For Your Flesh Do My Curtains Part.

Let's Talk About Ford

Stan and Rick had planned to part ways until Rick spotted what kind of a state Stan's car was in. The bonnet crushed, the entire hood almost ripped off, the engine smoking and almost totally shot, antifreeze spilling out the sides and dripping onto the rad underneath. An oil leak. So many problems wrong with that hunk of crap. "Geez Lee," Rick complained. "What the - What the hell'd you do to that thing?" Rick coughed as he opened the bonnet and black smoke puffed out.

"Hey," Stanley pouted, pointing an accusatory finger at Rick. "You cant talk about my baby like that!" he fondled the door handle of the car. "The Stanmobile's as pretty as they get. May not look like much but she gets me from A to....well, A on good days,"

"Uh huh," Rick agreed, unimpressed. "And why haven't you got it fi-UUUURRRRPPPP -xed?"

Stanley snorted. "Pffft, are you kiddin'? I'm not wasting money on a mechanic Rick, do you know how much those repairs cost?!"

Rick raised an eyebrow, watching Stanley curiously. "You're a real tightwad aint ya?"

"What gave it away?" Stanley asked, grinning a little, his eyes sparkling with something neither man could place, some binding force that made Stanley and Rick drawn to each other on a level deeper than either could understand, and there wasn't much that Rick couldn't understand. He couldn't even understand the chemical process behind it, that was how complicated this feeling was. He knew that love was dopamine and happiness was endorphins, but this feeling seemed to transcend way beyond both of those things. Although neither man would admit it out loud.

"Look," Rick relented, mainly just because he hated leaving a job unfinished, even one he hadn't actually started. "I can fix your car for free,"

"Really?!" Stanley asked. Rick swore that he saw the older man's eyes become dollar signs.

"Yeah," Rick shrugged, trying to act casual. "Whatever. You're fucking helping though,"

A few hours later Rick was underneath the car, tinkering with the exhaust or something Staley didn't know about. As far as he was concerned there was nothing wrong with the inner workings of the car, but Rick seemed to think otherwise and he was inclined to believe the scientist. Stanley walked over with a cold beer in his hand, giving it to Rick as he slid out from underneath. Rick was only wearing a white tank top with oil stains dotted around it, and Stanley found himself staring at the arms with lithe muscles. He tried to fight the blush creeping up his cheeks by scowling. "Here," Stanley offered the beer to Rick who took it with a sour look.

"Beer? Really?" Rick scoffed, popping the top of the bottle and pouring something from his whiskey flask into it, mixing the light coloured beer with the darker liquid. Stanley watched as Rick downed it without any hindrance. "Now th-that's what a drink tastes like Lee,"

Stanley couldn't help but blush at the nickname. He hoped Rick didn't notice. Rick stood up, wiping some excess oil off his hands with a dirty rag and some whiskey off his chin with his sleeve. "It's going to be a hot one tonight," Rick mused. Stanley nodded.

"Yeah,"

As dusk became darkness and the stars twinkled overhead, Rick and Stan lay side-by-side on the hood of the car, their legs dangling off the front. They watched the clouds pass across the moon, thin and wispy. Other than that the  night was clear. Rick, as always, was incredibly drunk. Bottles lay around the floor on his side, a few on Stanley's side too. Rick had also snorted something pink from a little baggie, but that wasn't Stanley's scene so he didn't get involved. "Rick?" he asked after some time, his voice childlike and curious. "What was Ford like?"

Rick sighed as if trying to find the best possible answer. He sat up, groaning as he rested his back against the busted windshield. Stanley stayed lying down; the thing might have been able to support Rick's weight but he was a different story. "Ford was a nerd," Rick began. When he caught the look in Stanley's eye he decided to elaborate. "He was so smart. Not as smart as me, but too good for Backupsmore,"

Stanley gulped, looking down guiltily; an action which didn't go unnoticed by Rick. "But he was pretentious. Too big for his breeches. He hated that I drank, that I smoked, that I was late to class and stuff. Yet I was still smarter than him," Rick scoffed. "He used to argue with me all the time, whenever we were paired up for an assignment or experiment. I even remember him saying that I reminded him of you," Rick smiled thoughtfully. Stanley didn't know what he had been expecting, but it certainly hadn't been that. He knew that Ford had been pissed at him for the incident at school but the fact that he was talking about him in university like that...it really made him think. He had screwed up everything for his brother, even if he didn't mean to. And now he was just getting his come-up-ins. Rick noticed the sudden heavy atmosphere. "Look, I don't know what happened with you two, but your brother was a fuckin jerk,"

"You're right," Stanley got off the bonnet. "You don't know what happened Rick," he said,  in a tone harsher than he intended to. He started walking away, even though it was his car. "Can I get the keys to your spaceship?" he asked, as if this was the most ordinary thing in the world. Rick shrugged, lobbing the keys over to Stanley who caught them expertly. He couldn't help but smile as he did so, walking away and leaving Rick to his thoughts. He knew he was supposed to be storming away in anger but damn was it hard to stay mad at Rick.

Unfortunately, Rick had other plans. He and Ford had been working on a device before Ford had fucked off - to Oregon he assumed - that allowed someone to read the other's thoughts. It was simple enough, however Ford had taken the only prototype as well as the blueprints. Being just a little smarter than Ford, Rick quickly configured a concept that would work just as well if not better than that stupid little helmet. It was to do with conductors, the nerves which allowed electricity to pass through the brain. If Rick had the correct conductor, something metal, he could transfer those electrodes onto a computer screen, similar to the design Stephen Hawking used for his chair. But hopefully better. After configuring the device and inwardly apologising to Stanley in advance in case his head blew up, Rick went over to his spaceship to find Stanley passed out amongst empty beer cans. "And he has the auda-UUURRRRPPP- city to complain ab-about m-my drinking problem. Sheesh," Rick muttered to himself before throwing the helmet on Stanley and hooking it up to his junk laptop.

A search bar appeared on the screen. "Right, what to search for..." Rick mused. He typed in 'Stanford Pines' but that came up with waaaaayyyyyy too many results. He scratched his chin for a while before trying. 'Stanford Pines betrayal'. Bingo. Three results, and Rick read them all. He was surprised to see the first one, the perpetual motion device Stanford built broke, just when Stanley was standing near it. Rick had to hand it to the guy, he certainly was dramatic. If he thought he had ruined his brother's life he was sorely mistaken. Rick had expected that Stanley felt guilty abut something but seriously, this was ridiculous. The machine had broken because Ford built it wrong, not because of anything Stanley did. But whatever. Rick thought that he might as well look at the next two results just to get some context. He was both amazed and enraged by what he saw. Ford, in his arrogance just walked out on his fucking brother without so much as a goodbye, all up and ready to go to some fancy college and crushing their dreams of becoming explorers. Rick snarled, hating Ford more and more. But the last one was what surprised him the most, although in hindsight he knew it shouldn't have.

Ford had always claimed too be the more intelligent brother, even using Stanley's name as an insult against Rick. From what Rick could see, Ford was incredibly wrong. He wasn't nearly as imaginative as Stanley. Stanley had managed to fabricate his own twist on his memories. Even though Ford had gone to Backupsmore because his machine hadn't worked, Stanley seemed to have always believe that he was holding his brother back. Like everything was his fault; everything that went wrong in Ford's life. Rick had to hand it to Stanley; the guy had a talent for fucking things up, sure. But putting the weight of that burden on himself? No wonder the guy ended up living in his car on those streets. Rick shook his head in both admiration and disapproval, a wry grin creeping onto his face. He knew more than one way to make his Lee forget about Ford.

Author's Note: I know I insult Ford a lot in this chapter. I love Ford, really! But Stan didn't break his machine. At all. It was flimsy.