Star moaned. This story was lagging in rainbows and magic. "This story is boring!" She rudely interrupted.

"Gee, thanks." Stan said sarcastically. Marco came in next. He gave a chuckle before speaking up. "Sorry." He apologized as if he was in control of Star's actions. "She, uh, gets like that sometimes."

Even Mabel had an objection. "Well, this is just not right." She began. "You guys shouldn't fight like this. It's time you guys push aside your differences and hug it out! Hug it out! Hug train is coming in the station! Hugapalooza! Two thousand!"

"As I was saying," Stan began again with his story, ignoring his niece's request. "There I was. Trying to take on the world by myself. I went along to the beach to go treasure hunting. Although, searching for gold is harder than it seems. Turns out, gold is some kind of...rare metal." As Stan went on, Marco tried his best to hold back a snicker. Even his brother covered his mouth with his hand to muffle his laugh. Stan glared at his brother and he changed his laugh to a phony cough. "Anyways," He started again, one last time. "I struck a different kind of gold...in sales."

Stan went on to telling the kids about how he became a salesman and attempted to sell people "Rip Off" band aids that weren't supposed to give you rashes, but, did and "Sham Total" towels that could get rid of stains, however, only made stains worse. With all the unhappy customers from every state, Stan drove to the next city, in search of a new sale to make. Unfortunately, he had been banned from his hometown, New Jersey due to his false advertising. "So," Stan said. "With a quick name change, Steve Pinington was ready to take on Pennsylvania."

Because of Stan's failure at sales, he never did get to settle in one place. Constantly being banned from every state, he moved all around the country, sometimes outside of it, in search of his big break.

"So that explains all those fake ID's." Mabel rang in.

Dipper brought Stan's brother to his attention. "But, what about you? Did you ever get to go to your dream school?"

Stan's brother, Stanford, dropped his eyes to the ground in shame. "Not exactly." The way he was able to show his emotions calmed Dipper. Stanford was just an ordinary person with human feelings. It relaxed Dipper to know the man was not threatening or some alien from outer space.

Stanford told his side of their story, using a strong vocabulary. "I went to Backupsmore University instead. It was obviously a low-ranked, insufficient school and in a degrading place like that, I managed to work twice as hard. I needed to show the professors and teachers that I was more than any other ordinary student. And, fortunately, that's what I had done. I went from undergrad to PhD three years ahead of schedule, wrote a thesis that was nationally ranked, and was awarded an enormous grant for my own scientific research."

He talked and Dipper listened in amazement. As for Star and Mabel-well, let's just say Stanford's story was a bedtime story to them. Neither of them knew the big, unsatisfying words he spoke. They almost were close to shutting their eyes and falling asleep. To them, this story could be going by a bit faster if it wasn't for the long, unusual words. Marco was in between. He wasn't as intrigued as Dipper, but, he also wasn't losing consciousness due to lack of interest.

Stanford soon went on to talking about how he wanted to study odd and strange anomalies and moving to Gravity Falls because of the highest concentration of anomalies in the town. He built his own house in the woods of the town, isolated from the rest of the townsfolk to study in peace. He told the kids about how he began to record his findings of the creatures and happenings in a series of journals. Dipper nearly jumped up out of his seat in shock. "Wait, so you're-!"

Stanford raised his eyebrows. He wasn't sure where Dipper was getting at. "Then that means...you wrote the journals?!"

"You've read my journals?"

Dipper let out a girly-like, high pitched, ear-piercing screech that served as an alarm clock to wake up Mabel and Star from their light slumbers. "I haven't just read them! I've lived them." He paced back and forth with a smile on his face that grew from ear-to-ear. Suddenly, he felt his stomach churn and flop from excitement. He held his gut, trying to keep the stomach acid down. "I think...I'm...I'm gonna throw up!" His stomach acid rose and tickled the back of his throat and Dipper shielded his mouth with one of his hands. Mabel rushed to his side to give him a caring, sisterly pat on the back. Dipper began ducking deep gulps of air, trying not to hyperventilate from the sudden news. The man standing before him was The Author of The Journals. He was alive and well and actually here before Dipper's eyes. When the boy was sure the vomit had kept itself down, he opened his mouth to finally talk. "I-I can't believe it! This is insane! I've been looking for you the whole summer! Oh my gosh, this is incredible! Where were you?! What happened to you?! Did you build this portal?!" Dipper spoke with a lot of excitement and speed. At his last sentence, he gestured to the totaled, silent portal in front of them.

"I'm getting to that." Stanford answered, proceeding to tell his story. "As I was saying, I began to keep a journal-"

Once again, Dipper screamed. The room was quiet for a second and Stanford continued. "Just going to ignore that. Anyway, there were anomalies everywhere. And the more I searched, the more I discovered. Gnomes, ghosts, lake monsters, floating eyeballs - you name it."

At this point, all of the kids' attentions were caught by their interest in the monsters and the mythical creatures Stanford had come upon. Especially Star, who had straightened up in her seat next to Marco to gasp. "You mean like...magic?!" Her eyes glimmered with delight.

"Basically, yes."

"And zombies?!" Marco chimed in.

"Especially zombies."

"Even unicorns?!" Mabel commented.

Star gasped again, getting up to respond to Mabel. "I love unicorns!" Mabel couldn't stop herself from chuckling at Star's sudden outburst.

"Yes, yes. I've seen it all." Stanford laughed.

Then, Stan barged in. "Meanwhile, your old uncle Stan was doing just fine living on my own. I had come up with a new, sophisticated business strategy." Sure enough, Stan was stretching the truth. Back then, he relied in lottery tickets to help him make money. Only he never won, he wasted the only money he had. "And the best part was I didn't need help from nobody."

Marco bit his tongue and kept himself from correcting Stan's lousy grammar. Once again, Stan had lied to make himself appear more proud of his 'independent' life away from home. He still remembered the time when he anonymously called his brother from a payphone. He missed his brother so much, he just had to at least hear his voice.

"Hello. This is Stanford Pines."

Stanley immediately hung up. He didn't want his brother to know it was him. He didn't want Stanford to know that he wanted to come back home and see him. Wherever Stanford was, it sounded like he was doing great without his own brother. It must be great for him to not have Stanley always following him and riding on his coattails. As for Stanley, he had been living in his car for nearly a decade. He had nothing left. His brother was all that remained important to Stanley.

Back then, thirty years ago, Stan had bought his own apartment with the money he was barely able to save up. Meanwhile, Stanford was hard at work. His studies were beginning to get too crowded for just one journal. After keeping track of three series a journals, Stanford began to wonder. Where were all these anomalies coming from?

Stanford needed answers. He needed to know where it was all coming from. He figured it must have been the cause of another strange dimension that leaked the anomalies into the earth dimension. Stanford finally decided he needed help. He called his old college friend, Fiddleford McGucket, to be his partner. His brilliant plan - to create a machine that would give him the answers to his questions - a portal. Together, they spent many long, exhausting nights trying to perfect the machine. There were even a couple of moments where they would use so much energy, it would result in the town's power to surge.

Finally, after a year or two, the portal was ready to be put to the test. Stanford and McGucket were going to send a dummy to go through to the other side. However, what was supposed to be Stanford's greatest achievement yet, quickly became horribly wrong. They let go of the rope, launching the dummy into the portal. Although, the rope had gotten tangled on McGucket's ankle, pulling him into the portal as well. Luckily for him, Stanford was there to grab the rope, right in the nick of time.

Stanford told the kids about how he had to reel Fiddleford back into the earth dimension and how Fiddleford walked out on him, leaving nothing but a warning behind. Fiddleford had cautioned Ford to shut down the portal or else the earth would perish.

With his only partner gone, Ford had feared he was losing his sanity. The only person he could turn to now to help him make sure his experiment was never activated again, he called for help from his brother - the brother he hadn't seen in the last ten years.

Stanley sat on his unmade, apartment bed. He was deep in his daydreams when a knock made him jump. "Just give me a few more days, Rico! I'll pay your goons back, I swear!" Stanley rambled on, thinking his apartment dealer was at the door.

Luckily for him, it was just the mailman, delivering a postcard to him. He slipped it through the slot and walked back to his truck. Stanley picked up the postcard. On the cover, was "Gravity Falls, Oregon". When he flipped the card to the other side, he saw Ford's handwriting. Stanley could feel a tear forming in the corners of his eyes. It was his brother, alright. "Please come - Ford" was written in capital letters.

And that's exactly what Stanley was going to do.