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1984 began with a handshake and a sharp pain in his right eye. Now, with blood smeared across his face and a pen in his shaking hand, Dr. Stanford Pines found himself terribly, horrifically alone. And he was desperate to keep it that way.
The little brass clock on the cabin wall read a bit past 4 AM. Lights on, candles burning, an egg timer ticking in the kitchen just in case, Ford paced to keep his heartrate as far from resting as he could. Documentation being a scientist’s best friend, he had been meticulous in his journal entries on the recent developments that put him in such a state. The trouble was what on earth he would do next. Holding a cloth to his face, he checked again to see if the bleeding had stopped. The ever-growing splotch of sharp red interrupting the delicate orange and brown plaid of the dish towel told him it had not. Shaky, impatient hands fumbled with the sink to rinse the rag off and wash away the crimson streaming down his face.
Something about the sight of the watered-down blood dripping off his six-fingered hands and streaming down the drain tipped his fragile calm over the edge. There were still scabs on his knuckles from earlier. There were still smears of blood on the basement door. He slammed his hands against the countertop and sobbed a wet, ugly frustrated cry. Begging to someone, anyone but his so called “muse”, he shouted through the catch in his throat:
“Why?! How did I end up here, of all places, covered in my own blood and tears? There are so, so many ways I could have stopped this, and I didn’t!”
Holding his face in his hands, he shouted into his palms, spit and breath hot against his skin. “Was this always going to happen? Is it me? Is that why he chose me?! Because I’m the only fool dumb enough to take it this far? To burn everything down just because I thought I was special?!”
Boiling over, he swept his arm across the dining room table, throwing papers and books to the ground. A candle jolted and tipped, splashing wax across the sleeve of his coat before snuffing itself out. Ford stared at it, remembering an exchange with his assistant not long before the house of cards fell.
“Don’t forget what happened to Icarus,” he had warned.
“He didn’t flap hard enough,” Ford had replied.
A feeling swept over Ford. The realization that he wouldn’t have been able to sleep even if he wanted to, after all he’d said and done. To the world, to his colleague… to his brother.
Sinking to the floor, back against the greasy kitchen wallpaper, Dr. Stanford Pines was profoundly alone.
Morning light only shifted the sky to a less ominous shade of grey as Stanford’s yellow-beige coupe pulled into the parking lot. Packed snow frozen into lumps of ice jolted him around in his seat as he made the turn into his usual parking spot. Stepping out, the cold air gnawed at his skin with teeth like needles. He frowned at his parking job, more crooked than he thought.
The snow-capped statue of a plaid-clad lumberjack grinned down at Ford as he walked past and entered the Triple Digits Truck Stop. He flinched at the sound of the bell above the door. Despite a momentary spike of panic, his eyes darted over to the counter. No one paid his entrance any mind. Taking a seat in a thinly cushioned booth that still smelled like stale cigarettes, he dumped a pile of books out of his satchel and onto the table. The waitress making her way around approached with a coffee pot in one hand and somehow three yellow porcelain cups in the other.
“What can I getcha, hun?” she asked.
“Just coffee, please,” Ford grumbled, hunched over and pulling a red marker pen from his coat pocket.
The next three hours and four cups were spent poring over newspaper articles on local history, textbooks on ancient architecture, and new age musings on beings only of the mind. Clues were circled, dead ends crossed out, and useful images torn out and taped elsewhere. The dull headache that’d lingered since the night before started to feel like sandpaper against his brain, and the diner’s fluorescent lights felt unnaturally bright. Thoughts faded out for just a moment as he closed his eyes to ease the pain.
Shocked awake by the jarring sensation of falling only to snap upright, the sound of the lights buzzed in his mind for a few seconds before he truly came to his senses. Strings of gibberish symbols were scrawled across his notes in red. Among the symbols were drips and smears, a few shades darker than the nonsense. He looked down at his hand, then the front of his shirt. It wasn’t ink.
He pulled his glasses off and tucked them away like a shameful secret. Frantically pulling napkins from the holder, tearing the cheap paper to powdery shreds, he balled them up and held them to his eye. There were other people in the diner. He couldn’t let anyone see him. His good eye darted back over his shoulder again and again as he ducked into the bathroom. No one seemed to notice. He wasn’t sure. The feeling of being watched prodded at him. He looked in the mirror. It was horrific. No it wasn’t. He could clean up most of it, and play off the rest as marker ink. He knew how to wash it off at home. He just had to wait for the bleeding to stop. A sound on the other side of the door made him nearly jump out of his skin. He shuttered himself in a stall. Tossing the wad of bloody napkins into the toilet, he bundled a length of toilet paper with shaking hands and pressed it to his face. It would stop soon, he told himself. He had to stay calm and rational. He had to get back to his research. This whole mess was his fault, and it was his job to fix it. He had so much to do, and the first thing on his list was to stop shaking. Even his breath was shuddering. He just had to focus. Focus. FOCUS.
A few minutes later, Stanford left the bathroom, hand over his eye. He finished his cold coffee in one swig, shoveled his papers and books into his bag, dumped a wad of cash on the table, and left without a word, wincing at the sound of the bell.
Thick layers of weighty snow dampened the air outside Dr. Pines’ cabin to an eerie quiet. Inside, however, was a cacophony of synth and electric guitar. Pouring out of the brass horn of the gramophone Ford had bought from the local antique store, the cryptic warbling tones of Danny Elfman filled the living room. Records already played were uncarefully strewn across his warzone of a coffee table: Speaking in Tongues, New Traditionalists, Nothing to Fear… His now ex-assistant once said of his taste in music, “It’s like you’re trying to be weird on purpose.” Ford remembered smiling at such an accusation.
Spinning steadily was his most recent acquisition, Good For Your Soul by Oingo Boingo. Ford’s affinity for new wave nonsense had paid off in that it was certainly hard to fall asleep to. But his limit was being pushed. He’d gone 54 hours without slipping up, without letting his mind be taken. Anxiety gave way to a twitchy sort of mania that ripped any sense of focus away, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how much hung in the balance. His notes and plans from the last hour were unintelligible, and he found himself rereading the same paragraph on pyramid construction six times at least. He’d found a paper on sleep deprivation. The record was 11 days and 25 minutes. He could keep going, he told himself. He just needed to stare at the ceiling for a bit. He slumped back in his chair, glaring at the wood panels above his head with furrowed brows. He blinked. His eyes stayed closed a bit longer than he’d have liked. He strained to keep them open. They started to sting. He had to shut them again, just to stop the pain.
“WAKE UP! WON’T YOU LISTEN TO ME?! WAKE UP! WON’T YOU LISTEN TO ME?! WON’T YOU LISTEN TO ME?!”
Jarring awake, Stanford snapped back to reality, music ringing through his head and shaking his skull like a struck gong. His eyes shot over to the gramophone. “Wake Up (It’s 1984)” filled the dark, cluttered room with shouts and claps before vaulting into a repetitive stream of hectic vibraphone. Hands over his ears, he rushed to turn the volume down. Staring at the vinyl as it spun like a star system, he felt his heart drop. It was playing the B side. He didn’t remember switching it to the B side. His right eye ached with the pulse of his heartbeat.
“No, no, no,” he groaned. He pulled the needle arm up and stuck the record back in its sleeve. “Stop MOCKING me!” he yelled into empty air. He thought he heard a distant laugh, but he didn’t trust his senses anymore. He’d been seeing imaginary spiders for days. Another sound came, clearer and more likely real. A dense thud from the back porch.
The crossbow he would carry on expeditions into the woods was now kept propped next to the coat rack. Loading a bolt, he held it at his side as he carefully cracked open the door. Lying a few feet away was a round lump of light-gray fur next to something red. He leveled the crossbow and looked closer. It was an opossum, slumped on its side with legs splayed out. The pool of red seeping into the snow nearly made Ford sick. The opossum’s head lacked any fur or skin, revealing exposed muscle slick with still-hot blood. The shine of the creature’s glassy black eye sent a chill through his body.
As Ford stood there, trying to catch his breath at the sight of it, he felt his hands start to shake. Spiraling thoughts turned to raw visceral horror as his every instinct screamed that something was wrong.
The opossum twitched, then scrambled to its feet, still alive.
Stumbling back, Stanford pulled the trigger, missing completely as the faceless beast scrambled up a post and let out a screech. Its needle-like teeth flashed with malice. Ford reached to grab another crossbow bolt from the quiver next to the door frame. Staring cold into the animal’s inky eyes, he cocked and loaded the crossbow without looking down. It sensed his intent and jumped aside, running towards the treeline. Ford fired, sticking the bolt directly into its side. It wasn’t fazed, jumping back and forth with a mad cackle before disappearing through the snowy foliage. Ford slammed the door shut, breathing hard. The crossbow fell from his hand, and he clutched his chest, sweat sticking his shirt collar to his neck. He wouldn’t be falling asleep again soon.
Ford glared at the heel of bread, pathetic and crumbling on his plate. The last piece of bread and he’d burned it. He debated whether it was even worth the time to put anything on it before choking it down. He gritted his teeth. “You’re not an animal, Stanford,” he chided himself. “At least pretend it’s a proper meal.” A sticky little smear of raspberry jam got onto his hand as he pried open the jar. His face turned when he looked inside. A little island of green and white mold had bubbled up on the surface of the sickly-sweet red goop.
Ford swore, tossed the jar in the garbage, and grabbed his keys off the counter.
The drive to town put into perspective just how jumpy he’d become. He eyed the trees, waiting for something to leap into the road. The open, grey sky made him feel visible, exposed. The radio wasn’t helping. The 20 minute drive felt like hours.
Pulling back the waxy white paper to take another bite of his sandwich, Ford trotted back towards where he’d parked his car, glancing over his shoulder at every turn. The streets were still slick with patches of ice and grimy, greyed snow. He checked his watch. The sun would set in 18 minutes.
Streetlights had kicked on. Ford moved from light to light, watching the shadows of each alley as he passed. As the brick side of the mattress store came into view, he stopped in his tracks. Painted on the wall was the symbol of an open eye with a slitted pupil, crossed out with a stark crimson X. He studied it for a moment. A stiff unease set in. He’d gotten as far as he had in his research of the unusual by throwing out any belief in coincidence. The familiarity of the eye made his next discovery all the more unnerving. As he turned to continue walking, he found the same symbol drawn on the side of a wide blue mailbox. And the fuel door of the station wagon parked next to him. He turned to face the way he came. On the back of a stop sign. In chalk on the pavement. Spraypainted on the lower corner of a billboard. How had he missed them? When were they put up? He waited for a moment, holding his breath to listen. He was alone on the streets of Gravity Falls. Picking up the pace, he hurried back to his car.
Two days passed. Ford had only slipped up once, sleeping for about 30 minutes. He woke up exactly where he fell asleep. Everything hung on his walls had been flipped upside down. He had no memory of doing this. There was only a nightmare of a massive sandstone pyramid, starting at the size of a softball and slowly growing. It pushed over trees and scraped up soil, until it filled the valley, standing as a lifeless, dense monolith.
After another early morning coffee stop to the Triple Digit, he took the opportunity to visit the library and collect more research materials. People had noticed his state of disarray, stared at him, and whispered. When it looked like a librarian was going to approach him, looking indignant, Ford didn’t take any chances. He left in a hurry.
Toting back his haul of books and articles, he found the crossed-out eye symbol scrawled across the town just as before, watching him from every angle. None of the townspeople seemed to acknowledge them, and he feared how they’d react if he asked. It was getting dark again. Days were still so short.
Walking past an alley, Ford felt something snag his attention from the corner of his eye. He was sure he’d imagined it at first. Huddled together in the dark was a group of cloaked figures. As if they could feel his gaze fall upon them, they all turned at once, snapping to face him. Their faces were covered, hoods bearing the crossed eye. They turned to run.
“It is unseen!” one of the figures yelled into the night.
Clutching his satchel to his chest, Ford ran after them. “No it isn’t, you creeps!” Ford called out. “I can see you just fine!” A few of the figures started to scatter, darting down side streets and slipping away. Ford drew closer to the few still in view. As he was about to lunge, hand outstretched to grab at the back of one’s deep red cloak, they turned to grab and throw a steel garbage can, knocking over three more in the process. Ford stumbled backwards and the figures darted away, leaving him in a cold puddle of mud and melting snow.
He picked himself up, wiping at the grit on the back of his legs with his bare hands. The cold air and wet gravel stung his skin. Another graffiti eye next to an emergency exit door stared down at him. He felt as if it were casting blame on him, tormenting him for what he’d done. Maybe it was right to do so.
The drive home was miserable. His eyes itched with exhaustion. It started snowing again along the way. Ford cranked down his window, letting the cold air hit his face like a slap as he turned the radio up louder and louder. He just had to keep going. He knew he could undo what he’d done if he just didn’t. Fall. Asleep.
Ford’s eyes snapped open just in time to swerve hard away from the guard rails. The tiny yellow reflective stakes along the side of the road glinted in his headlights. He knew they weren’t eyes. He needed something to think about. He knew nocturnal animal’s eyes reflected light because of the tapetum lucidum, a thin layer of reflective tissue at the back of the eye. Racoon eyes reflected yellow. Owls were red. What other animals had he run into during his research… Opossums? He shuddered.
Three pairs of eyes reflecting a hollow pale green appeared on the side of the road as he came around the bend. Ford’s heartbeat quickened against this will. He remembered deer’s eyes reflected green. It was three deer. He gently pressed the brakes, slowing as much as he felt he could afford. They were getting closer to the road, moving in unison. They fell into the beam of his headlights.
It was one deer.
Three faces warped and merged onto one head, with twisting gnarled antlers that grew together from a tangle to two towering points. It stood among the ferns on the side of the road. The face at what could be called the center of the unnatural mass of shining eyes, wet black noses, and malformed, drooling mouths locked its gaze onto him. Time seemed to slow as it turned its head to watch him. It didn’t move to follow, only stared as if keeping a vigil. Ford drove by.
He realized the radio was playing nothing but static. He didn’t know how long it’d been doing that. He turned it off.
63 hours without sleep. A glance at his calculator watch in the light of the neon open sign of the Triple Digits Truck Stop diner showed 5:15 AM. The bell above the door still made his shoulders flinch. He remembered his mother telling him he always looked so nervous before going to school, like he was “wearing his shoulders as earrings”. The waitress watched him slide into his usual booth at the back and headed over with a pot of coffee.
The smell of the sixth cup almost made Ford nauseous, but he finished it like it was his sacred duty. The breakfast plate he’d ordered felt like it was filling his stomach with cement, but he’d been picking at it as best he could. He slumped back and rubbed his eyes under his glasses. Just having the stiff cushion at his back was enough to nearly pull him to sleep. He moved to sit at the counter.
Waiting on an opportunity for another cup of heavy-duty caffeine, Ford propped his head up with his hand. His consciousness threatened to slip every few seconds like it was running up a greased slope. A man with a bushy moustache scooted over a stool to sit next to him. He wore a textbook trucker cap and flannel button up, along with a worried expression.
“You doin’ alright, buddy?”
“Hm?” Ford turned to face the trucker, suddenly aware of the dark circles under his eyes and stubble on his chin. He’d tried to clean up before coming to town this time. Tried…
“Looks like you’re having shutter trouble. I’ve been there, believe me.”
Ford nodded. “I’ve really got to stay awake, but coffee doesn’t seem to do anything but taste like dirt lately.”
The trucker smiled. “Well, you could always pinch yourself. Or pinch someone else… Then they’ll punch you awake.” He thought for a moment. “I suppose you could put a bit of peanut butter on your face and let a dog ride shotgun.” He laughed at his clever proposition.
Ford smiled politely and took off his glasses, rubbing his eyes with both hands, trying to bring himself back to life.
“If you’re desperate, you could give yourself a shock to the system” the trucker continued. “Maybe put peppers in your eyes… Or you could just give up, Sixer.”
Ford snapped to look up from his hands, blinking. Had he slipped again? Had he fallen asleep? What had the trucker called him?
Fear shot through Ford’s body like an injection. Stumbling back and out of his seat, his elbow knocked his thick ceramic plate of half-eaten bacon onto the floor. The deafening crash of its collision with cold linoleum rang through the air. Everyone in the diner turned at once. Ford felt his hands start shaking as he looked into all the strangers’ eyes. Yellow. They all glowed a vicious burning yellow. He backed towards the door. He was surrounded. HE was everywhere. His betrayer, the liar bent on burning down everything he knew, was everywhere.
“GET OUT OF MY MIND, CIPHER!” Ford cried before running for the door.
Legs burning with exhaustion, he sprinted through the icy puddles of the parking lot, past his car and towards the road. The golden light of the sunrise broke through the trees. Maybe he had imagined the yellow glow. Maybe he was losing his mind. Maybe he was being watched. Bill was always watching, and he was no stranger to using people. He could be using anyone. He could be watching through anyone.
Every breath in stung with cold and every breath out left a trail of vapor, catching the morning light. The town was still and quiet, yet all at once it seemed to close in on him. Billboards, graffiti, the racoon sitting still on the lid of a steel garbage can. All eyes followed him. The town was watching. Everything he knew, everything he had done, and all he had to do to fix it weighed on him like ten tons, and he couldn’t entrust the truth to anyone. Bill could be anyone.
Every muscle in his body burned, already well beyond his limit. He felt himself jolt and realized halfway to the ground that his leg had buckled beneath him. He fell to his knees, hand in an icy puddle, and gasped for air. The surface of the water stilled, catching a reflection. Ford looked up to see the road-facing sign of the Twin Bed Motel. The word “twin” pulled a well-buried mass of memories to the front of his mind. They stung at first. This time he didn’t push them away.
There was someone out there who had nothing to do with this. Someone who, despite everything, he still trusted. He remembered the last time they spoke. All the times he considered reaching out but held back. He didn’t have a choice anymore. He needed his brother.
Stanford’s reflection looked back at him with disappointment, or maybe disdain. He’d considered covering all the mirrors in the house just to shake the feeling that Bill was watching through his eyes, but he resisted the urge. It sounded unhealthy even to him. Maybe it wasn’t Bill that made his reflection so unnerving.
The postcard had already been sent. Of all the steps he’d had to take towards stopping Bill, that had somehow been the hardest. He told himself not to overthink. There was so much more at stake than the relationship of a couple of estranged twins from New Jersey.
Pulling a white button up shirt off its hangar, Ford took a moment to study the variety of bruises that marred his arms. They were all over him, really, all at different stages of healing. A particularly nasty splotch of purple, yellow, and blue ached as he pulled his shirt sleeve over his arm. He knew it was common to find a bruise without remembering the cause, but there was little doubt that Bill was behind most of his injuries. Just last week he’d awoken to find himself holding a fork jammed squarely into his own forearm.
If only he’d been paying closer attention, he’d have put together that Bill was doing this to his body far before his deception was revealed. He wondered if the bleeding from his eye was a natural side effect of Bill’s control, or if Bill was simply jabbing the same eye every time just for kicks. He didn’t have time to find the answer.
The buttons of his shirt felt small and slippery as he struggled to dress himself. Despite his shoving everything about Stanley’s opinion of him to the back of his mind, that part of his brain was getting full. He found himself trying to dress well, show he still had a handle on things, just in case Stanley arrived early. He hated himself for it. What was he trying to prove? He didn’t need to worry about what his brother thought of him. He likely wouldn’t care anyhow. There was no money in the favor Ford was asking. He bitterly wondered if Stanley would give him the time of day. He’d been keeping tabs despite his best efforts. The odd mugshot or questionable business venture sat as a pile of newspaper clippings and ads in a box under the floorboards of a secret room. Faith in his brother’s virtue and honesty was not abundant.
With an anxious sigh, Ford adjusted the thin black tie at his neck. Running his fingers through his still-damp brown hair, he found he didn’t want to look at himself anymore. He’d changed so much since senior year when his father had kicked Stanley to the curb. He wondered how different his brother looked. His eye twitched, and he pulled a sheet from his untouched bed and tossed it over the mirror.
He didn’t have time for that kind of thinking. The world was going to end.
The lukewarm air tasted of cherry cola and blood. Ford was surprised to find there was air at all. He’d half expected to die the instant he passed through the portal. Seconds of exposure had shaken his assistant’s mind so severely he’d likely never recover. Ford was face to face with the unknown and yet, for the first time, found his curiosity overwhelmed by fear.
The space between universes was ever shifting, debris and clouds of mystery substances drifting and swirling with an invisible tide. Still reeling, struggling against the fluid state of the air around him, Ford looked up. The impossible shapes and colors of Bill's throne made his senses spin as Bill spoke, giddy with triumph.
“Look who decided to pay me a visit!”
Ford looked into the eye of his tormentor. So many emotions filled his body and soul it felt like they’d crush him to death before any of Bill’s disgusting henchmen did. Fear, anger, shame… In so many ways, he was a failure. He could have been anything he wanted, and he chose to be a fool.
Huddled against a wall, arms around his knees, Ford sat in a back alley, waiting for a storm to pass. Another nowhere dimension, close enough to his own to hide in, but nothing like home. Hungry, tired, and cold, Dr. Stanford pines is completely alone.