Stan spent the last hour and a half listening to Ford chew him out about letting every potentially dangerous creature he ran into enter into a ‘soul pact’ with him. Stan mostly tuned it out, there were about fourteen spiders in the kitchen that hadn’t approached him for dungeon reasons, and he had left them alone. That probably counted as being responsible about his soul pacts or whatever instead of trying to build a spider army.

He watched as Ford paced around the kitchen, talking animatedly with his hands. Stan was grinning wildly from his perch on the table because he hadn’t seen Ford acting this much like Ford since he had been seventeen.

“Are you even listening?” Ford snapped, pausing his circular pacing around the kitchen to stare at the chair Stan wasn’t sitting in. Stan summoned a Fork next to him and lazily pushed it off the edge, causing it to clatter on the floor. Ford paused. Stared at the fork, the back at the chair he still thought Stan was sitting in. His anger had evaporated in a moment.

“How did you do that?!” Ford said, blind excitement made him forget that Stan couldn’t answer.

Stan was fine with that. Mostly. He lazily pulled a spoon from his inventory, and then pushed it onto the floor. Ford remembered their communication difficulties, and his face fell. “Ah. Right.” Ford said.

Stan had an idea about that. He whistled and Grimm bounded into the room. He wasn’t sure where the dog had ran off to, but he now was sitting at Stan’s feet, looking up at him with those weird red eyes that he shared with Brownie like Stan could reshape the universe.

“Hey buddy. Can you go fetch me a book? Any book.” Stan asked, hoping he’d understand.

Ford had taken a step away from Grimm, still clearly not liking the ‘death omen on four legs’ as he had called him. A little extreme, but, Stan thought, that was Stanford Pines for you.

Grimm ran out of the room, and returned about a minute later holding a book in his mouth.

“Good boy.” Stan said, reaching out a hand.

Grimm dropped it in his palm and Stan grunted at the weight. It was heavier than anything he’d tried to hold before, he could literally feel the mana pouring out of him. He lifted it onto the table, dropping it the second he could.

Ford made a thoughtful face, before smiling slightly. “Good thinking Stanley.”

“Brownie, come ‘ere you mangy arachnid.” Stan shouted.

The spider had been hiding behind the coffee machine since Ford came in. She was still annoyed about the whole Grimm thing, but she crawled out of the crevasse and scrambled across the floor. Ford let out a yelp as he saw how big Brownie had gotten clearly for the first time. Then he paused. Ford looked around the kitchen with a look of extreme confusion on his face.

“Stanley.” He said very slowly. “Did you clean?”

Stan felt another smile creep onto his face, then he began to chuckle. Moses he had missed his brother. Brownie crawled up next to him on the table and poked at the book with one of her eight legs. Stan nodded to her and she hooked her legs in the edge of the cover and pulled it open. It was some loud quality romance about space elves. That didn’t really matter.

“What… was that?” Ford asked again, approaching the table, his fear of Brownie entirely abated by his curiosity.

Stan gestured for Brownie to flip through the pages, he wasn’t really reading, but he was scanning for a specific word. He frowned, who wrote a book entirely in italics? He had Brownie pause on a page,

Page 76 of Elvina and the Skylarks vol.7:

“Oh Darumanlydude. You have no idea what I must do in order to defend the galaxy from the invasion the- Lewqirks.” Elvina spat, blinking her beautiful blue orbs.

“Ah. But milady- it would take centuries for anyelf to have an effect against the- Lewqirks. You are wasting your youth, come, and bed me, so that we can have many children together and be prospourous.” Darumanlydude smirked,

“Oh Darumanlydude, I want nothing more than to bear one hundred of your children and break the- Curse. But I have to furfil my destiny and summon the three platy . Or else Sqilminlink is doomed to be forever under the command of the- Lewqirks!” Elvina cried, her long pink lucious locks of naturally pink, long hair that fell to her waist and lusciously framed her elvish form as her bright blue orbs sparkled with tears.

“My sweet sugardoll.” Darumanlydude whispered, placing a hand on her waist. “I believe that you will defiantly defeat the- Lewqirks. But the time is not now. Now is the time for you to kiss me.”

“Oh Darumanly dude I-“ Elviana whimpered, before lunging into his face and kissing him on the lips.

Stan stared at the book in utter confusion. He didn’t think that Brownie could read, it’d be weird if she could, but they had hesitated on one page long enough for the spider to have somehow absorbed the absurdity that it contained, and she looked at Ford with 8 judging eyes.

Stanford sputtered, a hint of red creeping onto his cheeks. “I have no idea where The Grim got this from. It most certainly isn’t mine I-“ He snatched the book and held it to his chest. “I will go get a dictionary.”

He walked out of the room rather quickly. Stan rubbed his eyes. He hadn’t seen Ford that flustered since the kissing machine incident.

“Brownie. You’re a girl, what do you think of that nonsense?” Stan asked. “Would you like a Darumanlyspider to… don’t spiders eat their mates?”

Brownie looked at him with uncomprehending eyes.

“Eh.” Stan said. “Never mind you can’t read.”

Brownie tilted her head.

Ford returned with a dictionary, he walked over to the table and placed it beside Brownie. It was covered in dust, which Stan melted. Ford’s eyes practically fell out of his head. Causing Stan to grin wider.

“Stanley. Explain. Please.” Ford said, gesturing frantically at the dictionary.

Stan directed Brownie to the ‘M’ section. The dictionary was heavier and larger than the Elf book, and Brownie was struggling a little to turn the pages. Eventually, she got it open to the right page and Stan stopped her before pointing to the entry on Magic.

He tapped it, and Brownie did so as well.

“Well yes,” Ford said. “I assumed so.”

Aw. Stan thought, he was slightly disappointed he didn’t get to magic before Ford. Magic. Dang. He hadn’t actually thought of it as magic before, but that was really the other word that worked, wasn’t it?

“But what kind?” Ford asked. “How can you do magic?”

Stan sighed, he thought for a moment, well, he was already in the ‘MA’ section so he had Brownie flip a few pages, then directed her to point at another word.

Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.

“Math?” Ford said,

Stan had already told Brownie to go to the ‘W’ section, and he found Wizard without much trouble.

“Math Wizard?” Ford said, “Stanley, if there was such a thing as a Math Wizard I would have became one before you.”

Stan huffed and summoned a knife on the table.

Ford asked. “What do you mean then?”

He had Brownie turn to ‘help’, then ‘me’. Ford’s face cleared, then a look of intense suspicion came across it.

“…Are you talking about Bill? I already warned you about him but- he takes the form of a yellow triangle, he might be lying to you about his identity if you only talked to him when he was-“

Stan cut him off by pushing the knife off the table.

Ford flinched, but then he picked up the knife and set it back on the table.

“…Math Wizard. Okay.” Ford said, taking a deep breath. “Is he teaching you magic? Is he invisible? Are you talking about the invisible wizard? Can you see him, Stanley?”

His voice got louder with each question, and Stan had to interrupt him by pushing the knife off the table again.

“My apologies.” Ford said, then gestured at the dictionary. “Continue.”

The next words were ‘in’ and ‘head.’

Ford’s face clouded up again, like it did whenever he mentioned Bill, but he didn’t say anything.

Stan tried to think of a word that would describe Wiz in a way that would make he seem like a separate entity from the apparently triangular jerk that had hurt his brother.

‘narrator’ was the best he could come up with.

That only made Ford look more confused. Stan bit his tongue and added ‘game’ which took some time, because G and N were about a hundred pages apart.

“I don’t understand what you are trying to tell me Stan.” Ford said after a moment.

Stan sighed. He didn’t really know either.

He had Brownie go to the ‘D’ section and tap on Dungeon three times.

“DDnD?” Ford asked, “I thought you hated that game.”

Stan pulled a fork out of his inventory. “It’s a game for Nerds.” He said to no one.

“Why…” He trailed off. “Are you saying that the Math Wizard is your Dungeon Master?”

Something about the phrase ‘dungeon master’ ticked Stan off in a way it hadn’t before. He didn’t even have to tell Brownie to flip back to narrator and tap on it.

“Dungeon Narrator?” Ford asked,

Stan flicked the fork off the table. Close enough.

“I have no idea what that means Stanley.” Ford said.

“Honestly Pointdexter?” Stan said aloud, “Me neither.”

“How are you teleporting things?” Ford said, after a sigh.

He wasn’t, not really. Ford didn’t know that. Stan wished he could just talk to him. He probably could give him a real explanation for all this stuff. He had Brownie turn the pages to ‘I’ and hunted down ‘Inventory.’

Ford drew his eyebrows together in the way he always did when he was doing a particularly difficult homework problem. It was surprising how strange Ford looked, ten years older- and twenty years more haggard than he should be- but still making the exact same expressions he did as a kid. That made sense though, somethings about people didn’t change with time.

Like in DDnD?” Ford clarified. “Not ‘a complete list of items such as property, goods in stock, or the contents of a building.’” He said, reading off the definition.

Stan pushed the fork off the table. Ford picked it up for him.

“Why is DDnD so important all of a sudden? Did you finally see the light since the last time we…” Ford trailed off, then finished a moment later, slightly hesitant. “Talked.”

Stan frowned slightly, and summoned a knife. Ford had a far away look in his eyes.

“You… you should talk to your Wizard friend. See if he has any ideas about communication.” Ford said, taking the dictionary from Brownie. Not even hesitating to pull the book away from the giant spider.

Stan wished that he’d left it. Ford vanished to wherever he typically vanished to. At least he didn’t take any more coffee. He didn’t like the look Ford had. He couldn’t read him. Which Stan hated. He absolutely hated looking at Ford and not understanding how he was feeling. Which was stupid. He hadn’t really even been able to do that as a kid.

It’d just been… a little easier, he supposed. He hoped Ford wasn’t mad at him, at least, he didn’t seem mad. This was stupid. Stan sighed and slid off the table, avoiding where Grimm had laid down underneath it. Stepping on him probably wouldn’t do anything. It was more of the principle of the thing. Stan had never had a dog before. Pa didn’t want animals around, he’d barely been able to keep Shanklin. Brownie kept giving Grimm the stink eye.

Was she jealous? Hm. Stan began to pace around the kitchen. He was low on mana, and unless he wanted to eat one of the chairs, there wasn’t a readily available way for him to regain it. He wondered where Ford had gone. He groaned and shook his head.

“Grimm.” Stan said,

The pup trotted over to him.

“I’m going to teach you some tricks.” Stan said, dogs learned tricks. Maybe he could teach Grimm to snag wallets. Did he need money anymore? Bah. Who cared. Ford needed money, and Stan liked money.

“Sit.” Stan said,

Grimm sat.

Huh. Smart dog. He should’ve gathered that by now.

“Lay down.”

Grimm instantly flattened.

“Good boy.” Stan said,

Grimm’s tail began to wag.

Stan went through all the tricks he knew that dogs learned. Grimm performed them all, once Stan explained what he was supposed to do, at least. He ended up making up several. He could feel Brownie glaring. He turned on the stove and used the light to teach her how to make shadow puppets.

…

Stan wasn’t too proud of that one. It was a good party trick, but even with all her extra legs she really couldn’t do most of the puppets that Stan knew. He ended up improvising a lot. Brownie adored it though, so, maybe that was what counted. Or something. Stan wondered if people would pay to see a spider do shadow puppets.

Internally he answered of course and tried to show her how to do a butterfly. She was really struggling with the butterfly. Spiders just didn’t have the thickness in the legs that was needed to make a butterfly shadow puppet. The other thing was that it was hard to teach someone shadow puppets when you didn’t cast a shadow. That went double when that ‘person’ was a spider.

Stan sighed. He had nothing better to for the next… however long until the sun rose. Eventually, the light streaming through the window became too bright for shadow puppets and he turned off the stove. He didn’t feel tired. Which was strange. Brownie was tired, she had already climbed up into her cabinet, shut the door and probably fallen asleep. Grimm had been dozing on the floor for hours.

Stan felt more energized than he had previously. Shadow puppets didn’t take mana. He’d been gaining energy the entire time. It felt inherently wrong. His hands should be cramping, his legs should hurt from standing for so long. He shouldn’t feel… fine. Stan huffed and laid on the floor. He wasn’t going to try and sleep after Wiz’s lecture last time. But it felt right to try and rest after spending hours on his feet.

Even if maybe he didn’t need it anymore.

He wasn’t sure how long he stayed like that. The sun had risen higher in the sky. It had to have been about noon. Ford still hadn’t come back to the kitchen. For lunch, coffee, or to talk. He was just thinking about trying to go find him when suddenly a tingling spread through every inch of his body. Stan shivered. Danger. His heart beat. Danger. Danger. Danger.

Grimm jumped to his feet. Brownie crawled out of her cabinet. Stan stood up.

“…Stanferd?” A highly accented voice called from the hallway.

Stan literally flinched. A person. Was inside. The House. He felt like someone had walked over his grave. (did he have a grave?)

“Hello?” The man called again.

Stan clenched his fists, and peaked outside of the kitchen. Someone had gotten inside. Because he hadn’t locked the door. Because it was too much trouble. To lock a door. Now there was a person. IN thE HOUSE.

He realized he wasn’t breathing.

He didn’t need to breathe.

He didn’t breathe.

He walked into the t-rex skull room and looked down the entrance hallway. Grimm followed him. The man was blonde, with small glasses, far too small, the lenses were barely the size of quarters. He was wearing a warm looking brown jacket and snow was on his boots.

Stan didn’t need to tell Grimm to pounce. The man cried out with a southern-twanged scream as the pup tackled him to the ground.

Grimm looked a lot bigger when he was pinning someone down like that. He was snarling. Stan realized that he could kill this man. He should. Kill him, that is. He had gotten two levels from his own body, what would he get from this guys? And why would he even need to feel bad about it? Ford wouldn’t need to know that his brother was a murderer. He’d killed a guy before. Under different circumstances. Ford had killed him. His twin couldn’t exactly claim to be morally superior in the murder department. He could just melt the body and any evidence, lock the door, not worry about.

The man was staring at Grimm with wide, terrified eyes.

Stan stood in the doorframe of the hallway, completely unaware that his projected body was flicking from Stan Pines, to a blank red mannequin with a golden fish on his chest.

Ford decided to go upstairs for some more coffee.

Grimm waited for the command from the Dungeon.

Stan was about to speak when here heard shattering porcelain behind him. He turned around and saw Ford standing among the ruins of a coffee cup. He melted them. Ford glanced at the rapidly disappearing shards before striding forward with all the false confidence in the world. Stan flinched as Ford walked directly through him.

“Up.” Ford said to Grimm.

The dog glanced at Stan, Stan nodded. Grimm backed away from the man, but stayed close to Ford’s heels. This was the first time Ford didn’t seem opposed to Grimm’s presence.

“Fiddleford McGucket.” Ford said, his voice was cold, but he spoke with familiarity.

Stan flinched again. Had he almost killed one of Ford’s friends?

“Stanferd Pines.” Fiddleford said. “I didn’t think you were the type to try and keep a Grim for a pet.”

“He’s my brother’s.” Ford said offhandedly, which made Stan smile. “What are you doing in my house?”