(Sorry it's short)
"That Stanford is his brother," Bill told her. They'd both decided that so. He'd thought he'd told her this before. "That other 'Ford was just his twin," Bill told her.
"Ah, that's what I meant. Sorry, still having trouble keeping that straight, they're all named Ford, it's… difficult for me." Miz pouted. Telling people apart was hard enough, much less dimensional counterparts of the same person! She needed a nickname for them.
Bill was a little concerned that his sister was having trouble keeping three dimensions straight; what would happen if she tried looking at closer to an infinite number of them? ...Well, she had said that she'd found it hard to keep track of what was what here, though, because she'd had no practice in her own dimensional set; because in hers, she'd only had one set to keep track of. So maybe she just needed more practice? It was almost-definitely why she had been so confused about the events that had happened here in this dimension so far, and how and why they'd happened, too! --But that was a problem for later. For NOW…
"That Stanford is Sixer is my six-fingered hand, and he's MINE," Bill told her patiently. "Sixer is Stanley's brother," Bill continued. "'Ford is the other six-fingered Stanford, and Stanley's twin. This 'Ford that is HERE is a third six-fingered Stanford. He is NOT Stanley's twin, or Stanley's brother," Bill told her.
"So… the young Ford here is Mini-Ford, your Sixer is Ford who is also Sixer, and Stanley's real twin who is dead currently is…" Miz paused. "Fister?" she shuddered "That's an awful nickname for his symbol…"
"Mini-'Fister', if you insist on that nickname for 'Ford," Bill corrected her. "And 'Ford doesn't have a symbol," Bill told her, not quite flatly. "He has not, and never will be, part of my Zodiac. Never." Bill refused. ...And then Bill's stony-gazed look softened slightly into a thinking frown. "But yes," he told Miz, "If he ever was going to be on anyone's Zodiac, his symbol would be a squeezed-closed-fist that never lets ANYTHING escape its grasp, not EVER." He eyed her sidelong. "You will NOT add him to your own Zodiac," he told her straight-out. And if she tried...
Well. There was a REASON that he wasn't planning on bringing him back to life while Miz was still around. He didn't want to risk what might happen if 'Ford tried to pressure her to… Or what 'Ford would realize might be a possibility (it wasn't) if he managed to get in contact with other dimensional sets (he wouldn't) with other Bills in them (he <i<wouldn't, Bill would SEE to that)--
Miz shivered. "I don't want him. If Fister is anything like Mini…" She frowned. "Is Fister like Mini?"
"Yes," Bill told her. "They are almost exactly the same," he told her, "Except 'Ford was not the one kicked out of his home in his own home dimension; Stanley was."
"Then there is no way I'm ever going to let either of them in my Zodiac. Mini's a jerk, and it sounds like Fister was a jerk too." Miz huffed.
"Yes, he is, and yes, he was," Bill said, of those two 'Ford's. "And that's GOOD to hear, that you won't do that ever! --You should remember that!" he told her, as he started patting her on the head. "Don't forget it! EVER."
Because as far as Bill was concerned, the very last thing that any him-who-was-also-a-him needed, let alone should want -- whether they were in their right mind, or left mind, or sideways mind, or not -- was that 'Ford Pines on their Zodiac.
Frankly, he couldn't IMAGINE a him-that-was-also-him who WOULD.
Making Deals with 'Ford had been one thing, but having him as a Zodiac?!? --NO THANK YOU!! (As far as Bill was concerned, it was one of the ONLY things the stupid frilly lizard had EVER gotten right!)
Miz nodded. "I won't let Fister or Mini in my Zodiac. Never ever. I don't like them. I don't want them."
"GOOD," Bill repeated, as he continued to pat her gently on the head. Miz purred softly. She was worried about her own zodiac now. She really, really hoped her own Ford wasn't going to be anything like Mini. He was cute, sure, but he was also a Grade-F jerk. Miz was still holding out hope that maybe he could grow out of it, get better. She'd asked Stan about it, and maybe he could do something. But if he couldn't… well, Miz still had time before her own zodiac all converged. She would stalk the Earth for Stanford Pines and make sure he didn't grow up into a monster if she had to. ...and the other members of her zodiac too!
This thought in mind, Miz drifted off to sleep, nestled in her brother's arms, safe and secure in his soft embrace.
----
Tuesday morning rolled around, and Stan was making pancakes for breakfast again.
Stan let out a sigh at the routine they'd all already started to kind of fall into, and how maybe the younger twins had seemed to have maybe gotten a little too used to it, already. He had never planned on staying forever, just long enough to help get the kids enough financial stability to make it through high school -- and enough food and shelter to last 'em a decent chunk of time on top of that, in case the money all got stolen -- and between the ridiculous con they'd pulled using DragonMiz, along with all the money Stan made, the teenagers certainly had plenty of cash in their pockets, now. And those new additions that Miz had added onto the Stan O' War for them weren't nothing to sneeze at either. Neither were the ones that he and Ford had put together, too. And along with the rest of the general 'renovations'...
Anyway, Stan had decided long-since that they would only spend the one full week here, and he'd been planning everything around that accordingly. One week would be enough time to finish out the kid's 'bet', be long enough to settle their younger twin selves, give them enough time to fix up the boat and make enough money to tide the two of 'em over for a couple more months at minimum, and make sure that all the paperwork at the school was done and handled for all of 'em. And that included handling the pull-back of the demon-kids too, since it would be suspicious if they pulled the demon kids out of school without any explanation. And for the demon-kids, the explanation was that they were going back to being homeschooled again. He was going to hand off the paperwork to the office that morning, the demons would finish through the end of the day today (Tuesday), and that'd be the week; they'd come back to the boat for one last dinner together, and then they'd all go home again that night.
---
Things were somewhat tense between the teenagers at school that day. Lee was still more than a little worried for his brother's life and safety. At the very least, Sixer was keeping his mouth shut. ...Well, he still couldn't speak. Bill had frozen his voice again this morning, just as a 'safety precaution', and neither of the older-thems had complained about it.
Miz, for her part, told the teachers that Sixer had temporarily lost his voice. Sixer kept instinctively raising his hand during class to answer but every time he did it, Miz would just reach over, entwine her fingers with his, and pull his hand right back down. "Let the other kids have a chance to answer," she told him every last time, in the same gentle-sounding tones.
Sixer wasn't sure what to think of Miz at this point.
Miz had outright told him that she didn't like him just yesterday. And she'd been so angry (and unreasonable) about everything, too, but... she was still willing to be around him? To touch him and hold his hand in the classroom, but not when they were out in the hallway? Why? Was this just a girl thing? Where they made absolutely no sense? But even though it seemed like Miz had forgiven him, since she was being nice to him again, she had agreed to let Bill continue freezing his voice this morning! Where was the reason in that?! --Even after the older Stanley's talk the night before, Sixer just didn't understand...
With Sixer unable to talk that day, their classes actually went by almost smoothly. The demons did their thing, and... the rest of the school seemed sad to hear that they would be leaving. Miz sat with Mary during their Art class and chatted with her.
"So you're leaving?" Mary asked sadly. "Do you still live around here? Can we still hang out?"
"Eh, we're gonna be going back to another dimension," Miz shrugged as she sketched. "I could give you a communications device so we could keep in touch, but I don't know if that would be safe." Miz glanced around. "The government might come after you," she warned.
Mary rolled her eyes. (So did Bill.) "If you don't want to keep in touch, just say so. You don't have to make up excuses," she said.
Miz pouted. Then she sighed. "Well… there's a chat room I'm in. And, it exists outside of time. So I guess… if you can keep this on the down low, so that you don't get captured and interrogated for having it…" She folded some paper down over itself, again and again before clasping her hands around it, covering the paper and squeezed. Then Miz opened her hands and handed Mary a small metallic object. It was almost flat, rectangular in shape and around the size of two quarters side by side. "Here. It's not a full Com; it only has the chat room function, and it's only hooked up to mine. You wouldn't be the only human on the chat, either. I've got a friend, his handle is Student and he's always online so even if I'm not on, you'd have someone to speak to." (Sixer was outright staring at the girls as he listened to this, jealousy gleaming in his eyes.)
Mary frowned as she turned the 'thing' she'd just been given around in her hands. "Ah… that was a neat trick but--"
And then Miz took it from her and placed it down on the table in front of her. "Right, turning it on." She placed her index finger in the middle of the rectangle. "Press and hold for three seconds--" Miz demonstrated, doing so herself, and the chip let out a soft 'beep' and then a holographic display screen appeared above it. Miz moved her hand away and a holographic keyboard materialized below the screen, next. "So you can read what people have written up here, and type in your comments with this." Miz explained. Mary's jaw dropped open.
Sixer's hands were twitching. But Bill was staring at him, eyes lidded low, just daring him to try and make a grab for the device. (Which Lee noticed, and had him putting a warning and restraining hand over Sixer's own.)
"If you want to turn it off, just press your finger to it for another three seconds," Miz explained to Mary next, who still looked rather gobsmacked. "It's solar powered. So make sure to let it soak in some sunlight every few days," Miz continued. "See this bar down here?" Miz asked as she turned the chip over to reveal the bottom. "That's your battery life. It'll dull to black, square by square, as it runs out -- so just make sure you check on it." Miz told her. Mary was still staring. Surprisingly, no one else in class seemed to see the glowing holographic display.
"There's a built in Perception Filter, too, so unless you're really obvious about stuff when you're using it, people shouldn't notice that there's anything strange about it. Or notice it at all," Miz explained. "It's also keyed in to you and will only work for you -- and me, of course -- and there's a protection effect to prevent it from being broken or opened up by curious people who might break it." Miz deliberately did not glance at Sixer as she said this, though Lee knew his brother understood the jab.
Bill reached out and touched a finger to it himself, carefully, assessing. The protections she'd put in place were already very robust, but... "Might want to just make it intangible to any person or animal that tries to touch it, or use a tool or cloth or anything-similar to pick it up or otherwise touch it, little sis," was Bill's contribution to the idea of 'safeing' the device, as he slowly pulled his hand back. "Protection effects are all well and good, but making it hard to grab or touch tools to in the first place makes it that much harder to modify," Bill noted. "Keeps anyone with a set of sticky fingers from running off with it, too!"
"Good idea." Miz made some modifications and nodded at Mary. "Any questions for things I forgot to tell you?" Miz asked.
Mary stared at her (kinda?) friend. "This is amazing. You're… really from the future, huh?" she said, almost reflectively.
Miz shrugged. "We weren't lying about that. We're from another dimension, which is an alternate future. Though I'm actually not from the same dimensional set as brother." Miz explained.
"Wait, what?" Lee asked as he set his own sketch aside, hands covered in charcoal dust. They were siblings, but they weren't from the same…??
"Bill and I are actually dimensional counterparts. Like you and the older Stan," Miz said. "Bill is much older than me. And he's a guy," she explained, as if that made any lick of sense, before turning back to Mary. "So yeah, this way we can keep in touch, just please don't go getting yourself grabbed by the government or something."
Mary nodded, staring in awe at the holographic display. She placed her finger on the keyboard and tapped a few buttons, watching the words appear on the screen. "This is so cool!" she enthused. It was like… like having her own personal typewriter! --Only better!
Lee was glancing back and forth between Bill and Miz, while trying not to stare. They were… the same person? Like him and the older Stan? --Well, okay, not the same obviously, but… Lee groaned. He wasn't going to think about it. He just wasn't going to think about it. This was too messed up and weird. (Did the older-thems know this?)
Sixer really wanted to get his hands on that communications device that Miz had so easily handed over to someone so wholly undeserving of it. He felt it was really, truly unfair. --Why did Miz give one to some random girl and not him? That girl wouldn't even appreciate how amazing it was! She couldn't possibly!
It was so infuriatingly unfair!
---
(I plan on taking a break soon, nothing long but maybe like a week, what do you guys think? You could potentially change my mind since it is just a thought at the back of my mind.)