you know.”

“Do you really think he’d do that?” the researcher asked his friend worriedly.

“I dunno, he’s your brother.” McGucket shrugged. “But we are bringin’ him out to a cabin in the middle of nowhere to do experiments on him. If’n it were me, I’d run, even if it were my kin doin’ it.”

“I’m not going to treat my own brother like a lab rat!” Ford bristled. “I know ethics isn’t a strength for either of us, but I do have some morals. Stan underwent a major postnatal genetic mutation that completely altered his senses and physical abilities. He seems to be stable now, but from the sound of it I don’t think he’s had so much as a checkup since then. What if that rapid mutation had a negative impact on his health? I know he seems fine, but what if it weakened his immune system? What if it accelerated his cellular degeneration? What if the mutation is continuing, but it hasn’t physically manifested yet? What if it’s shortened his lifespan? What if-- ”

“Stanford, calm down! I get it, you just wanna make sure yer brother’s ok. But does he know that?” Fiddleford jerked a thumb back at the red car following them.

“I highly doubt Stanley would have agreed to come if he didn’t.”

“I dunno… back in Portland you were just goin’ on and on about helpin’ him develop his powers and be a better crime fighter. Seemed like you were less concerned about yer brother and more concerned about the Spider Man.”

“Well I don’t want to alarm him! My fears about heretofore unseen effects of the mutation are currently just that, fears. I don’t see any reason to worry him with them until we have evidence that he might be in danger.”

Fiddleford nodded. “Makes sense, I guess. It’s just, I know things between you and yer brother are strained.”

“That’s a gross understatement.”

“I’m just sayin’, it’d probably do you some good to extend an olive branch, so to speak. He probably won’t wanna stay long if’n he feels like you only brought him here because of his powers.”

“I doubt Stan will want to stay long regardless. He has his own life to get back to, being the Spider Man. I suspect he only agreed to come in the first place out of some sort of familial obligation.”

“Maybe.” McGucket didn’t sound convinced.

-_-_-

It was late afternoon when they finally reached the cabin. Stan gave a low whistle as he got out and stretched. He’d always stuck to the cities after he left home; it was easier to pickpocket on a crowded urban street than some podunk town. This was the first time he’d ever been in a densely wooded area like this. It was beautiful.

“D’you need help unpacking?” Mc-Whats-his-name asked.

“Nah.” Stan shook his head and grabbed his pillow and an armful of clothes. As he looked up at the cabin, with its peaked roof and many triangular windows, he began to feel uneasy. His fears were getting the better of him. Better not unpack too much. I’ll be lucky if he lets me stay more than one night.

“Come on, Stanley, I’ll show you where you can stay, then I want to get started right away.” Ford called from the porch, already carrying his luggage into the house.

Stan followed his brother inside and up the stairs. He paused on the landing when his eye caught the strange design on the rug beneath his feet. It was a gold triangle on a red background, with a single piercing eye in the center and lines radiating out from it. He felt his spider-sense twinge. That was weird. His spider-sense had always been a full-on warning of oncoming danger, like all his nerves were yelling “Watch Out!” at once. This was different. He felt the same way looking at this image that he used to feel whenever he was up someplace high. Like an alarm bell was going off in his head saying “This is Dangerous!”

“What’s this?” He asked Ford, who had noticed him stop and look down at the floor.

Ford’s eyes grew wide with surprise for a moment, but then he grinned like Stan had just asked him to brag about one of his experiments.

“Oh yes! That! It’s a, uh, cryptid I’m personally very interested in. This image is found all over the world, in countless times and cultures, but the, um, creature itself only seems to, ah, show up for one particular person, once a generation. I’ve seen it depicted in some cave paintings not far from here. Beautiful, isn’t it?”

“More like creepy.” Stan shuddered.

Ford’s grin flipped to an annoyed frown. “Well, I suppose there’s no accounting for taste.” He sniffed.

“I think that thing’s creepy too.” Fiddleford whispered to Stan as Ford continued up the stairs. “He’s got ‘em all over the house, gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

“Yeah, well, Ford always loved his creepy junk.” Stan shrugged and followed after his brother.

They reached the attic and what was clearly meant to be a storage room, although there was a full-size mattress sitting under yet another triangular window.

“Here were are.” Stanford spread his arms wide, “Sorry it’s such a mess, obviously I wasn’t expecting to bring anyone else back with me from Portland. You can just shove everything into that corner behind the door. I’ll find some sheets for you before you go to bed.”

Stan took it all in as he plopped his pillow and the few clothes he’d brought in with him on the mattress. “Still nicer than most of the motels I’ve stayed in.”

Ford frowned again and exited the room. “Well, like I said, I want to get started right away. I think we’ll just start with some bloodwork and a basic checkup.”

“Bloodwork?” Stan grimaced.

“Don’t be such a baby, Stanley, it’s just a finger-prick.”

So Stan followed his brother back down the stairs and into what appeared to be a library. There were bookshelves everywhere, but there were also quite a few experiments in various stages of completion set out on some tables, so it was really hard to tell the purpose of the room.

“We’re gonna do blood work in here?” Stan asked.

“Of course not, it’s not sanitary! We’re going down to the lab.” Ford stepped over to the bookshelf sitting closest to the door into the hallway and pushed aside a few books on the top shelf, revealing a hidden panel in the wood. He pushed it aside, pressed a series of buttons, and the bookshelf swung open like a doorway.

“...Ford, do you have a freakin’ secret lair under your house?”

“Yep!”

-_-_-

Stanford drifted off to sleep quickly that night. It had been a long day, what with the three-hour drive and trying to make his previously estranged brother feel at home up in the attic, all the while taking blood samples and running tests on said brother to make sure his superhuman mutation wasn’t slowly killing him. So far everything looked fine, but the results of the blood samples wouldn’t be done until tomorrow night.

Ford was a bit surprised when Bill appeared to him that night. Usually the muse’s visits were few and far between, a rare, privileged occasion. But ever since work on the portal began, these dream-visions were becoming more and more regular.

“GOOD, YOU’RE FINALLY BACK! BUT IT SEEMS LIKE YOU’VE BROUGHT ANOTHER DISTRACTION BACK WITH YOU!”

“I know I said I’d get right back to work on the portal when I returned,” Ford said sheepishly, “But I didn’t expect to actually meet the Spider Man, and I certainly didn’t expect him to be Stanley, of all people!”

“YEAH, CRAZY COINCIDENCE. I’M JUST HAVING A HARD TIME UNDERSTANDING WHY YOU’D BRING HIM BACK WITH YOU TO STUDY WHEN YOU’VE ALREADY GOT YOUR HANDS FULL WITH THE PORTAL PROJECT.”

“I didn’t bring Stanley back just to study!” Ford insisted. “Why does everyone have such a hard time seeing that? Undergoing a major genetic mutation like that could have some serious consequences on his body systems. I just want to make sure there aren’t any hidden side-effects.”

“SO YOU’VE GOTTA PUT YOUR WORLD-CHANGING MAGNUM OPUS ON HOLD FOR YOUR DEADBEAT BROTHER.” Bill sighed in irritation. “THIS IS WHY I CUT TIES WITH MY FAMILY A LOOOOONG TIME AGO.”

“I-I’ve cut ties with my family, for the most part….” the researcher stammered. He didn’t want his muse to think he was weak. “But I’m largely responsible for Stan undergoing these mutations, and as such it’s my responsibility to ensure they won’t have any negative long-term effects on him!”

“SURE. RESPONSIBILITY. I’M SURE THE IRRESPONSIBLE LOSER WHO USES HIS INCREDIBLE POWERS TO PICKPOCKET AND GET HIMSELF OUT OF JAIL FREE WILL APPRECIATE THAT. I DON’T BLAME YOU FOR BEING JEALOUS.”

“What? I’m not jealous of Stan! Far from it!” The thought had never even crossed Ford’s mind.

“C’MON SIXER, LET’S BE REAL HERE. YOU DID ALL THE WORK OF RESEARCHING THE EFFECTS OF RADIATION ON SPIDERS, OF RAISING THEM, OF STUDYING THEM. AND THEN YOUR BUFFOON OF A BROTHER TIPS OVER THEIR CAGE AND HE GETS ALL THE POWERS AND THE FAME OF BEING THE SPIDER MAN. AND WHAT DO YOU GET IN RETURN? SHUT OUT OF YOUR DREAM SCHOOL! WHO WOULDN’T BE JEALOUS?”

Ford hadn’t even connected these dots, but now that Bill mentioned it, the muse made some very good points.

“YOU WISH IT WAS YOU.” Bill said in a sing-song voice.

“Yes.” Ford heard himself say, although he hadn’t consciously thought that. “I mean, no!” He corrected quickly. “It seems that Stan’s suffered quite a bit despite his powers. Maybe even because of them. And without either of us realizing it, his role as the Spider Man helped my thesis that led to my research grant. I might not be here today if it wasn’t for him.”

“OH, I THINK YOU’D STILL BE HERE.” Bill assured him, “FATE BROUGHT YOU TO ME. IT’S YOUR DESTINY TO OPEN THE GATEWAY. I’M JUST WORRIED YOUR BROTHER BEING HERE WILL LEAD TO TROUBLE.”

“He won’t.” Stanford assured the muse.

“YOU’RE SURE YOU WON’T GET DISTRACTED AND LOSE YOUR RESOLVE?”

“Absolutely. I’ll make time to work on the Portal, don’t worry.”

“OK, BUT REMEMBER, I’M DOING THIS FOR YOU. IF YOU WANT YOUR GRAND UNIFYING THEORY OF WEIRDNESS, YOU’RE GONNA NEED ME AND THAT PORTAL.”

“I know, I know, and I’m very grateful. I just need to take care of Stan first.”

“WELL, I SUPPOSE THAT’S THE MOST I CAN ASK OF A MORTAL LIKE YOU.” Bill said with a long-suffering sigh. Ford frowned like a kicked puppy. The last thing he wanted to do was disappoint his muse. “BUT HEY, JUST TO SHOW THERE’S NO HARD FEELINGS, HOW ABOUT A GAME OF INTERDIMENSIONAL CHESS BEFORE I GO?”

“Yes! I’d love that!” the researcher agreed eagerly.

-_-_-

Stan woke with a start in the middle of the night when his spider-sense went off. It was yet another strange twinge like earlier in the day when he’d seen the rug. But this one was ten times stronger. He jumped out of bed and looked around wildly, but he couldn’t find anything that could be setting off his internal alarm.

What was going on? Normally his spider sense let him know exactly where the danger was coming from before any normal person even realized there was something wrong. Then Stan would jump out of the way and the indescribable sensation would pass. But this weird twinging spider-sense wasn’t going away, and he couldn’t seem to find what was making him feel so twitchy.

Maybe it was coming from outside? Stan cracked the window open and crawled out onto the exterior wall. He didn’t see anything, even after he climbed up onto the roof for a better view. And it wasn’t like much could hide in the bright light of the nearly-full moon.

“What the heck is going on?” Stan whined to himself. The continuous tingling of his spider-sense was really starting to grate on him. It was making him want to scream, but he didn’t want to accidentally wake up Ford, or his assistant.

Wait, that was it! The whole reason Ford had brought him up here was to study the Spider Man’s powers, maybe Ford could figure out what was wrong! Stan climbed back in his window and snuck down the stairs, trying to remember where his brother’s room was.

Ford was clearly dreaming when Stan found him, but the prolonged spider-sense ringing in Stan’s head made it a bit harder to care. The con man not-so-gently shook his brother awake.

Stan gasped when his brother’s eyes snapped open. For just a split second, they glowed a sickly yellow. But it must have been a trick of the moonlight, because he blinked and Ford’s eyes were their normal earthy brown, and blinking blearily awake.

“What… why…?” The researcher blinked a few times as he tried to figure out what had woken him. He frowned in annoyance when he realized it was his brother. “Stanley what do you think you’re doing? Why did you wake me up?” He demanded.

“Y’know how I said I can just sense danger some times? Well I’m sensing it now!” Stan explained, “I’ve been feeling weird ever since I got here, and just a few minutes ago it woke me up when it got worse. I tried to look around to see what was causing it but I can’t find anything! And…” He trailed off.

“What?”

“It stopped.” Stan said in confusion. “Just about when you woke up, it stopped.”

“Great, then go back to bed. And don’t ever wake me up unless there’s an emergency, I need my sleep.”

“This is an emergency! Or it was! I dunno, this has never happened before!”

Stanford yawned dismissively. “I have a theory that this danger sense of yours actually detects weirdness. It’s acting up now because you’ve never been in a place with such a high concentration of weirdness before. I promise I’ll look into it later, just let me go back to sleep.”

Stan wanted to argue that his spider-sense had never acted as a weirdness detector before, but he could also see that he wasn’t going to get any more out of Ford until morning. And the sensation had passed. Maybe he would be better off waiting until daylight to try and figure out what happened.

20-8-1-20 20-9-20-12-5 23-15-21-12-4 13-1-11-5 7-15-15-4 11-5-25, 23-15-21-12-4-14'20 9-20?

Klw hsrva pn oqlafrltbg szf azeg. Fftwuiydg owh qy Fvvg Qcl uiuksml me, cgj kbf'b mqdbxl ks zxa.

Nfl smltew? Tyl iwrk ejbs ghsi jsbwyq? Lpv'e utiv qw aohyp.

#Gravity Falls #Fanfiction #Spiderstan AU #Stanley Pines #Stanford Pines #This jerk #Fiddleford Mcgucket #Spider Stan AU #My Writing

[nikxation]

Gravity Falls Fic Rec List

In honor of Fanfiction Writer Appreciation Day, I’ve decided to compile a list of some of my favorite fanfics I’ve encountered thus far in the fandom! Please note that this list is not all-encompassing, and that even if you don’t see your fic here, if I have liked/kudoed/commented/reblogged your fic, that means I love it. Keeping this list a moderate length is already going to be difficult enough because holy cats this fandom has a lot of amazing writers!

Before the Bridges Burn by @endae

Summary: Canon Divergence from DAMvtF and the entirety of Weirdmageddon. Rather than being stopped by Ford and being encaged in front of Blendin, Dipper finds Mabel in the forest trapped inside her Dreamscape. He makes a deal with Bill to rescue Mabel, but with the risk of losing his life if he doesn't make it within the time restriction of Bill's game.

Why you should read it: Okay, so, Endae has this absolutely beautiful and heart-breaking way with words that really whacks you in the face with the Feels Stick from the get-go, and if you haven’t read anything by her yet, then you’re missing out. The angst is real, folks. Don’t take my word on it. Just go read it for yourself. Seriously. Currently the sequel is a WIP.

Fisherman’s Knot by @scribefindegil

Summary: Happy endings are messy, and the Arctic winter is more difficult than either Stan or Ford want to admit.

Why you should read it: Okay this is literally a fandom classic, and if you haven’t heard of it thus far, you must be new like I was. This fic is a gem. So much hurt and quite a few serious themes that you should make sure you’re ready for before you start. Also... tissues. Be sure to have tissues on hand... The fic is technically not finished, but where it leaves off is super satisfying and honestly works as an ending, so don’t worry, you don’t end on any horrifying cliffhangers.

Raising Stakes by @marypsue

Summary: 1982. A postcard from his estranged twin brother summons Stanley Pines halfway across the country to Gravity Falls, Oregon, where something sinister is brewing. Ford may have bitten off more than he can chew this time, but Stan's never been one to lie down and give up. And this time, he's got a new bag of tricks to try...

Why you should read it: Two words... Vampire AU! It’s super well-done, it has heart and jokes while also being appropriately sinister at certain points. Also, I love the interpretation of vampires and how they work. Beyond this fic itself, Mary is just a superb writer and really cranks out some amazing fics and AUs.

Lighthouse Keeper AU by @impishnature

Summary:  A beast lurks in the waters. Stan loses Ford to the waves, the lighthouse his only point of contact and hope of ever getting him back. …He used to love the sea, now it’s taken everything from him.

Why you should read it: Okay... This is another one where, if you haven’t read it, you must live under a rock. Super cool AU where the show takes place centered around a lighthouse instead of the Portal. Bill is creepy af, Ford’s means of being trapped are super rad and also super terrifying, and Stan is just such a good boy I love him so much. Imp also writes beautifully and has this amazing grasp of imagery and storytelling that is really astounding and paints these gorgeous pictures of what’s happening. Her stories will just have you completely enraptured, so go check out her stuff.

Some Sunny Day by @anistarrose

Summary: Time isn’t linear, Stan has a catchy piano tune stuck in his head, and blue flames threaten to consume the peace that the Pines family has found. Based off the Same Coin Theory.

Why you should read it: I’m going to be completely honest here: I’ve only read the first chapter of this so far. I know, I know, bad Nikki. But look, okay, the first chapter is super good, Rose’s Stan Twins are amazing and so in-character that is hurts, and Same Coin theory is just so cool to explore and play with. But Nikki, how can you rec something you’ve barely read? I can because I just know, alright. Rose writes really well, and even the first chapter had me completely invested (even if I haven’t had time to read the rest). So I’ll rec what I want, thank you very much. Currently a WIP.

1 Step Forward, 20 Years Back by @infriga

Summary: A Tale of Two Stans AU: Instead of fighting over the journal Stan tries to leave, but Ford isn't willing to let him go that easily. During the argument Stan comes into contact with a strange magical substance, and when he wakes up later he finds he's a bit smaller than he remembers. Now not only does Ford have to worry about Bill taking over the world, he also has to figure out how to turn his brother back to normal.

Why you should read this: This is another one that is a huge fandom hit, and for good reason. It’s got humor and imagination. Infriga’s writing is super nice and flows perfectly. Their grasp of the characters is spot-on, and they explore some really neat concepts and ideas in the fic. Really, just and all-around amazing fic that you should definitely read if you haven’t yet. (They also illustrate every chapter, and their art is spectacular).

by the skin of your teeth by @apathetic-revenant

Summary: In which Ford's attempt to survive entirely on caffeine and paranoia suffers some pitfalls, and things happen differently in 1982.

Why you should read it: This was literally the first fic I read for this fandom, and I still love it to this day. Ford’s a goddamn mess, Stan is the real MVP for taking all this BS and craziness in stride, and Fidds saves the day. Some rather dark themes interspersed with some comforting humor (lookin @ you, end of Ch2/beginning of Ch3). Plus, I am always in the mood for the boys figuring their problems out and bonding again. Good good stuff.

Cast Away (part 2) by @fordanoia

Summary: What happens when Stanley is the one to fall through the portal instead.

Why you should read it: Two chapters of absolute stress. Both of the boys are bad-ass in their own ways, and Stan gets some unexpected help (from something that canon really would have benefited from expanding upon). Really, an all-around awesome two-shot. Noia gets into the boys’ heads so well and writes them amazingly. Just... such a great read.

An Outreached Hand by @dubsdeedubs

Summary: On a cold winter's day in 1982, Stan Pines shows up at his brother's door with two cats tucked in his jacket and no heartbeat in his chest. (A sort-of Ghost Trick AU, but requires no previous knowledge of that to read.)

Why you should read it: Super neat concept. Really, this fic is so cool. Dubs’s writing is spectacular, and they instill this sense of mystery and foreboding into this story so seamlessly with little hits of humor here and there. Really, I can’t put into words how awesome this fic is. Just go check it out. Currently a WIP.

30 Seconds Later by @invisibletinkerer

Summary:  Stanford falls through the portal in 1982, but is pulled back almost immediately. Stanley, meanwhile, struggles for 30 years to bring his brother back. Neither is reunited with the brother they expect.

Why you should read it: Hooooo boy. This fic is about as angsty and painful as you would expect from reading the summary. It’s super well-written and the idea is so unique and honestly heart-breaking when you consider the implications. It just presents some new and interesting challenges for the gang to overcome and is a solid, interesting fic so far. Currently a WIP.

Okay I know I’m missing some, but these are some major highlights in my book and this post is starting to get ridiculously long RIP.

To everyone that writes, thank you for doing what you do. You all are amazing and loved and appreciated. The world would truly be a sad place without so many of amazing writers in it. Keep doing what you’re doing, and may the gods of inspiration rain every beautiful idea down on you, and may your fingers fly swiftly across the keys to compose beautiful tales each and every day. <3

#fanfiction #gravity falls fanfiction #fic rec #holy crap i need to stop before this list gets longer #if you think i missed someone feel free to reblog and add on!!! #LOVE YOU ALL #happy fanfic writer appreciation day!!!!!

[anistarrose]

The End (Of The Lonely Road) Approaches [Gravity Falls - WhatWouldTeslaDo]

Word Count: ~950

Summary:  The drive from New Mexico to Oregon is long and snowy, and Stan can’t help but be distracted by his own thoughts about how much his twin has changed.

Warnings: Minor (but frightening) car accident, fairly strong swearing

Based off the Paranoid Ford ask blog @whatwouldteslado​, and while I can’t recommend it strongly enough, you can read this without having read that blog. All you need to know is that it's a canon divergence AU where Ford:

1. dismantles the portal

2. calls Stan to ask him to come, and warns him to watch out for people with yellow eyes.

(Also on AO3, as a gift for @fordanoia!)

It didn’t take long for the mild New Mexico winter to vanish and snow to coat the roads, forcing Stan to slow down. Which was probably what he deserved for deciding to drive through freaking Colorado instead of Arizona, but the route had looked just a little shorter that way, and he didn’t want to try and take any shortcuts on local roads and risk getting lost.

And, well, excuse him for not thinking too clearly when his twin brother was four states away and rambling about people with glowing yellow eyes that were out to get both of them.

Stan still didn’t know what to think of that phone call. How the hell were you supposed to respond to your estranged twin calling you, all paranoid and incoherent, and begging you drive hundreds of miles to meet them?

Stan just knew that if he’d said no, or just pretended it hadn’t happened, he’d never be able to stop worrying. If he left Ford to fend for himself, he’d live in fear of the phone ringing again, this time with a message that his brother had gone missing — or worse.

Probably worse. What had Ford said, that he’d “already been in town for too long?” That Stan couldn’t trust anyone? Was Ford even interacting with any living, normal people who might notice he was missing and report it?

So really, Stan thought grimly, if they were going to call me about something happening to him, it would be because they found a body.

And that was when it sunk in — how little Stan really knew his twin, how little he could wrap his mind around the idea of the brother he knew getting murdered in some crazy hick town in Oregon.

Gone was the boy who was only paranoid about elaborate, distant government cover-ups of UFO crashes, conspiracies that would never make him, or any normal person, worry for their own safety. Gone was the nerdy kid who looked at mystery and secrets and creepy glowing eyes as an adventure, as something to study. Gone was the boy who was fascinated with the weird — replaced by the unstable man who feared it.

Though still there, for sure, was the genius whose head was always in the clouds, thinking about things most people couldn’t even begin to understand while missing so many warning signs, so many dangers. It was the brother who had always kept him safe that had left.

Without really meaning to, Stan pushed his foot down on the accelerator, desperate to cut down on the length of his trip by even a few minutes — just as he rounded a curve.

The car began to skid, the brake coming down but failing to accomplish anything besides making a horrible noise that sent Stan into a state of shock.

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck —”

Stan had skidded plenty of times before, usually while fleeing from people who were thankfully several hundred feet behind him and skidding even worse than he was, and he’d never gone off the road — at least, not so far off that he couldn’t drive right back on and make his escape, dented doors and misaligned wheels be damned.

But those times had been different, because he’d concentrating as hard as he could on the drive, not lost in thought. He’d been expecting the skid those times, knowing it was a risk he was taking for going as fast as he was, not daydreaming about how in a way he’d abandoned the person that he’d always blamed for abandoning him.

This time, Stan hadn’t been prepared for the car to start swerving through the dark, and he jerked the wheel and slammed the brakes on instinct, too panicked to think about what would have the best chance at getting him out of the skid. He barely even processed that he was driving with only one functional headlight, meaning he could easily fly off the edge of a cliff, and not even realize until he was already falling to his death —

Somehow, some combination of instinct and dumb luck eventually guided the car to a stop, and for a moment, Stan just put it in park and sat still, heart pounding.

He didn’t think he’d hit anything, and if he had hit something without noticing it, it probably hadn’t been big enough to cause any damage. But he easily could have died — there could have been another car on the road, he could have gone off a cliff, he could have had a fucking heart attack — and then what would have happened to Ford?

He’d probably just think I betrayed him again, Stan realized, and while he didn’t want to believe it — wanted to believe Ford would worry for him instead — he knew it was probably true.

He got out and checked the car over. It took a lot longer than it should have, even though he wasn’t very thorough, because he’d never bothered to buy a flashlight to keep in his car and had to resort to using his lighter to see instead. At least the warm orange flame kept his fingers from going numb.

Once he was satisfied, which was probably after about three minutes but felt like about thirty, he got back into the car, and cautiously pulled off the shoulder and onto the road. Everything seemed to be working fine, no misaligned wheels or broken brakes.

“Don’t worry, Stanford,” he whispered. “I’m coming.”

***

The title is mostly about Stan preparing to reunite with Ford, but also partly about how WWTD may be ending very soon, and oh man, I am not prepared. I'm hoping Stan will be able to do something to help, because damn, does Ford need help...

Anyways, feedback is appreciated as always!

#gravity falls #whatwouldteslado #wwtd #stanley pines #stanford pines #rosalia writes fic

[minijenn]

Nothing's Changed

In nights like this, Stanley Pines sat alone in the living room as he recounted the events of recent days that have left their mark on him and all associated with him. After 30 long years, he managed to acquire all 3 journals that his estranged twin brother wrote down himself that not only had the info of every paranormal anomaly in Gravity Falls but it also held information about the Crstal Gems and Gemkind. But none of that barely concerned him, he was more focused on the instructions that told him how to restart the portal, the secret device he’s been working on for so long, the very thing he’s lied about this whole time. In one single moment, he felt genuine happiness over the fact that he could bring Stanford back, even if there was a chance that his actions would result in the universe being torn apart, he thought that it would’ve been worth it to see him again…

…But he was wrong.

He wasn’t asking for much really. He didn’t expect the poindexter to just forget everything’s that’s happened between them, it just would’ve been nice for him to express some semblance of gratitude for bringing him back which would be the first step in repairing their broken brotherhood. But nope, instead of a happy reunion, he got socked in the face, Stan didn’t even know Ford could hit that hard since he was never the one known for his brawn, that was more of the former’s thing. Then came Ford completely getting on his case for opening the portal, it was like listening to Rose all over again which fueled his rage. But that rage turned into guilt and regret once he came clean about all the secrets he’s kept from Dipper, Mabel, Steven, and….Amethyst. He could care less about the wild accusations thrown at him by Pearl, it hurt him to see the look of disappointment from the only other person he would call friend, Dipper said that he understood but the old conman could tell his nephew’s trust in him was shaken, and he expected nothing less.

Not even watching The Duchess Approves could ease his soul, all that he’s done in the past; lying to his family, faking his death, taking such risks, all to bring his brother back, and this is all he had to show for it.

The kids were sleeping and Ford was no doubt down in the hidden bunker, doing some nerd thing, not caring about his own flesh and blood’s inner turmoil. Well he wasn’t having any of that, Stan got up and made his way to the gift shop where the vending machine was, where he typed in the code to the hidden passage. It was surreal, he would go down to turn on the portal, but this was a whole different intent. Once he took the elevator down, he made it to what was left of the portal room, there was some tarp hiding that machine, but his main focus was the scientist at work.

“Ford.” he spoke out, getting his twin’s attention.

The six-fingered scholar’s brow furrowed, showing his discomfort at seeing him. “Stanley, what are you doing here?”

His tone was cold and apathetic, but Stan continued. “Came to see what you were doing down here.”

“If you must know, I’m trying to see if there was any ill effects that resulted from you staring up the portal.” Ford replied, getting back to his work.

The conman crossed his arms, skeptically. “Ah, you’re paranoid, Sixer. As far as we know, you are the only thing that came out of that thing.”

“That we know of.” Ford countered. “I’ve seen a lot of things in the other side of the multiverse, dangerous things.” he clarified with a grave tone. “I can tell you right now that if even one of them ever made it to our world, the disastrous effects would be enormous.”

Stan rolled his eyes. “Still think it’s nothing to worry about.”

That little comment made Ford remark with a bitter tone. “Of course you would.”

Stan may be old, but his hearing aid served him well. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he demanded.

“Oh nothing.” Ford shrugged with a faux-relaxed manner. “It’s just no surprise that you wouldn’t be so concerned with the repercussions of your actions, and heaven forbid you trying to fix them.”

“My actions?!” Stan repeated with a scowl. “How long are you gonna keep giving me nothing but crap over doing the one thing that brought you back home?!”

“Maybe when you realize exactly how much you had put our entire universe at risk!” Ford snapped back, standing up. “Why else did you think I included warnings to not activate it in my journals?! Everything around us could’ve been wiped out before we could even blink!”

“But it didn’t!” Stan pointed out, gesturing to himself and the other. “Look at us, we’re still kicking, still acting like when we were 5 abd fighting over the remote with Shermie!”

“But it easily could have, that’s what you refuse to comprehend!” Ford ran a hand through his grey hair. “Did you even think about how much of a danger it posed to Dipper and Mabel, along with Steven and the Gems? They were right there when the portal acted, had things gone differently, their fates would’ve been on your hands! Did you care more about reaching your vain ambition than their safety?!”

Okay, that was a low blow, but he was right. Stan clenched his fists as he thought about what could’ve happened to the kids and the gems, they could’ve gotten sucked in like Ford….or worse….. “Damn.” he whispered.

“Then again, this is you we’re talking about.” Ford threw his arms up. “Besides being a lying cheapskate who scams people out of their hard earned monetary objects, you’re also an impulsive knucklehead who jumps into things without thinking of the consequences, just like-”

“Like what, that damn stuffy college?!” Stan cut him off. “You still gonna whine about that?!”

“Only to prove my point.” Ford retorted. “To give you an example on how your brash attitude makes trouble for everyone else. If only Rose got to you.” he shook his head with a somber expression as remembering his departed friend brought him sadness.

“Oh here we go again with how great Rose was!” Stan bellowed. “You know you say that she was such a great friend to you, but what friend would be okay with not even putting in the effort in saving your life! Here’s a fun little tidbit, ol’ Pinkie tried stopping me from turning that machine of yours back on, even when she knew that it was the only way to save you!”

“Good!”

Stan blinked twice as he tried to process what his brother just said. “Wait, what?”

“It’s good that Rose tried to stop you!” Ford clarified. “It showed that she had more common sense than you ever did, I have no doubt that she wanted to save me but knew that using the portal to do so was out of the question, you should’ve listened, it would’ve saved everyone from the trouble.”

Stan was angry before, now he was furious. “You’re telling me you would’ve liked being trapped in whatever hell you were in than to come home?!”

“If it meant safeguarding the universe, then I was prepared to make that sacrifice.” Ford said with an affirmed look. “Rose made the same choice by deciding not to tell you where the 3rd journal was, even if it meant never seeing me again. You didn’t understand back then and I don’t expect you to do so now, but there are some things that are better left closed off from us.” his mind briefly flashed back to a single eye. “Instead of doing the logical thing, you just went with your instincts which always spelled disaster, like the screw up you’ve always been.”

Stan couldn’t believe it, even when he was informed that even Rose, his so-called close friend wasn’t willing to open the portal, Ford still chose her over his own brother. And that last remark, the thing many people have called him, his father included, that was the last straw. “You know what? Fine!” he turned around and went to the exit. “If I’m such a burden to you, then maybe I should just leave you alone!”

As he watched his brother leave, Ford couldn’t help but think he may have gone a little too far…maybe he should apologize…..no, there were more important things to do.

Stan went back up and stormed into his office where he threw his desk over with a hell, he thrashed things around, breaking many stuff into pieces and once he was finished, the old man sat down and looked at his reflection in the mirror. “Nothing’s changed…..” he whispered as tears threaten to drop. He was expecting things to be different, but no, it’s the same as it was before: he was still the screw up, he and Ford still had issues and people he knew thought little of him….

Nothing’s changed at all.

#universe falls #sumbission #submission #d-damn.... #that stan twins angst tho #its hella good #i feel like the angst between these two is something none of us ever really focus on #but this was beautifully done great job! #uf fan fics

[calciseptinefic]

stay (it doesn’t have to hurt)

Gravity Falls || Stanford Pines/Stanley Pines || Part One notes: Written for Summer of Stancest. All my love to Blue, who organized this event, gave me encouragement, and was over-all an amazing human being. ♥ ¶ also available on AO3 warnings: mentions of blood and poverty as a theme

.

The motel television has nine channels and, as he has every day since he arrived in New Mexico, Stan spends his day mindlessly switching back and forth between them. Images shift. Noise fluctuates. It helps him ignore the gnaw of hunger in his belly and the squeeze of anxiety around his lungs. There is no remote. Any time a program becomes unbearable, Stan has to get up and manually change the station.

It does little to ease the restlessness in his stagnant bones.

Eventually—when the heat of the day dissipates into evening, and the setting sun illuminates Stan's room in red—Stan gives up the distraction. He switches the television off and plops back down on the sagging edge of his mattress.

Stares at the matted shag carpet.

Runs a hand over his uncombed, sweat-damp hair.

Sighs softly and—

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Stan's head jerks up. His heart begins to race.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Stan can only think of two people who would visit him at this hour. The first is the owner of the motel, a skeletal man with beady eyes and a bald head. The second is Rico, a man from whom Stan unwisely borrowed money.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

In the sinking pit of his stomach, Stan knows it must be Rico. The motel owner already came by that morning, asking after overdue rent and threatening to get the police involved. All Stan had was a wrinkled five dollar bill, which he handed over; the other man sneered at the last of Stan's money and spat tobacco on the concrete near Stan's feet.

"Ain't worth the phone call," he said before he stalked off.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

"Just give me a few more days, Rico!" Stan shouts as he grabs the baseball bat lying next to his bed. He immediately chokes up on the wooden handle, his knuckles white and bloodless. "I'll pay your goons back, I swear!"

Stan has said the same thing for the past three months. He was lucky, last time, to be sent home with nothing more than a pair of black eyes and a five thousand dollar deadline. He knows he won't be shown the same generosity this time around, but if Rico and his lackeys are expecting him to go down without a fight, they are in for a very rude awakening.

A second passes.

Two.

Yet instead of the telltale sound of the door being kicked in, there is the simple, metallic whisper of the mail slot. A single piece of cardstock falls to the floor. It seems innocuous, but Stan has been on the wrong side of business long enough to know that a bullet may follow.

A minute passes.

Two.

With the bat clutched in one hand, Stan gets up and creeps towards the door. He tries to keep his footsteps silent and his breathing even, but his movements seem thunderously loud in the still quiet of the room. Slowly… slowly… slowly he bends, pinches the postcard between his fingers, and—

swiftly and without finesse—

Stan sprints back to the safety of his unmade bed.

When nothing continues to happen, Stan inhales deeply and lets go of the tension in his shoulders. Then he looks at the postcard. The front is a generic picture of a forest, coniferous and verdant, complete with a perfect blue sky and a waterfall. The center of the card is dominated by a bold font that entreats:

VISIT SCENIC GRAVITY FALLS OREGON

Stan raises an eyebrow. He's been to all forty-eight contiguous states, seven Canadian provinces, and every country between Mexico and Columbia, but he's never heard of a place called Gravity Falls. It's probably some small, backwater podunk, he deduces before he flips it over. Who the hell—

PLEASE COME!!!, the postcard reads

- FORD, the postcard is signed.

A storm of emotions travels through Stan at the sight of those three words, hastily written and underscored thrice. Rage is the easiest to recognize because of course Ford contacts him when he's in trouble. It was just like Ford to turn to Stan and expose his vulnerability when the going got tough; Stan could never say no to Ford's big blue eyes—or, in this case, his tremulous scrawl—and Ford knew it. He knew that Stan wouldn't be able to ignore a such a summons. Unconsciously or not, Ford was using the fact of Stan's loyalty to his advantage.

"Fuckin' typical," Stan spits. The postcard strains in his hands and, for a moment, Stan contemplates ripping the damn paper in half.

He doesn't.

Instead, Stan's anger dims, his grip on the postcard loosens, and worry edges in. For such a smart guy, Ford could sometimes be an unbelievable idiot, frequently letting his curiosity overrule his common sense. He was never incompetent nor was he liable to do something he didn't want to, either, so ff he needs help, and is willing to ask Stan after ten years of silence, then he's probably way in over his head.

Goddamn, Stan thinks as he reads the plea again. Ten fuckin' years.

This is sorrow. It is a heavy thing, bone-deep and pervasive, and unlike his other feelings, Stan always carries it with him. Part of it is due to the unexpected turn his life took—Stan never planned on being estranged and homeless—but a majority of it comes from losing the one thing he always thought he'd have.

The other half of him.

His brother.

Ford.

Stan exhales shakily. Rubs the damp off his skin with his callused fingertips. Looks down at the card in his hand for the thousandth time since he picked it up and traces the lines with his eyes.

P-L-E-A-S-E-C-O-M-E-!-!-! -F-O-R-D

The last thing Stan feels that night is resignation.

.

In the morning twilight, when the desert sky is a wash of pale rose and gray, Stan leaves Dead End Flats with a single suitcase full of clothes and a wooden baseball bat. Dust kicks up behind the wheels of the El Diablo, billowing up behind him like clouds. He grits his teeth at the obviousness.

An hour passes.

Stan drives with his heart in his throat. He constantly checks his rearview mirror to see if he's being followed. He is less concerned about skipping his dues on the motel owner and more concerned about Rico and his network of sour-faced lackeys.

Another hours passes.

The sun rises high enough over the horizon to turn everything yellow and brown.

Three hours later, suburbs begin to bloom in the red sand. Houses spread inward, becoming denser and denser until they rise into the city of Albuquerque. Gaudy skyscrapers made of steel and glass glitter like diamonds amid the tired landscape. Stan would be impressed if he hadn't learned to hate cities after spending a long winter dodging cops in Columbus, Ohio.

Albuquerque fades quickly.

The desert looms.

San Ysidro. La Jara. Counselor. Nageezi. Farmington.

As he nears the border between New Mexico and Arizona, Stan keeps an eye out for a medium-sized town with a gas station slash diner. He finds one right out of Shiprock, pulls in, and fills his tank among a slew of vacationing families and grizzled truckers. He brings his enormous, dog-eared road map into the diner with him, and grins when he's seated at a booth instead of the counter.

"A pot of coffee," he tells his waitress, a woman several years his senior. Her dark hair is pulled into a fraying bun and there is a huge ketchup stain along her sleeve. She keeps glancing at the toddler two booths down, a small monster who is smearing mac-n-cheese across the table. "And the number seven, and a cherry pie milkshake."

When Stan gets his double bacon burger, fries, and shake, he devours it. He hasn't eaten in nearly three days and the uncomfortable bloat of fullness is a welcome change to the scratch of emptiness.

"Check?" the waitress asks when she comes to collect his plate.

"More coffee, please," Stan replies, gesturing to the road map opened in front of him. "Need to decide where to go next."

Her returning nod is harried and her eyes remain on the toddler. The unruly child has recently graduated from wiping his food on the table to throwing handfuls on the floor and giggling.

It doesn't take Stan long to map out the next leg of his journey. The quickest route to Oregon is to take U.S. Route 191 through Utah, but in order reach said route, Stan needs to either continue west into Arizona or head north into Colorado. The problem arises from the fact that Stan has outstanding arrest warrants in both states. The Arizona detour is shorter, but the charges—

Two booths down, the waitress tries to tell the toddler's parents to control their son's behavior. The father does not take this well and begins to shout.

That's my cue, Stan thinks.

And as the rest of the diner turns to watch the waitress and the father get into a screaming match about appropriate child care, Stan drains the last of his coffee, rolls up his travel atlas, and walks out the front door without spending a dime.

.

Stan heads west into Arizona and spends fifty uncomfortable minutes on Route 64. He passes Teec Nos Pos then turns north at Red Mesa. By the time he crosses the Utah border, he has seen a grand total of seven other cars.

Bluff. Monticello. Moab. Price.

Utah is made of the same red-brown dirt and pale green scrub that is present in New Mexico, and after twelve hours on the road, Stan isn't paying as much attention to the road as he should be. This is why he panics when a mule deer appears suddenly in front of him; he inhales sharply, slams on the breaks, and knocks his nose hard against the leather steering wheel.

"Shit!" Stan curses loudly, clutching his face. Unhurt, the deer prances off. "Shit—fuck—ow, ow, ow!"

Blood leaks warm onto Stan's hand as he pulls over onto the gravel shoulder and parks. He reaches blindly into the back seat, grabs the first thing that feels like a t-shirt, and waits for the bleeding to stop. It takes several minutes. The numbing flush of adrenaline wears off before Stan pulls the worn cotton away.

"Goddamnit," Stan curses when he sees that he managed to grab his last good button down. Blood blooms vivid across a stretch of pale blue, like the desert sun setting west on the winter horizon, and not all of it was captured. Stan's hand is smeared pink and huge drops fell on his t-shirt, where his belly swells fat beneath the fabric. "God fuckin' damn it."

Stan's only stroke of luck is that his nose is not broken. It's tender, so much so that he hisses as he gingerly taps the bridge, but he knows this from vast experience that the bone is intact.

Once Stan cleans as much of his blood up as he can, he gets out of the car and pulls his shirt over his head. It is colder than he expects. The chill hits him hard and his teeth immediately begin to chatter. It's pathetic for a man who was New Jersey born and bred, but Stan has spent the last four years in the deep south and beyond; even in the middle of winter, it was an easy fifty degrees in New Mexico.

Utah is much colder.

Stan quickly stashes his bloodied shirts in the trunk, then grabs his suitcase out of the backseat. There is nothing warm inside. Stan curses as he grabs his least stained article of clothing, a once white shirt that's gray with age and yellow under the pits. It smells like aged leather and stale sweat. Unpleasant. He pulls it over his head. Ignores the stench. Gets back in the El Diablo and cranks up the heat. Stan shivers. It is only going to get colder the further north he goes and he doesn't have a coat, or gloves, or a hat.

Or money.

He looks up at the picture of Ford he keeps above him. Ford smiles so hard it is nearly a grimace and Stan beams. Stan remembers how Ford felt tucked against his side, warm and pliant, both when the picture was taken and later that night when Ford crept into the bottom bunk.

Stan sighs.

"The things I do for you, Sixer," he mutters, and gets back on the road.

.

Colton. Soldier Summit. Tucker.

Mapleton. Springville.

Provo. Orem. Pleasant Grove.

Salt Lake City.

Stan stops as at every gas station he sees. His tank is running towards low, but he never fuels up. Instead, he scrounges for fallen change: for pennies turned black, for scratched nickels, for thin dimes worn flat, for rare and defaced quarters. He hates the pitying looks he gets when he scavenges and ignores them the best he can, hunched against the deepening cold.

Woods Cross. Bountiful. Centerville.

Another Farmington.

Kaysville. Layton. Clearfield. Roy.

Stan's pockets are full and the El Diablo is empty when he pulls into the parking lot of a darkened thrift store. It's midnight. His eyes itch. He's hungry. He's thirsty. He's cold. He grabs the remaining clothes out of his suitcase and piles them atop his body in an attempt to shield himself from the night. He thinks, This ain't got nothin' on Ohio, and pushes his seat back as far as it will go.

Closes his eyes.

And sleeps fitfully till the morning sun breaks white and weak over the pavement.

.

Stan has been to hundreds of thrift shops in the past ten years and he has never understood how they can all smell the same. Like a pair of old shoes and an abandoned house and musty clothes, faint and all at once, familiarity edged with disquiet.

He hates it.

Walking through the racks, Stan searches for the heaviest coat he can find. The best options are long gone, however, picked out before winter could reach its brutal peak, and Stan ends up with three hangers. The first is a heavy leather bomber with no visible tears and a soft collar; the second is a wool peacoat that falls to his knees; and the third is a red parka lined with synthetic fur.

Stan tries the peacoat on first. It's a size too small, unable to stretch over his shoulders and the thickness of his waist, and the fabric smells like spoiled milk. Stan wrinkles his nose as he takes it off and puts it back on the hanger. The peacoat is a definite no.

Next, Stan tries on the leather jacket. It fits well. Really well. So well that Stan takes a peek at himself in the dingy mirror at the end of the makeshift aisle. He looks big, yes, but in a good way: brawny instead of fat, rugged instead of homeless, nineteen instead of thirty-one. Unfortunately, Stan's vanity cannot give the leather jacket another layer of needed insulation, nor can it lower the price tag that reflects its good condition. So he sighs, takes it off, and ignores the sting of want.

The last coat is Stan's best option. It's heavy, it has a hood, and there aren't any rips or thin patches of fabric. The zipper pulls up smoothly. Indeed, the only detriments are the motor oil stains on the shoulder, sleeve, and hem, but the faint scent of detergent Stan smells means that the parka was obviously washed before being donated.

Stan hasn't done laundry in months.

Decided, Stan then searches the store for some gloves. He can't find any. Instead, he finds a hat and a matching pair of mittens; all three pieces are dark and smell like damp, but Stan needs them. The El Diablo's heat can be intermittent in the extreme cold—often not working at all—and it hurts Stan's hands to hold a frozen leather steering for long periods of time.

"Better than nothin'," Stan tells himself before he scoops up the hat and mittens and heads up to the front of the store. He goes to the only cashier working, a reedy teenage boy with a thin face, a thin mouth, and a thin mustache. Skinny doesn't greet him, merely begins to punch in the prices after Stan sets his stuff down.

"Seven fifty," he intones when he's finished bundling everything into a plastic shopper.

Stan digs in his pockets. Dumps all his dirty change on the counter. Skinny exhales through his nose in irritation at the small pile, but says nothing as he sorts the coins and adds them to his till: quarters first, then dimes, then nickels, then pennies.

"You owe forty-three cents," Skinny says.

Stan is too tired to argue. Too tired to be sarcastic. He just shrugs and says, "S'all I got, kiddo."

For the first time since Stan walked up, the teenager lifts his gaze from the counter and looks at Stan. Stan has no illusions about what the kid sees. He's a fat, middle-aged man with an uncombed mullet, bags under his eyes, and a gross t-shirt. Skinny probably sees someone like Stan every time he works. Sees the symptoms of poverty—the weary slump, the flat eyes, the resignation—

Skinny closes the drawer and hands Stan his purchases.

"Have a good day," Skinny says.

"Yeah," Stan gruffs. "You too."

.

Stan dons his new coat in the parking lot. Tosses the hat and mittens onto the passenger seat. Starts the El Diablo and freezes when it takes a moment for the engine to respond. Thanks a god he never believed in when a familiar rumble fills his ears.

"Halfway there," Stan tells the dashboard. "Just one more day."

The fuel gauge sits dangerously low until Stan can find a small, slow gas station at the edge of town. The attendant manning the till inside looks up and waves. Stan returns the gesture with a smile before he fills his tank.

Stan looks up. The attendant waves again. Stan smiles again even as unease begins to prickle beneath his skin. He needs the attendant to be distracted so he can drive away without the police being called or his license plate number being taken down. Thankfully, most people are easily bored, and Stan only needs to spend a few minutes cleaning out his car for the attendant's attention to turn elsewhere.

Ha! Stan crows silently as he slips into his car. Gotcha!

And a minute later, when the attendant looks up from her big book of crosswords, the only thing left outside will be a bin full of garbage.

.

Willard. Brigham City. Tremonton.

The earth turns tan. Naked aspens and thin pines sprout out of the ground between knee-high shrubs. Little towns with names like Blue Creek and Snowville pop up and disappear faster than Stan can blink.

Less than two hours after Stan has left Ogden, he crosses the border into Idaho.

Juniper. Sublett. Cotterel. Burley.

By the time Stan hits Twin Falls, the temperate drops below freezing.

King Hill. Chalk Cut.

Mountain Home.

Mayfield.

By the time Stan hits Boise, he sees snow for the first time in years. The heat of the desert has softened his remembrance of it, made him forget how deceiving it was, how pervasive. White flakes falls from an unchanging gray sky and build on the black pavement of western-winding interstate. He skids twice on unseen ice and nearly ends up in a ditch before he remembers to mind his lead foot.

Nampa. Caldwell.

Then a green sign says in white: Welcome to Oregon.

.

Vale.

The towns begin to shrink—the towns begin to s t r e t c h—

Harper.

The towns begin to hide behind the boughs of dense conifers—to peek through the skeletal branches of sleeping deciduous trees—

Juntura.

The towns begin to whisper secrets in the stillness—

.

WELCOME TO GRAVITY FALLS

.

part two

.

#fandom: gravity falls #pairing: stanford pines/stanley pines #rated: e #stancest

[capricious-passions-blog]

By Word Count

Words, words, words.

moosesmittens

A Grim Night

Yes

688

1

I could care less how short this is. It’s that Grim dog. I’m so glad this was written. Any and all ‘Grim’ fics about Stanley and this dog are blessings in my eyes.

bananabog

Balm

Yes

1,073

1

A one-shot that wasn’t meant to be more unfortunately, but has a very interesting premise about Bill not being gone from Stan’s head.

scribefindegil

Nomenclature

Yes

1,133

1

Haha! - No, I’m sorry. This one. This one is great. Portal Ford.

anonymousAlchemist

our past ghosts always haunting

Yes

1,347

1

Stanley never regains his memories. And it’s okay.

impish_nature

Sleight of Hand

Yes

1,638

1

Oh my gosh - MagicStanley! It’s beautiful.

Neelh

Homologous

Yes

1,642

1

HA! I was wondering what ‘homologous’ even means. And then I saw the author’s note. Read my mind.

Reread it. I have no words. Monster. Angel. Blessing. Curse. How shall I describe this author?

HowAboutThatSnapback

Death Omen, Shmeath Omen

Yes

1,649

1

Just the title. Just the title on it’s own is enough. THAT TITLE.

LogicalBookThief

Stan Protecting his Kids

No -

First Posted

2015-10-29

Last updated

6 Mar 2016

1,670

2 works

First one is Soos’s dad. The second is a tourist and Wendy. I actually thought the Soos and the dad bit was interesting. I never would have thought about it, but yeah. That could go down like that.

Kalajorn (Mortsyn)

The Black Dog

Yes

1,763

1

This one has Stanley befriending the grim because of an accident. It skirts the depressing and jumps into the Stanley is amazing.

impish_nature

Silent Plea

Yes

2,070

1

BlindFaith Au. Stanley helps Stanford with cave flashbacks.

hapful

out

Yes

2,587

1

Amnesia Stanley. Andrew - ANDREW - *he thinks he’s andrew … * I can’t -

Tell_Me_Tales

Math is Money

No?

First Posted

2016-10-22

Last updated

28 Nov 2016

2,622

2

As I recall - this one was actually kind of adorable. Right? I don’t know why it’s marked unfinished unless the Tell_Me_Tales had more in mind. Otherwise it feels like a pretty cohesive pair of one-shots. And Filbrick is … normal.

molossiamerica

2 AM

Yes

3,062

1

In relation to the title. One word. Relatable. But other than that - these two. I tell ya. Sea adventures.

impish_nature

Signs of a Well Lived Life

Yes

3,276

1

JOML AU @notllorstel

More Grim Au. I think they actually die in this one. Quote on Quote “Bittersweet and stuff”

eltigre221

Gravity Falls: Aspects of Stanley

Yes

3,321

1

500 Fords Au. In a hall of Fords, Stanley splits himself into parts of his personality. And Ford has to put that back together.

The_Lionheart

Missing

Yes

4,103

1

How Stan has dentures. A basic recap of when and where he lost most of his teeth WITH CRIPPLING FEELS.

MaryPSue

Now You See

Yes

4,158

1

Stanford never feels like he has to ask for Stanley’s help to come to gravity falls. You can probably guess how well that goes. Cause he finishes the portal but how to keep the world from ending?

thesnadger

It’s A Great Idea (Who Are You To Judge?)

Yes

4,295

1

Relativity Falls. Grauntie Mabel and Grunkle Stan compare lives over drinks. Not the best idea.

impish_nature

Blind Rage

Yes

4,743

1

BlindFaith Au. Stanford goes off on some midnight attackers and Stanley isn’t handling heat of fire too well.

WDW

Estranged, Lost, Found

Yes

5,047

2

This exists. And that is enough. I have no idea how this could have been thought up, but … I rather thought it was okay. You know. Once you get over the Stanley feels. What is it with this man. And my poor heart.

thesnadger

Things You Can’t Take Back

Yes

5,058

1

Stanley in the Colombian forest. But why is Stanford there? Dun, Dun, DUUUN. But no, actually - the feels.

LogicalBookThief

One and a Half Stans Au

Yes

5,092

2 works

De-aged Stanley

impish_nature

Seeing is Believing

Yes

5,136

1

BlindFaith Au. Stanley regains some of his sight

StoneSabre

So the Ocean Soothes Our Scars

No -

First Posted

2016-10-20

Last updated

27 Nov 2016

5,508

2 works

Grunkle Adventures at sea

fex_libris

Darkened Light, Starless Night

No -

First Posted

2016-10-03

Last updated

12 Dec 2016

5,531

2

BlindFaith Au. They get out of the cave, but things aren’t peachy.

Aaronna

With the Help of a Brother

Yes

5,638

3

Amnesiac Stanley. They get to the boat. Sad Ford. With a happy ending.

LogicalBookThief

The Devil You Know

Yes

5,677

2

Possession. Mystery trio. Ford gets possessed before he realizes that’s not a good thing. And Stanley … obviously gets caught in the crosshairs.

Keleficent

Trust Me

Yes

6,528

6

It …

Well anyways. Stan falls into the portal and … just … BADness ensues. Ford gets him out, but … so yeah

Tell_Me_Tales

A Girl Named Carla

Yes

6,569

2

Carla McCorkle meets Stanford and it’s awkward, and funny, and adorable.

impish_nature

Finding the Right Frequency

Yes

6,885

1

Ford, and that radio! Talking over the air! Him and Stanley! It hits the spot.

Nicnac

Five Years Older

No -

First Posted

2016-11-01

Last updated

10 Jan 2017

7,659

3

27 year old Mabel going into the past and finding Mullet Stan. Come on guys. This one is almost mandatory viewing.

Nicnac

Weep Not for the Memories

Yes

7,718

1

Scrapbook doesn’t work. Amnesia Stanley.

TheLazyBAMF (TheGuardian219)

Fixing a Mistake

No -

First Posted

2015-12-13

Last updated

7 Nov 2016

8,334

7

Stanley uses a time wish to go back in time and relive his life so he doesn’t ruin Stanford’s. So … he’s in his kid body with his grumpy grandpa mind, and kid Ford wants to play all the time, but is smart enough to see something’s up. How could you not want this?

SilveryBeing

Key Moments

Yes

8,913

1

Stanford looking into different realities. Seeing the consequences of various actions over the course of his life. Post Weirdmeggedon. It’s good, but also full of Stanford hate propaganda NOPE THAT IS A LIE. Why am I lying like this?

impish_nature

A Lot More Lost

Yes

9,620

1

Feral Ford Au. Stanley Amnesia.

MiniatureGlitterSoul

Searching For Stanford Pines

No -

First Posted

2016-04-17

Last updated

7 Jun 2016

9,805

6

Portal Ford.

thesnadger

Summer’s Over

Yes

10,604

3 works

I’m - no THEY’RE trying to kill you. And I quote “Making Ford Feel Guilty For Fun And Profit; Actually There's No Profit; And No Fun; only pain”

LogicalBookThief

A Pound of Flesh

Yes

10,918

4

I remember this mostly for the Clairvoyant. Post Weirdmeggedon boat adventures.

The_Lionheart

The People That We Always Hoped We Would Be

Yes

11,546

1

Christmas Carol AU where everyone comes back into the past to get Stanford to reconcile with Stanley. Oh my gosh. THIS ONE. That one scene. WITH THE GUN.

Beleriandings

A Tale Of Three Stans

Yes

12,413

1

They’re in iceland. Stanley and Stanford get separated. Until Stanley runs into another portal Ford. This is a really nice read. Short, but not too short. In a fun setting, running around doing interesting stuff. Police get involved to some degree. Otherwise it wouldn’t be Stanley and Stanford.

Nicnac

Lost and Found

Yes

12,687

2 works

Connected to Elementary Falls. “CanonFord!” lands in Elementary Falls universe. It creates TWO happy endings, so plus.

biteinsane

Wearing the Working Man’s Clothes

No -

First Posted

2016-05-11

Last updated

25 May 2017

15,063

7

So it says Tiny Ford Au, and I was thrown off. I thought - the shrink ray stuff. But it’s kid Ford. And Kid Ford’s mind too. So it’s cute! But also - how can Cipher NOT take advantage of that? A One and a Half Stans, with Ford.

WinchesterWarrenSon

Fractured Fingers

No -

First Posted

2015-12-14

Last updated

25 Aug 2016

15,631

15

I shouldn’t like this one so much, but um … I REALLY like this one. Stanley comes to help Stanford in Gravity Falls.

CCs_World

And You Were Not So Old

No -

First Posted

2017-01-01

Last updated

10 Mar 2017

17,629

7

Stan contracts a serious illness and Ford is obviously extremely upsetted (yes I mean upsetted). Guys, right about now I’m banking on the lack of Major Death tag. Also how is this not longer? It feels longer. Huh.

KuroJanKazu

Reminiscence at Sea

No -

First Posted

2016-04-04

Last updated

29 Sep 2016

17,754

7

Reverse Falls. Stanford ends up in reverse falls in one of his trips through the multiverse. And really learns to like … Will Cipher.

runawaycartoonist

Gravity Falls: It’s Relative!

No -

First Posted

2016-05-04

Last updated

20,587

7

Stanley and Stanford go and visit their Great Auntie Mabel for the summer.

pinesinthewoods

Blind Faith

Yes

21,027

4

Stanley and Stanford both land in the portal. Stanley loses his eyes. Blind Faith Au.

Kalajorn (Mortsyn)

And Then There Were Three

No -

First Posted

2016-04-19

Last updated

25 Jun 2016

21,450

12

Mystery Trio.

Vituperative_cupcakes

The Demolition Log of Stanford F. Pines

Yes

22,280

11

A really amazing, after Dipper and Mabel leave, but before they set sailing sort of random adventures of the Stans. Full of humor, fun, and if I have this right - proper flash-back angst?

orphan_account

The Ghost that Lives in Great Uncle Ford’s Basement

Yes

22,348

7

Stanley - GOES BACK IN TIME, and ends up as a ghost. But I think what’s most important here, is that he’s basically lived twice but looks young. And the ending. It finally makes Canon the better option in a not ‘rip your heart out and feed it to cannibals’ way.

highwayKing

Stannapped

Yes

22,508

11

The one where Stan’s old buddies catch up with him, shove him in a trunk again, and Ford has to find him. And he does! Wait … oops, spoiler.

CCs_World

Mabel and Ford for Gravity Falls

No -

First Posted

2016-10-19

Last updated

22,889

12

Ford and Mabel Fluff as they try and save their kidnapped siblings. Apparently. Actually - you know what? I think it updated since I last saw it. I should … probably go read that.

roomapple

Liar To A Liar, For Lies Are His Coin

No -

First Posted

2016-10-19

Last updated

13 Mar 2017

23,456

10

Same Coin theory. Bill is back. Mucking about in Stanley’s head.

impish_nature

Phobos

No -

First Posted

2016-01-03

Last updated

10 Feb 2016

24,721

7

Mystery trio and Stanley has issues from his time on the road. It is unfortunate that it is incomplete.

eosrealis (Aurorealis)

Cooperation is Mandatory

No -

First Posted

2015-10-09

Last updated

6 Nov 2015

26,024

6

Stanley is a werewolf. And yet outcast from all other werewolves - of course he couldn’t just get with the program, even as a wolf! And so Ford leaves Gravity Falls to study the phenomenon.

impish_nature

Demonic Conman

Yes

26,385

8

Reverse One of Us Au. Stanley becomes the demon for Bill Cipher. What an exhausting ride. And the ending. Pretty much low-grade torture for the soul. As I recall, wasn’t there an alternate ending to this too?

videogamelover99

A Different Form a Different Time

Yes and No

First Posted

2016-12-23

Last updated

16 Apr 2017

26,407

6 works

Based on Flat Dreams and Pengychan’s and doodledrawsthings probably ideas and drawings. Bill is stuck as a human and is mostly annoyed.

the_subpar_ghost

Gravity Falls Timestuck AU

Yes

26,761

11

Mabel trapped in the past and Stanley has to help her get back. Mostly through finding Stanford, and we all know how that goes down.

Tell_Me_Tales

D-23:Guardian

No -

First Posted

2016-08-15

Last updated

23 May 2017

28,242

20

Carla McCorkle. Tell_Me_Tales adds a great addition of her as her own mystery trio in some of their work. Short chapters … that I feel get better as time goes on, but is that just me? Also - Gargoyle Stanley Au, but not monster Au.

azhdarchidaen

In Search of Antidotes

Yes

30,200

11

Historical Au. It’s great. So Stanley goes to help Stanford and it’s all in 1892. Double thumbs up.

The Last Speecher (HeidiMelone)

In Another World

Yes

30,381

14

One shots of Portal Ford. Journal Style.

The_Lionheart

Takin’ Care of Business

No -

First Posted

Last updated

19 Mar 2017

30,663

9

Modern … sort of Au. Where … Stanley goes to help Stanford. But Mabel and Dipper are more like niece and nephew - not great nibings. And … it’s really good. I really like The_Lionheart. They’re a really good writer.

Kazriku

Silent Falls

No -

First Posted

2015-10-01

Last updated

26 Feb 2017

31,078

9

Absolutely no idea, but it’s got one helluva mystery element and it feels like it’s going someplace, but I’ve no idea where.

MaryPSue

Hive

Yes

32,368

2

Note: Have not read. Vaguely skimmed. Looks interesting. [Note to self: read]

Post Canon horror story with casual fluff and happy ending. I think. Wait - how is this in my history if I haven’t read it? *Sigh* I don’t even know anymore.

thesnadger

Axolotl

No -

First Posted

2016-02-18

Last updated

18 Jan 2017

32,458

11

Post Weirdmeggedon and Bill is back. The Stans head over to Gravity Falls from their sea voyage to let family comfort, and maybe find a solution.

Kazriku

My Demons

No -

First Posted

2015-08-16

Last updated

28 Mar 2016

33,672

13

Mystery Twins.

Demonic Possession included. Kazriku also made a lyric video based on the same title and I recommend listening to it. Possibly while reading.

delcatty (Harlecat)

The Thing On the Doorstep

Yes

35,915

12

What is this - lovecraft? ... Ha! I was right. I also don’t know much about lovecraft. But I do, however, know about this. And it’s Stanford getting himself into messes in a 1930’s setting and Stanley trying to help while overcoming Fiddleford’s phobia towards horrors of the eldritch type. The actual thing on the doorstep is … a mixture of a shiver down your spine and ‘bleck.’

Amydiddle

Theory of Relativity

Yes

39,151

21

Relative Falls. Au colliding with Canon. Stanley and Stanford end up in relativity falls on a boat trip. Actually, the kids meeting their older selves - that’s neat.

The Last Speecher (HeidiMelone)

Stanley McGucket

Yes

39,759

14

Stanley MCGUCKET. And that’s just PART ONE.

… wait. Guys. It UPDATED since I last saw it. I have so much to catch up on.

SandyQuinn

There’s an Endless Road

Yes

41,073

8

This one is so great. Who doesn’t love a road trip? With your annoying brother and archenemy? Stanford sure knows how to pick ‘em. Also, this tag - ‘horror that is completely undercut by humour.’ It’s adventure in an almost episodic way, but also not at all, and is just super fun while not simply ‘pure fluff’ in any way shape or form.

Giroshane

Gravity Falls Adventures

Yes. But you kinda wish no. Series is marked incomplete, so maybe?

44,073

3 works

The Adventure with ____

How else to describe? Hurt/Comfort.

Stanley, Stanford, Mabel, and Dipper. Post Weirdmeggedon/in Weirdmeggedon.

Fordanoia

Gotham Falls

No -

First Posted

2016-09-27

Last updated

18 May 2017

45,735

11

Batman, Gravity Falls crossover! What more do you people want?

asbelow

Time Has Changed Me (And Left Me Full Of Doubt)

No -

First Posted

2017-01-18

Last updated

13 May 2017

46,708

8

REALLY GOOD ONE GUYS. Everytime I think about - Stanley. Going through that portal. Coming out. And still not speaking to Ford for another couple of years. Having that kid. Dealing with trauma of having been on the other side of that portal. REALLY GOOD ONE. Major focus on awesome slice of life that just is REALLY GOOD.

Nicnac

Elementary Falls

Yes

48,665

15 works

Stanley and Stanford get an orphaned Dipper and Mabel. A lot of oneshots around this, filled with feels and fluff.

tallykale

A better place, a better time

Yes and No

First Posted

2015-12-02

Last updated

22 Feb 2016

49,002

3 works

Mystery Trio. Stanley and Stanford reunite. Help.

dliriously

Changing Tides and Tribulations

No -

First Posted

2016-06-04

Last updated

23 Jun 2016

49,902

6

Really fantastic Stanley and Stanford post weirdmeggedon on their boat sail away and still deal with nightmares and disillusion and ‘what did Ford get up to in the portal?’ and STUFF!

WDW

A Thousand Natural Shocks

No -

First Posted

2015-10-09

Last updated

3 Aug 2016

53,750

14

Neverhuman AU. As in, ‘Stan Pines Dead’ Stanley actually died in that car crash and made a deal with a demon that wasn’t Bill Cipher and melded and is … no longer … human I guess.

PengyChan

Flat Dreams

Yes

53,940

16

Alright. Full disclosure. This is a really good fic. But … I’ve never understood the whole - ‘it makes Bill Cipher into a redeemable character’ thing. Bill feels well rounded and it gives Bill Cipher good motivations for the show. But … he’s still actually a rather genuinely rude person who does bad stuff with only slightly more understood reasons. If anything it just pulls him from psychopath to misguided. I don’t feel sorry for him, I’m just six times more interested in him as a character. But other than that - Man is this a really great fic.[Note to Self. Edit this description][Edit of the Edit: Ignore me. I know nothing]

Queen_Mab

Ad Astra

No -

First Posted

2016-07-29

Last updated

3 Jun 2017

54,200

11

Mabel falls into the Portal to find a new Grunkle. The selling point would have to be how amazing the portal Mabel bits are. Ford and Mabel. It’s just fantastic at times. And then in rolls the Dipper and Stan bits and everything is up in flames.

MaryPSue

Raising Stakes

No -

First Posted

2015-11-23

Last updated

4 Jun 2017

56,058

19

Vampire Stanley. Enough Said. Also Stanley showing up at his old ‘friend’s’ house when the guy is thinking about how harmless Stan Pines is. He was BEGGING to get his throat ripped out. That scene was so cool.

Sarah1281

A Time Wish

Yes

59,420

18

Stanley goes back in time to stop himself from landing Ford in the portal. He lands as a old mind in a young body and stays level headed as Ford wigs out. And proceeds to relieve the next thirty years.

embulalia

Two Old Men and the Sea

Yes

69,409

26

Boat adventures that head back to Gravity Falls. This one includes werewolves, nightmares, amnesia, seizures, Demonic possession, and torture. All from the tags, because for the life of me this blends in with other fics. I should probably reread this. (I remember the werewolves well enough ...? and obviously liked it ...)

scribefindegil

Fisherman’s Knot

No -

First Posted

2016-03-06

Last updated

27 May 2017

84,545

17

You think it’s over. And then there’s another twenty thousand words if not more. You don’t know how to handle these feelings.

babyblueavenger

Mystery Nerds AU

Yes and No

First Posted

2015-11-26

Last updated

2 Jun 2016

97,460

5 works

Series. It’s the last one that isn’t finished, with a 4 chaptered 46k word count hanging off the side.

WinchesterWarrenSon

Motorbikes and Sailboats

Yes

114,378

3 works

Okay, so if you’ve ever heard of Jimmy Snakes being a jerk and being in cahoots with Stanley in any way shape or form … this was probably where those ideas came from. That and the original Jimmy Snakes character info from the show. This um … it breaks you. If I was going to warn against any of these fics. This is the one I’d seriously warn against. I’m serious. Parts of me wish … that I’d just glanced over this one. I don’t know if I’ll ever recover. You should finish it, bordering on tears if not outright crying. It’s good. Really, REALLY good. Almost too good. I’m warning you DO NOT READ THIS ONE (you’re gonna read it anyways aren’t you, well I tried)

EvilEkat

Versability

Yes

131,274

33

Stanley … strikes it rich, become an even worse person, and then gets the kids when his and Stanford’s names are mixed up.

Overall - Excellent. Very, very Excellent.

DisneyMuse, slytherintbh

The Demon’s Apprentice

Yes ish

149,836

2 major works, plus a drabble and alternate endings

Have I read this? I feel like I have, but I’m not sure. It’s where Dipper becomes Bill Cipher’s apprentice of magic and Ford is just not having it. But … have I read this?

The_Lionheart

One Sword

Yes and No

First Posted

2016-07-31

Last updated

9 May 2017

239,518

9 works

Oh, just lots. Portal adventures. Reimagining of canon episodes. Crossovers. But what I wanna know is how they get away with some of that purple prose stuff? Poetry? Different formats? It’s brilliant. How? Just - how?

#Gravity Falls #Recommendations #Fanfiction #By Word Count #Master Post #my junk