Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Your entire home dimension?” Ford repeated in disbelief. “Destroyed? How? By what?”

Bill looked distant, more distant than he’d ever allowed anyone to see before.

“By a monster.”

A plethora of sympathies escaped Ford. Sweet little offers to hunt, to hurt, to kill the wretched thing that had burned his muse’s home.

The devotion was charming, really. So determined to be a good little servant to the only god he’d ever gotten on his knees for.

A giddy little look crinkled Bill’s eye. “I have a better idea.”

Pity was such an interesting thing in humans, Bill had discovered. They would do most anything to kiss a boo-boo or dry a wet eye, and Ford was no exception. Not when it came to Bill, at least.

“I’m all ears, my muse.”

“Fordsie, I need you to understand—“ There was a little shake to Bill’s voice as it reverberated through the mindscape. Desperation was a fun little thing to play with— to convey, to prey upon— fun all around! “I am the last living member of my species. I’m the only Euclydian left.”

Ford blinked in surprise— his muse hadn’t exactly been so open about this before.

“I want to repopulate my species, IQ,” Bill declared softly. “But I need a host. A virile well of DNA. An incubator.”

The idea would’ve shocked anybody else. The implications, the biological restraints, the impossibility of it all— it should have scared Ford. It should have left him trembling, nervous, uncomfortable at the very least.

Bill couldn’t truly discern whether it was sympathy, or curiosity, or sheer devotion that lulled the next words out of Ford.

“Anything for you, my muse.”

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

Over the next few weeks, Bill had explained how the process would work, but Ford still hadn’t quite made sense of it. He knew it involved a smaller version of the portal he’d been working on for so long, several weeks of chastity, an egg timer, and a turkey baster.

“Remind me, once more, how this is supposed to work?” Ford asked as he flipped a few switches in the lab. “And how this is any different from the real portal I’ve interrupted work on?”

Ford could hear Bill’s groan reverberate inside his head, which was dramatic in Ford’s opinion— after all, he’d willingly offered his body as a vessel for repopulation. He was entitled to as many explanations as it took for him to understand.

“For the seventeenth time— the big portal is the light at the end of the tunnel. The little portal is temporary— exclusively for Euclydian repopulation purposes,” Bill explained unhelpfully. “That tiny thing uses a fraction of the tech you’ll need to complete the real thing. That’s why only I can get through, and only for half an hour at a time.”

“Was the egg timer really necessary for that bit?”

Bill’s cacophonous laughter vibrated through Ford’s skull. “It’s thematically appropriate!”

Ford’s face contorted with confusion. “What exactly is the theme?”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, Sixer,” Bill soothed him. “Just flip that tiny portal on, and let me handle the rest.”

Through numerous effigies of his likeness, Bill took great pleasure in watching Ford’s hands work. A flick of a switch, the pull of a level, a last-minute calculation, and before Bill could begin to drool over the way Ford’s freakish hands curled around pens and other objects, he felt it.

The pull towards the weak spot between their worlds. 

Granted, it was a fraction of the euphoria he intended to unleash upon the dimension. But for the time being, this was what Bill had to work with.

And Bill planned to spend his time very wisely.

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

When the flaring light died down and the objects in the lab stopped floating, Ford wasn’t quite sure what to expect. In the mindscape and in his visions, Bill had appeared as a dapper triangular deity, flat in space but manifold in company.

To Ford’s surprise, when the wound in the space-time continuum seemed to stop bleeding chaos, Bill was more or less the same. Same yellow triangle, same bricks, same hat and bowtie and piercing eye.

Across the ages, when prophets and priests were graced with visions of their god, they often fell to their knees in awe and reverence of the sight before them.

Stanford Pines was not a prophet or a priest. He was a scientist. 

Stanford Pines fell to his knees regardless.

He did not intend to kneel before his divine specimen. But the thrumming blue chains that pulled him towards the ground left him little choice. They were wrapped around his wrists and ankles, cold against the thin sheen of sweat that’d coated his skin.

An appendage unfamiliar to him danced across Ford’s cheek.

“My muse,” Ford managed despite himself. He looked up at the glowing god before him— shades of yellow light cast onto his skin, warm enough to burn him alive. “You’re actually—“

“Here, present, in the flesh,” Bill filled in for him, waving his hand dismissively, “we know, genius. You’re wasting precious time with me, Stanford.” Another black appendage extended from his backside and reached for the egg timer Ford had delicately placed upon the workbench, per Bill’s request. He spun the top half and clicked it all the way to the thirty minute mark. 

“Time starts now.”

Ford made the mistake of blinking at the drawl of the word, and within the instant his eyes were closed, Bill’s strange form of flesh and pure energy morphed into something unfamiliar. Something sinister with mouths in places there shouldn’t have been— Ford tried to count them off, but the sound of his own heavy breathing threw off his measure. There must’ve been three betwixt the bricks of Bill’s body, at least one in the corner snapping like some sort of gator, and one particularly wide mouth where his eye seemed to float in the middle.

Each opening was adorned with sharp teeth and sticky blue tongues— Ford couldn’t help but wonder how they’d feel against his skin.

At the mere thought, Ford felt the chains tug at his limbs. Bill seemed to jostle them to his satisfaction, which apparently involved Ford being suspended mid-air.

“I can still hear those sick little thoughts of yours, brainiac,” Bill taunted, his mouth-eye crinkling with delight. “They’re real loud right about now!”

Even fully clothed, Ford had never felt more exposed. His face flushed completely red, and when a glowing blue appendage that appeared to be a tongue moved to unbutton his shirt, he saw the blush had seeped down well into his chest.

“I-I see this physical form hasn’t diminished your powers in any way,” Ford stammered, glasses askew on his face as he tried to retain a single ounce of his dignity.

Bill chuckled, his entire triangular body vibrating as he did so. He took up a good chunk of the lab with his flat body of mouths and tongues and strange appendages.

“This isn’t even a fraction of my power, smart guy.”

Ford shuddered at the thought of what could have possibly been more powerful than the being before him, stringing up his body like the most willing puppet in the world as one toothy mouth took Ford’s entire leg inside. 

“Bill!” Ford shouted in a panic, terrified of being cannibalized like so many scientists before him who’d ventured to dabble in forces beyond their understanding. “T-That’s my leg—!”

“Relax,” Bill coaxed him, “didn’t I tell you not to worry your pretty head?”

The fragmented praise blossomed something sugary deep in Ford’s gut as his muse’s sharp knives of bone dug into his pantleg— just enough to puncture the fabric before dragging his teeth down Ford’s leg and spitting out the ripped pantleg. 

“See?” Bill guided his whimpering devotee with eyes screwed shut. “Still all in one piece. Next time strip, genius. Or don’t— you make the cutest faces when you think you’re about to be torn apart!”

Ford glanced down and, to his relief, his leg was intact. Little puncture wounds in the shape of Bill’s teeth, which he didn’t exactly mind, but intact. It lessened his worry when Bill pulled the same exact stunt on his other pantleg, biting at the seam and dragging it off like the worst tailor known to man. 

By the time Bill had flipped him over and ripped the back of his pants-turned-booty-shorts to shreds, Ford made a mental note to purchase another pair.

“Were you this bricked up before summoning me here, or is this fresh wood?” Bill asked as he ran one of his sticky monstrous appendages over Ford’s erection.

“Do I have to answer that?” Ford shuddered in response, twitching at the wet touch to his long-neglected cock. A healthy drip of precum began to leak from his tip, which seemed to pique Bill’s interest. From the same workbench where he’d put the egg timer, Bill grabbed the turkey baster Ford had supplied upon Bill’s request. He unscrewed the rubber bulb from the plastic tube, and pushed Ford’s leaky cock into it as far as it would go.

The tightness around his girth was suffocating. “M-My muse, what is—“

“To collect your jizz, genius,” Bill answered crudely. “Something’s gotta fertilize the eggs, and it’s gonna be you! Can’t afford to waste a single drop.”

Ford wanted to press further question about the eggs, but before he could, something cold pressed hard against his backside.

A little lower than his backside, actually.

“Let me in, Sixer,” Bill crooned with a saccharine little lilt. 

For all his scientific curiosity, it was almost too much for Ford.

He was more than a vessel, wasn’t he?

“Sixer,” Bill purred, sensing the hesitation, “of course you are.”

The reassurance was little, and some inhuman limb was still prodding at Ford’s less-than-prepared hole.

“Stanford, you are helping me repopulate my species.” The sentiment was almost warm coming from Bill, which was rare. “Of course you are more than a vessel. You’re so much more than an incubator, or a surrogate, or a sperm donor.

“You’re a hero.”

The word alone was enough to melt Ford into a puddle on the ground like snow against a burning hot engine, but from Bill?  

From Bill, the praise was silk against his skin, honey on his tongue, butterflies in his stomach freshly emerging from chrysalis for the sole purpose of fluttering inside him.

“Breed me,” Ford sputtered out, the words pathetic as they left his tongue.

Bill’s eye lit up with perverse intrigue. “What was that, Sixer?”

“You heard me.” Ford swallowed, sweat beading up on the side of his face. “W-Whatever Euclydian mating ritual this is, I want it.” He pressed his knees together shyly, only to be pulled apart by some combination of tongues and tentacles. “Knock me up like it’s the only thing I’m good for.”

As his body became less his own vessel and more Bill’s plaything, Ford grew very okay with the idea that getting knocked up by the last living Euclydian was exactly what he was made for.

Science required some sacrifice, after all. This particular altruism, giving his body like an offering to his muse, was one of the more enjoyable sacrifices.

Bill took the opportunity wherein Ford was putty in his hands, and shoved the slick appendage into Ford’s hole. He started small, of course, he wasn’t needlessly cruel. Yet. The black limb, in a fashion akin to what Ford might have called a tentacle, was small enough at the tip and became gradually girthier further down its length.

Upon the intrusion, a whiny gasp escaped Ford— a sound Bill enjoyed very much. The tip of his appendage released more of it lubricating jelly before pushing further into Ford.

“What a sound,” Bill marvelled, punching deeper into Ford just to hear those sweet little gasps. “Keep this up and you’ll be a sexed-up alto saxophone in no time.”

Ford couldn’t quite discern whether that was intended to be an insult or a compliment, and Bill didn’t seem too keen on clarifying. Whatever it was, it went straight to his dick and made the rubber bulb around his cock feel significantly tighter.

Before Ford had the chance to bite down on his lip and prevent further embarrassing noises from escaping him, Bill made a devastating discovery—

Ford’s prostate.

Bill promptly abused the sensitive spot inside Ford, ramming against it hard enough to bruise before leaking more slick in a poor attempt to soften the blow.

Obscene sounds left Ford’s mouth, ones he didn’t even know his vocal cords were capable of producing. Grunts and whimpers, pleas for mercy, all the while his body couldn’t decide between arching into the touch and bucking away from the brutality.

“B-Bill, this hurts,” Ford whined, the wind practically knocked out of his lungs. “A-Are you close to, um…” He realized that he wasn’t quite sure how to finish that. It was unclear whether Bill’s orgasm was anything like a human one.

“If you want me to finish, I—“ Bill’s breath hitched at the feeling of Ford’s tight walls pulsing around his appendage. “I need to go deeper.”

Ford nodded, screwing his eyes shut. “Okay.”

Without an ounce of hesitation, Bill drove himself deeper into Ford’s velvety hole. A cry of anguish and euphoria wracked Ford’s willing little body, stomach rising and falling with each quick breath.

The concave and convex motion of Ford’s stomach, actually, gave way to something interesting.

A tentacle-shaped bulge just above Ford’s navel.

Bill wiggled the appendage inside Ford experimentally, watching the bulge move with him. “Oh, this is fun.”

Ford peeked one eye open. “What is it?”

Ever pushing his limits, Bill rammed directly into the spot where his appendage bulged against Ford’s stomach. “I can see me under your skin!”

“Y-Yes, on account of the fact that you’re fucking gargantuan,” Ford huffed, thoroughly unimpressed by the feat.

Bill did not take kindly to being dismissed.

He shoved a cruel blue tongue down Ford’s mouth, quickly making its way to his esophagus. A harmony of tongues and tentacles wrapped around Ford’s skin, flush against his legs, cutting off circulation in his arms, enveloping every bare inch of him tight enough to leave bruises.

There wasn’t an ounce of empty space inside ford, what with his ass being stretched to roughly the girth of a cantaloupe and his throat being so wholly full. Things that should have been excruciating, were supposed to hurt, but something was clouding the pain receptors in Ford’s nerves. He might have liked to hypothesize that the lubricant Bill seemed to excrete had pain-dulling properties for precisely such an evolutionary reason, but thoughts were just so hard in his head. Each sensory experience was reduced to abstract feelings that blossomed in every sensitive part of his body, which was everywhere.

Warm. Wet. Tight. Hot. Good. Every little feeling his body picked up on was dumbed down enough for his fucked-out little brain to pick up on.

Even the messages his bundle of neurons tried to send to his muscles were so simple, so easy, so soft and gentle Ford wasn’t sure if the instructions were from himself or Bill. Bounce. Suck. Relax. Suck. Clench. Relax. Cum.

Wherever the instructions might have come from, he sure as hell listened.

A strangled cry ripped through Ford’s stuffed throat, convulsing in the blue chains as he came. He filled the rubber bulb of the turkey baster about three-quarters of the way with his seed. 

Watching Ford unravel under Bill’s control was a feeling like no other. He came undone so perfectly, so beautifully, like nothing Bill had ever seen. Torture and anguish and pleasure and desire all mingling together in one dumb little expression— it was a good look on his devotee. Such a good look, in fact, it had waves and crests of pleasure ebbing through Bill’s newfound physical form, and without so much as a warning—

Ford must’ve felt it before Bill had even realized it. Some firm bubbles like engorged frogspawn leaked out of Bill and buried deep inside Ford. He glanced down at his stomach, which was expanding in size as Bill’s orgasm drew on. The eggs inside him bulged against the skin of his abdomen, like flesh shrink-wrapped around dozens of tennis balls inside him.

The filling feeling stopped shortly after the eggs gave Ford’s stomach a generous swell. A last spurt of lubricant escaped Bill and, with a squelching sound, the appendage was removed from inside Ford.

With a bit of slack in the chain, he ran a hand across his stomach, feeling how the eggs lined up so neatly inside him. He pressed against one, rubbed it through the skin of his stomach, and felt it shift inside him.

Oh.

This was more than scientific curiosity, Ford realized as he came a second time from only the feeling of an egg shifting inside him.

His second orgasm had seed leaking out the side of the turkey baster’s bulb cinched so tightly around his sensitive cock. 

Bill was making some noise that resembled panting as he popped the rubber bulb off Ford’s cock. He retracted his supernatural blue chains and, slowly enough to get a good look at his swollen surrogate sperm donor, lowered him to the ground. 

“We’re not done yet, Sixer.”

Ford whined, the dull ache inside him starting to sharpen without Bill’s nerve-soothing fluids.

“Don’t worry,” Bill cooed, an almost mocking sound as his numerous tentacles and tongues posed Ford just how he wanted, on his elbows and knees with his ass high in the air.

“I-Is this really necessary?” Ford complained, shaking like a leaf as an oversized appendage pressed in the middle of his spine to arch his back.

“Which one of us knows more about Euclydian mating rituals— me or you?” Bill challenged in turn as he screwed the plastic tube back into the rubber bulb of the turkey baster full of cum.

Ford figured the logical answer was Bill, of course, but then again his muse did many strange little things purely for his own enjoyment, which bordered on sadistic more often than not. He obliged regardless, and bent to Bill’s will.

Stranger things than a turkey baster had been shoved up Ford’s ass, but between his sensitivity and the loss of his muse’s touch, it was certainly the least welcome intrusion of the evening. He was almost certain the tool didn’t have to go as deep into him as Bill had cruelly shoved it, but seeing his devotee writhe gave Bill some sort of thrill Ford couldn’t quite wrap his head around; all he knew was that Bill really liked it, and if he obliged despite his discomfort, it was worship in its own right.

His discomfort grew as he felt his own warm semen being pumped inside him, seeping into the gaps between Bill’s tapioca-like spawn and pooling heat in his contorted gut.

“There we go,” Bill encouraged, his inhuman hand squeezing the rubber bulb and tilting the turkey baster at any angle that would get the last drops of Ford’s cum out. “You’re doing amazing, Fordsie. Fucking perfect.” His eye darted over to the egg timer he’d set earlier, which seemed just about ready to go off. “You look so good like this. Imagine how pretty you’re gonna look when you’re all swollen with my babies.”

Ford flinched at the plurality as Bill slowly pulled out the freshly empty turkey baster.

“Doesn’t that sound so good? Watching you waddle into town, all big and knocked up— all the funny looks you’ll get, people wondering if you’re pregnant or just fat or some other freaky third thing, and only you and I will know the answer—“ An appendage spread Ford’s knees open, and another creeped between his legs to swipe a wet stripe from his gaping hole down to his taint, then across his balls before stroking his soft and sensitive cock. “—you’re mine.”

The attention, both to his abused cock and the hypothetical judgement of the townspeople, elicited a whimper of discomfort from Ford.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” Bill chided, his voice uncharacteristically soft. “You’ll be my hero, Fordsie. My knocked-up, surrogate, sperm donor, species-saving hero.”

Ford liked the word more than he cared to admit. He liked it all more than he cared to admit, actually. The feeling of being so full, the honor of being a savior to his muse’s species, the warmth of being the only human Bill had deemed worthy to carry his offspring, the comfort of his inhuman touch— every bit of it ate away at anything that should have resembled concern and left only pride in its absence.

All too abruptly, Bill’s touch pulled away from his skin, and his presence seemed to vanish from the lab.

Trembling like a lovesick little puppy lost in the woods, Ford lifted his head to try and look for the tiny portal, and—

The egg timer went off, its ringing practically mocking him.

The rip in time and space had sewn itself shut, and it had pulled Bill back to where he came from.

“Gateway’s closed, Sixer,” Bill’s voice echoed through his head. “You look like you enjoyed that a whole lot.”

Ford ran an experimental hand over his bulging stomach. The sudden loneliness was suboptimal, but the teeth marks on his thighs and the swell of his abdomen left him feeling less abandoned. 

He really needed to get the real portal working properly, and fast.

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

After the fact, Bill had done Ford the courtesy of explaining what was supposed to happen next with his newfound attempt to repopulate the Euclydians.

“Your body can’t handle all those eggs,” Bill explained rather crudely, “so the first thing that’s gonna happen is your body breaking down and absorbing whatever it can’t afford to nourish. It all gets broken down into prenatal nutrients essential for mothers— well, Euclydian mothers. You might be smelling sounds and hearing colors for a little bit. Your belly’s gonna go back to its normal size for the time being, until the next stage.”

Ford wasn’t quite sure if mother was quite the right label for him— he liked it less than hero, but perhaps more than incubator.

In any case, Bill’s prediction was correct. The eggs seemed to be absorbed into Ford’s body, and his stomach shrank back to its usual size within a day. Though Ford didn’t experience any of the synesthesia Bill had predicted might happen with the cross-species mating, he did feel more energetic than usual for the next week or so, which he tried not to attribute to the fact that his body had absorbed about half the chromosomes of what was on track to be Bill’s children.

“The next stage starts after a few weeks. This is the fun part— it’s when you get symptomatic!” Bill had continued giddily in his initial explanation. “Morning sickness, weird cravings, increased libido, belly starts to get bigger again, hair where there’s usually nails and nails where there’s usually hair— the usual stuff, you know.”

The last item was a terrifying notion to Ford, but he pressed on. Bill’s praises of being a hero, a savior, a perfect vessel for his offspring became the prayer he sunk himself into whenever doubt or fear threatened to claim him.

But in the following few weeks, those symptoms never arrived. No morning sickness, no strange cravings beyond the usual stale coffee and ramen noodles Bill had made him swear off, his libido was about the same, his stomach did not swell, his hair stayed hair and his nails stayed nails.

“Maybe it just takes longer because I’m human,” Ford had pleaded to Bill in the mindscape. “Please. Give me a few more weeks.” Even in the mindscape, he’d perfected the sad puppy-dog eyes Bill had unfortunately grown soft to.

“Let me prove myself to you, my muse.”

Ford had practically given up his body like a sacrifice upon an altar, and Bill just couldn’t say no to such an offer. 

So he granted Ford a few more weeks, and even still, no indication of successful impregnation had surfaced.

“I’m sorry,” Ford apologized, his head hung in shame while he kneeled before Bill in his galaxy of a mindscape. “I don’t know why it didn’t work. I took such precautions, I was so careful—“ he choked back sobs as he listed the measures he took. “I-I didn’t touch a drop of coffee, I drank a gallon of water every day, I ate fruits and vegetables and whole grains and all those things you told me—“

Bill only interrupted him with a dramatic sigh. “It’s okay, Fordsie. Really, it is— oh, jeez, why are you crying?” Saccharine-coated cruelty painted his eye as he extended a hand to cup Ford’s teary face.

“You of all people know I’m used to being disappointed by now.”

The words shattered Ford. In a matter of weeks he’d gone from Bill’s hero to Bill’s disappointment.

All things considered, he would have been better off if he were nothing and nobody at all.

And the words he choked out as a result were a desperate plea.

“Let me try again.”

Bill’s brow quirked in surprise. “What was that, smart guy?”

Ford looked up from his pitifully hung head.

“Let me try again,” Ford repeated himself, determination filling the void that disappointment had drilled in him. “I’ll get the temporary portal running again. I’ll get the egg timer, a-and the turkey baster, and anything else you might need. Just— let me try again. Let me prove myself to you. Please.”

Bill tapped the space below his eye where a chin might’ve been. “I dunno, Sixer. I’m a fertile, young triangle— why should I waste my time and eggs on your slow swimmers in that run-down motel of a fleshbag you call a womb?”

In all fairness, Ford didn’t have a good rebuttal. He hadn’t taken decent care of his body until Bill had started putting eggs in it.

“Maybe I should find some other human to bring back the Euclydian race,” Bill mused aloud, his eye drifting off. “Someone younger, who takes better care of themself. A human with an actual maternal instinct might be nice—“

“Please,” Ford begged, his breathing ragged and desperate in the face of such a threat. “Breed me. Only me. I’ll do better this time, I promise. Please, my muse, I swear. I’ll do better, I’ll be better, so much better—“

“How fast can you get that temporary portal back up and running?”

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

“You’re a disappointment to me. You know that, Stanford?”

Months had gone by. And every few weeks, it was the same routine.

Ford would strip just before he opened the temporary gateway. Bill would arrive, fuck his devotee senseless, stuff him to the brim with eggs and his own semen. The gateway would close all too soon, and they would wait for a zygote to implant inside Ford.

After seven long months of trying, nothing had worked.

They tried new positions, different diets, vitamins, supplements— Ford put his body through half the drug store’s catalog in the hopes that something would give him those symptoms of pregnancy he’d been chasing. Over and under the counter medications, drugs Ford had synthesized himself, holistic remedies he’d heard in passing— he tried everything he could think of until he exhausted every option.

Still, nothing worked.

His failures forced him to his knees in front of Bill, pleading for mercy, for forgiveness, for another chance to be his vessel. 

“I know,” Ford managed through his shame. This night was another visitation in disciplining Ford’s constant failures. “I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry doesn’t cut it, slick,” Bill spat with a narrowed eye. “You told me you could handle this, didn’t you?”

Ford swallowed the mortification that bubbled up in his throat. “I know.”

“You told me you could repopulate my species, didn’t you?”

He looked up to defend himself in the little ways he could. “T-To be fair, it was never really certain that this would work—“

“Sixer, do you have any idea how much you’ve let me down??” Bill fumed, growing red in color and greater in size as he raged. “You had me thinking I’d get my species back! Do you know what that means to me??”

Ford bit down on the inside of his cheek. “I couldn’t possibly imagine how hard this is for you, my muse.”

“You’re damn right about that!” Bill shouted. “You can’t imagine how hard it is to have someone so USELESS feigning competence long enough to get my hopes up, only to let me down over and over and OVER again!”

“One more try,” Ford begged. “One more try, please, my muse— I’ll think of something. I don’t know what yet, but I swear, I’ll think of something if you give me just one more—“

“No,” Bill snarled. “No more tries. No more chances. No more of that stupid temporary portal. No more opportunities for you to disappoint me.”

Bill’s arm extended to lift Ford’s chin enough for scornful eye contact.

“You have made it abundantly clear that your mind is the only thing you’re good for.” Bill’s eye roved up and down Ford’s kneeling figure. “Let’s hope that much of your pathetic meat-sack doesn’t disappoint me.”

After that visit, Ford spent many nights wide awake working on the portal. With every scratch of his pencil against parchment, he cursed his barren body for being so useless to his muse. He hated to fall asleep, for he knew who waited in his dreams; Ford could not bear the dread of looking into his muse’s eye and seeing every obsolete inch of his inviable flesh the way Bill saw it.

It wasn’t long until he fell back into his terrible eating habits of stale coffee and ramen. 

After all, there was no reason for him to continue to nourish this fruitless vessel.

His mind was the only thing he was good for.

That was what Bill had said.

And Ford trusted Bill. Even when it hurt.

Which was just the funniest thing in the world to Bill.

Especially because he knew it would hurt a whole damn lot when those hundreds of eggs he’d planted inside Ford would come out of dormancy.

Chapter Text

“Dr. Pines, I assure you, I’ve reviewed the results three times myself—“

“Then review them a fourth time!” Ford shouted, a vein in his forehead ready to burst. “This isn’t possible! There has to be another explanation!”

The doctor shook her head. “Originally, I’d suspected it was a tumor—“

“That’s great news!” Ford beamed. “A tumor! I’d love a tumor! Please let it be a tumor!”

“But that didn’t account for your other strange symptoms,” the doctor continued. “The rapid onset weight gain you mentioned, the vomiting, the strange growths on your skin…”

It was true. Ford had begun feeling nauseated in the mornings, often throwing up before breakfast. And sure, a few extra pounds had recently pooled around his midsection. But he was retired, damnit— and old! He had a right to get seconds at dinner every once in a while, and if that happened to tighten the waistband of his pants, so what? 

The symptom that final urged him to visit the doctor, however, was the strange growths.

The keratin in his fingernails had started to split into fibers. Thin little hairs that bent and curled when pressed upon.

And his chest hair, which had come to look like curled porcupine spines, had begun to spindle and poke sharply into his skin. He’d used a nail clipper on a number of occasions to trim the painful spikes— they tore his sweaters, itched uncomfortably at his sensitive bits, and he did not want to find out what might happen if they were to migrate down his front side.

Upon the tests run at the doctor’s office, Ford found himself lightheaded. The ultrasounds, the medical terminology he’d typically understand with ease, the words out of the doctor’s mouth— it all blurred together as his head spun.

Pregnancy.

Ford had done many regrettable things in his time working with Bill, and in his time not quite working with Bill. It became a haze of shame and embarrassment he refused to let himself think about, until one instance or another would cut crisply through the blurred lines. 

Those memories, he would allow to bubble up, and then he let them go.

But they never quite went.

At the mention of pregnancy, however, the amalgam of fuzzy scenes in his life became sharp images, ones he scrolled through frantically for some sort of explanation.

There had been threats Bill had made towards him, not all of them empty. Eye stealing, sure, horrifying. But sudden onset pregnancy was just so implausible.

After all, Ford had tried. For seven long months in that regrettable stretch of time with Bill, he’d tried.

“Is this my file?” Ford asked, pointing to the manila folder in his doctor’s hands.

She nodded. “It’s all here. Medical records, ultrasound, tests—“

Without another word, Ford snatched the folder out of her hands, and left the building.

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

“Sixer~!”

“Cipher.”

Bill rolled his eye as though he couldn’t see Ford staring daggers at him through the plexiglass. “Don’t give me that! You’re the little freak who decoded all my messages just to see me here!”

“I’m not here for you,” Ford spat.

“Let me guess—“ Bill puffed up the space below his eye that one might interpret as a chest, as he proceeded to do a poor imitation of Ford. “I’m not here for YOU, Cipher, I’m here for ME. Closure is important for healing from all the damage you inflicted upon me and my dumb family, blah blah BLAH I’m utterly lost without you, my muse, please come back and have hot tentacle sex with me!”

Ford sat in his chair and debated leaving the Theraprism that very instant.

Instead, he opened the file he’d taken from the doctor’s office. He picked up the ultrasound image, and pressed it against the plexiglass.

“Explain something to me,” Ford insisted, his tone deceptively even. “Why did I go more than thirty years thinking I was infertile, and all of a sudden this happens?”

“Beats me,” Bill replied, checking his nails as if he couldn’t give fewer fucks. “Been sleeping around with any other egg-laying cryptids these days, or was I just special?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

“Fine. You whoring around, then?”

“The sheer versatility of your mental gymnastics continues to astound m—“ Ford cut himself off, bringing himself back to the primary issue at hand. “Bill. I’m pregnant. In the tissue between my bladder and rectum, there are nearly three hundred developing embryos in some sort of monochorionic-diamniotic sac . And that’s just what my doctor counted.”

“You can’t prove they’re mine!” Bill screamed, pointing a finger through the glass.

“No one else has laid fucking eggs inside me!” Ford snarled. He screwed his eyes shut, and rubbed his temples in a poor attempt to get himself back on track. “It doesn’t matter. I don’t care what strange Euclydian breeding ritual this is— that was a lifetime ago. As far as I’m concerned, this is… some abnormal internal growth. One that happens to have your DNA. I figured you had a right to know before I got it removed.”

Bill grew alarmed at the idea. “Removed?! You’re gonna ABORT my babies??”

“Bill, I’m in my sixties, and there’s three hundred of them!” Ford shouted. “I don’t have a uterus! This should not be happening at all! My body can’t handle this!”

“I beg to differ!” Bill retorted. “You and I both know your body can handle a whole lot, Sixer!”

“Not birthing three hundred eggs!”

“You look good with some pounds on you!”

“That is FAR from the point!” Ford put the phone down on the table for a moment, pulling at his hair as he tried to ignore Bill growing red with anger. After his attempt to ground himself, he picked up the phone once more. “I’m getting them removed. I don’t care what you say. I only came here to inform you.”

“Wait!” Bill protested, and it might’ve sounded like pleading if Ford didn’t know any better. “Think this through, Stanford. That’s an extinct species you’re incubating in that tissue pocket of yours!”

“Yes, well, it’s my tissue pocket. I’ll do with it how I see fit,” Ford grumbled.

“It’s not just YOURS anymore, IQ! The fate of my species is in your womb! You’d really genocide my species to save your own skin?” Bill pouted, his eye going wide as a dinner plate.

Ford laughed bitterly. “You are delusional.” He swallowed and avoided Bill’s gaze for a brief moment. “I’m getting the operation tomorrow. Goodbye, Cipher.”

“Wait— nonono— Sixer, c’mon, smart guy, please!” Bill shouted as Ford hung up the phone.

His eyes locked with Bill’s one final time before standing.

“Fordsie, wait!” Bill screeched. “Think of our children together! All three hundred of them! They’d be beautiful! They’d be one-eyed, six-fingered geniuses! They’d be, um—“ He scrambled for new words to plead with as Ford turned his back, “— biodiverse..?”

The appeal to nature was lost, though, on a man who left with no intention to return.

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

When Ford awoke from the procedure, he was not altogether surprised. The IV hooked up to his wrist, the clamp pinching his finger to read his vitals, the beeping from the monitor behind him— he expected just about every part of it.

His eyes lazily drifted across the room until they landed upon his doctor. The anesthesia coursing through him weakened his body, his muscles too tired to move much.

“Dr. Pines, how are you feeling?” the doctor asked.

Ford tried to shrug, but his shoulders were too stubbornly comfortable right where they were. “Fine, I think… Lighter than before.”

“That must be the morphine,” the doctor chuckled. “While it’s still in your system, I’d better tell you the bad news.”

“Bad news?” Ford repeated blearily. 

“The procedure didn’t quite… take,” the doctor explained. “See, when operating in the region where the… growth happens to be, we have to be extremely careful. At your age, one simple mistake in an invasive procedure such as this could be deadly.”

“No, I understand, that makes sense,” Ford murmured dreamily. “Have you considered— and I know this might be a little out of the box here— not making simple mistakes?”

“Dr. Pines, we both know it’s not that simple,” the doctor replied with as much calm as she could muster. “There are variables we have to account for. This growth has tunnelled far into you, and it’s incredibly active. Each time we cut out a segment, the remaining organisms would multiply to fill the space. It’s a miracle of science, honestly— it defies any and all our expectations.”

“Oh, well, why didn’t you open with the whole miracle of science line?” Ford snarked with wide, wet eyes. “Really, I wanted to terminate this parasite growing inside me, but if it’s a miracle of science as you say— oh, wait, no, I just remembered I still don’t want a fucking parasite growing inside me!”

“You know, typically morphine makes patients less inclined towards hostility.”

Ford giggled deliriously. “Doctor, I’m pregnant. As a man. Sans uterus. This is as un-hostile as I get for the time being.”

“Luckily, we have some other options,” the doctor pressed on. “I’ve drawn up a few treatment plans. We can introduce depressants into the organisms’ nervous systems, see if we can slow the growth before removal. And if that doesn’t work, a little riskier, but cauterization of embryos could pose a—“

The doctor rattled off a few more options, to which Ford hardly listened.

“Yes,” Ford replied when she finally finished. “Any and all of those. Whatever gets this damn thing out of me.”

“Dr. Pines, I should warn you— every time we operate in this location, the odds of complications increase,” the doctor explained. “We can try these, but I can’t promise anything. In the downtime between operations, do you have a support system you can talk to about these… unusual circumstances?”

Ford hadn’t quite gotten around to telling his family of the ridiculous predicament he’d found himself in. Stanley would only make fun of him for being pregnant as a man, Mabel would elect to ignore any horrific part of the situation only to zero in on the miracle of life and joys of parenthood. Dipper, in all his anxiety and morbid curiosity, would elect to zero in on every horrifying aspect of the mortifying ordeal.

“I’ll be fine dealing with this on my own,” Ford assured the doctor. 

“Stanford,” she said softly, “just because you can do this alone, doesn’t mean you should.”

He clenched his jaw as he felt the morphine starting to wear off. “Is there some discharge paperwork I need to sign, or—?“

“I know you have loved ones, Stanford, and they can help you through this,” the doctor tried to coax. “You don’t want to carry this to term, and I will try my damn best to ensure you don’t have to. But we both know that organisms like these are unpredictable. It’s a very real possibility that we have to monitor this, and allow it to pass through your system. And it might not be pretty.”

“An understatement.”

“My point is, I want to make sure you have someone you can talk to.” She placed a hand on Ford’s arm. “If you don’t believe me as a doctor, believe me as a mother when I tell you— you’ll need it.”

Mother. After all these years, Ford still didn’t enjoy how the word sounded in such close proximity to him.

To say he disliked the idea of motherhood would be a reduction. He thrashed against the grip of the word like an animal struggles when caught in a snare.

Because it did not matter what parasite was growing inside him, or how much his stomach expanded, or how quickly the vile cells replicated within the stretch of flesh they’d tunnelled into. 

Stanford Pines was not a vessel for Bill Cipher.

Not anymore, at least. And he would not allow his body to be used for a demon’s convoluted agenda again. No guilt trip, or slew of praise, or false promise could possibly persuade him otherwise.

“You’re not listening, are you, Stanford?”

“Of course I am,” Ford lied through his teeth. “Same time next week?”

The doctor sighed. “Yes, Dr. Pines. Same time next week.”

.˳·˖✶𓆩𓁺𓆪✶˖·˳.

Much to his chagrin, Ford found himself returning to the Theraprism. He glared at Bill through the plexiglass as he picked up the phone.

“Back so soon?” Bill asked without a care in the world.

Ford clicked his pen and opened his journal. “Tell me everything you know about Euclydian biology.”

“Not with that attitude!” Bill shot back. “Would a ‘please’ kill you?”

“I didn’t come here to play games with you,” Ford snarled.

“I figured! After all, it’d probably be pretty hard to play a round of Twister with THAT!” Bill taunted.

Ford drew his eyes to where Bill was pointing and staring— to his dread, it was his inflated midsection. His belly had gotten even bigger, somehow. Every item in his wardrobe had gotten uncomfortably tight around his stomach, and it had been getting harder to hide from his family.

“Let me guess. Your attempt at an abortion didn’t quite take?”

“Seven times,” Ford uttered gravely, “seven goddamn times I went in to get your fucking embryos scooped out of me.”

“Nice word choice,” Bill interjected.

“Like a malignant tumor hellbent on killing me, they just kept coming back. Faster and stronger each time. The doctors cannot operate in that stretch of flesh and organs again, apparently, since the risk of fatal complications increases,” Ford grumbled. “They want me to… see if I can pass it through my system.”

Bill guffawed obnoxiously. “That’s doctor-speak for birth, baby!” His eye practically sparkled at the thought. “Aw, gee, Sixer— after all these years, you’re finally having my babies!”

“On one condition,” Ford stipulated. He hated that he might agree with any part of the sentiment. “You tell me everything you know about Euclydian biology, so I have a fighting chance of making it through this somewhat comfortably. I can only carry this… parasite of your DNA… to term if I have some idea of what I’m up against.”

Bill quirked his brow. “And if I don’t?”

Ford leaned forward with narrowed eyes. “I go back home, find a scalpel and a melon baller, and I scoop whatever remains of your species into a clay pot to use as fertilizer for my tomato plants.” Or die trying, he thought to himself, but refused to voice for the sake of maintaining an ounce of control in the situation. 

The question of whether or not Bill actually cared about repopulating his species was one that itched at the back of Ford’s mind for some time. It was entirely possible he was indifferent to the idea, and only used it as a way to toy with Ford all those years ago.

Then again, Ford supposed it was equally possible that Bill really did care. Even if it was only for a brief moment. Even if it was small in comparison to the bloodlust and insatiable craving for unadulterated chaos. 

Despite everything, Bill could care. Possibly. Maybe. And it was Ford’s only bargaining chip.

“Tomato plants,” Bill repeated, as though the words were the most disgusting thing in the world. “You’re such a boring old man now.”

“Does that mean you’ll tell me what to expect from this… gestational period?”

Bill leaned forward in his seat. “What makes you so sure I won’t spew a bunch of bald-faced lies just to see the dumb surprised look on your face?”

Ford leaned forward in his seat too, matching Bill’s grab at control in the conversation. “Mislead me about any part of this pregnancy, and the second something unexpected happens, I get the aforementioned melon baller.”

“Alright, alright,” Bill conceded reluctantly. “Don’t go all Leonid Rogozov on me.”

Bill proceeded to rattle off his limited knowledge about Euclydian biology, a grating sound dulled by the scratch of pen against parchment with every careful note Ford took.

“—then, after being laid and fertilized, the eggs shrink and go into dormancy,” Bill explained.

“So everything you told me all those years ago, about my body breaking down and absorbing the embryos—“

“Was a load of crap, yes, get with the program,” Bill groaned. “ANYways, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted— the zygote-egg-thingies don’t come out of dormancy until your body produces some gestational hormone that signals physiological readiness, or whatever. It’s unique to Euclydians— well, I thought it was.”

“You didn’t do this?” Ford asked. “You didn’t trigger the release of this… Euclydian gestational hormone?”

“Me? Trigger your pregnancy for my own personal amusement?” Bill’s eye widened with feigned innocence. “That doesn’t sound anything like me.”

Ford narrowed his eyes at Bill. 

“Even if I wanted to—“ Bill gestured vaguely to his orange jumpsuit, then to the facility around him, “— between this and the dumb metal plate in your head, I couldn’t flood your various glands with hormones you don’t naturally produce. The proof is in the pudding, IQ!”

“Then how did my human body produce a Euclydian gestational hormone?”

“Beats me!” Bill exclaimed. “The gestational hormone’s an evolutionary thing. Release triggers gestation, and it only releases during indication of physiological readiness. Prevents overpopulation with underprepared parents, you know the drill. Things you humans haven’t caught up on. You really suck at being the apex species, y’know— primates just can’t stop breeding like rabbits!”

“Bill.” Ford paused his writing. “Is there some way I could’ve ingested it? Or… ingested something that made my body produce it?”

“Your guess is a good as mine,” Bill shrugged. “But when that hormone goes off, you start bein’ preggo— and I’m not talkin’ about the sauce! The damn thing grows like a bad tumor!”

“Yes, that brings me to my next question,” Ford said, trying to remain as clinical as he could despite himself, “three hundred goddamn eggs. Should I be expecting to… birth… three hundred organisms?”

Bill seemed to chuckle at the thought. “Good question! Maybe!”

Ford groaned. “You are painstakingly unhelpful.”

“They could stay in their respective sacs and develop like that,” Bill pondered, “but there’s a good chance they start tearing those flimsy flesh-walls apart and eat each other. Limited resources and all. Survival of the fittest, right?”

“Do not regurgitate misinterpreted Darwinism at me,” Ford snarled. “Now, in the event of either three hundred small babies or significantly fewer larger babies— where exactly will they… exit from?”

“Whichever orifice they find first.”

“Great,” Ford spat. “And how long am I supposed to be… carrying?” Ford asked.

Bill thought for a moment. “Dunno!”

“Don’t make me get the melon baller.”

“Really, Sixer!” Bill insisted. “Human pregnancies last, what, nine months, give or take? Euclydian pregnancies last anywhere from two months to two years, depending on the size of the litter! Not to mention, you’re old! Complications arise with that.”

“Complications also arise on account of the fact that I am a man.”

“Man, schmann— there’s a billion genders on Euclydia, and, like, all of them can carry a baby to term. Quit complaining,” Bill scoffed.

Ford went still for a moment. “All of them? Including whatever gender you happen to be?”

Bill blinked very slowly. “Oh… well, it’s really very complicated, you see—“

“God-fucking-damnit, Bill!” Ford shouted, slamming his hand on the table. “All those years ago, you guilted and tortured me about how I was failing as a surrogate, how I was disappointing you, how my mind was the only thing I was good for— all for the sake of repopulating your species, and YOU could’ve been the pregnant one this whole time?!”

“Oh, come on— you know EXACTLY why I wouldn’t wanna be pregnant!” Bill shouted, gesturing to Ford’s hands. “I can see you’ve already gone through the whole nails-in-the-hair-follicles and hairs-in-the-nail-beds thing! I have gorgeous lashes, Stanford! I can’t afford to lose ‘em!”

“So your next course of action was to make me your incubator?? And thirty years after the fact?!” Ford fumed. “To hell with your lashes, Bill!”

Bill gasped dramatically, clutching the collar of his orange jumpsuit. “How dare you. There’s only so much I can excuse as you being hormonal, Stanford!”

With a huff of frustration, Ford slammed his journal shut, hardly waiting for the last of his ink to dry. “You know what? I’ve gotten everything I need from you. I won’t put up with you for another second. I’ll raise this child, or children, or small village on my own. With the help of several doctors and an adoption agency, maybe. But it will be done without you.”

Ford stood from his chair. “Goodbye, Cipher. I mean it this time.”

“Wait, Fordsie, hold on one second—“ Bill pleaded. “Don’t I get the right to see the little guys? They’re mine too, y’know!”

“No,” Ford whispered coldly, hanging up the phone.

As he turned to leave, he heard Bill screeching and clawing from behind the plexiglass. He hastily lifted the phone once more.

“What the fuck do you want??” Ford hissed.

“Sixer,” Bill murmured solemnly, “that’s the last of my species you’re carrying.”

He looked, for a moment, almost sorrowful.

“I’m aware.”

“You’re really not gonna let me meet my next of kin?”

Ford bit the inside of his cheek hard. He would not fall for Bill’s manipulation again. He couldn’t. There was so much more at stake now. His family, for instance, and that could have been reason enough.

But there was an urge in him, loud and feral and desperate— some beaten animal inside him that wanted to scrape at his own flesh and carve words into his skin that might cover up the tattoos and marks Bill had etched into his body so long ago.

Not yours.

Along his neck, across his knuckles, over his lower back, Ford wanted to scar the words not yours all along his body, in the event that Bill would someday get another glimpse.

In the event that Bill would need a reminder that Ford was not the doe-eyed, daisy-fresh scientist whom he could win over with sugary praise. His skin was no longer the white canvas for Bill to engrave his morbid masterpiece upon. His flesh, his bones, his tissue, his body—

Not. Yours.

Then again, had Ford chosen to carve the reminder into his skin each time the urge arose, he too would have to see the words every time he’d look in the mirror; they would speak not only to Bill, but to himself. Each patch of scabbing and blood would only serve as grim reminder of how he’d once forfeit his own autonomy, the message itself would drill deeper and deeper into his own head before it even scratched the surface of Bill’s each time he’d read the words—

Not yours.

The thought was interrupted, as if often was, by Bill. He let out some strangled sobbing noise that pulled Ford from the macabre idea entirely.

“Just—“ Bill sounded like he was about to get choked up, “just take care of them, okay? None of that stale coffee and crappy ramen. No liquor or cigars—“

“—or raw fish, or undercooked eggs,” Ford finished the list, uninterested with Bill’s bullshit performance of grief. “I know. The doctor gave me very precise instructions.”

“What will you tell them about me?”

Ford could only roll his eyes. “I’ll tell them you were an irresponsible, manipulative asshole who only ever wanted to host parties and use people for his own amusement.”

Bill chuckled bitterly as though he considered it a fair description. “Can you tell them I was an irresponsible, manipulative asshole who loved them?”

For a moment, Ford almost bought it.

Almost.

“Bill, for Christ’s sake, you don’t even know them—“ Ford groaned with the realization. “You’re fucking with me, right? You’re appealing to my emotions, and you’re fucking with me?”

Bill cocked a brow. “Is it working?”

“Yes, it’s working, you jackass,” Ford snapped. “One visit with the offspring, through the glass. Behave.”

“And then I get to see ‘em all the time?” Bill bubbled, far too much hope in his expression for a man in an orange jumpsuit.

“Don’t push it.”

“I’ll keep trying.”

Ford sighed. “If that’s all, I’ll be leaving now. I promised Mabel I’d take her to see the meteor shower—“

“Buh-bye,” Bill dismissed him with a careless little wave, as though he hadn’t been begging for a visit with his unborn children mere seconds ago.

Nevertheless, Ford hung up the phone. He picked up his journal, and made his way to the door as quickly as he could.

“I hate to see you leave, but I love to watch you waddle away!” Bill shouted from his spot behind the plexiglass.

Ford elected to ignore the harassment. Bill only ever did it to get a rise out of him, and Ford had learned to pick his battles.

As he ensured the door shut behind him, he removed the thrumming otherworldly device from his breast pocket, the tiny red light still blinking on the side of the metal-screened tablet.

“Did you get all that?” Ford asked the Theraprism worker who approached him— some orb-like being who radiated light.

“Every word,” the orb of light replied, taking the device out of Ford’s hand and absorbing it. “I’m amazed, honestly. That’s the most he’s ever talked about his home dimension.”

Ford adjusted his trench coat, trying his best to hide his belly in any way he could. “That is what you were after, correct?”

“Absolutely. And you got us further than we could’ve hoped,” the orb praised. “Thank you for your assistance. Now, we understand you may have some reservations about this arrangement—“

“None whatsoever, actually,” Ford cut in. He was not particularly bothered to uphold psychological ethics when it came to Bill. This facility could electrocute the triangular bastard into opening up, for all Ford cared; cutting a deal with the exasperated staff to coax information out of Bill was not something he readily objected to, especially when they’d given him such an enticing offer. “I was actually wondering about the, um… materials I was promised in exchange for upholding my end of the bargain.”

“Of course.” The orb of light seemed to rummage through whatever pocket of its being held its inventory. “Did you get a chance to notify Cipher about the parental outpatient visitation compromise we’ve worked out?”

“Ah, forgive me— I’m afraid it slipped my mind,” Ford replied. “Will that be a problem?”

“Not in the slightest. We have ample opportunity to tell him ourselves,” the orb beamed. Then, it carefully set the contained substance in Ford’s hands. “Do be careful with this in your travels. It’s a bit volatile, and extremely powerful.”

“I’m well aware,” Ford beamed without missing a beat. “I’ve had my fair share of experience with NowUSeeItNowUDon'tTium.”

It wasn’t a lie, despite his previous deceit to the orb. Ford did have plenty of experience with the powerful element he’d gingerly pocketed. 

“May I ask what you’re planning to do with such a compound?”

Ford wanted to hiss and run away like some sort of mad-scientist-possum, but he brushed away the inclination in favor of following basic social courtesy. “Oh, just the usual scientific research. Toying with solutions to the world’s energy crisis, ending world hunger, overthrowing various mining industries— you know how it is.”

The orb seemed to nod in agreement. “Well, don’t let me keep you— your transportation vessel’s arranged and ready to bring you home.”

Of course, Ford didn’t plan on doing any of the items he’d listed to ward off suspicion. Well, not for the time being— perhaps in his free time later down the line whenever he’d be a bit less pregnant.

But for the time being, he hopped in the strange dimensional travel sphere (which felt a little like a hamster ball rolling through gelatin at warp speed wherein he temporarily possessed the ability to smell sounds) and took his ride home.

For the time being, he tried his best to make his waddle less evident in his strides down to the lab.

For the time being, Ford took his black portmanteau out from under his bed. Dust puffed up from inside the case as he opened it, fanning away particles to get a good look at the case’s contents.

Some gears and parts, bits and pieces, scraps Ford would have to weld the hell out of before they became useful. He carefully took the satchel of NowUSeeItNowUDon'tTium out of his pocket, placing it into the portmanteau.

It was a vague and fragmented silhouette, but Ford was an experienced man in such matters. He knew damn well he could pull it together in time.

He’d built the quantum destabilizer gun to kill Bill Cipher once before.

He could do it a second time.