Au where Stan finds the duffle bag.
Basically it’s like a week or two before the science fair, Stan is minding his business (sort of) and while he’s going through a closet/cabinet trying to find some supplies, either for the Stan’o’War or his car, he finds a duffle bag. Curious he rummages through the bag, inside are some toiletries, 20 bucks, and clothing- wait a second. Those are his; his shirt, his pants, his socks— all stuff he has been missing for a couple of weeks. He’s confused, scared, and worried.
Why would his stuff be in here? Why are there toiletries? Why is there money? And who put them there? Unfortunately he already has his answer. Pa was always clear that none of his children would continue leech off of him. If you had nothing to prove then you had nothing to take. The conversation behind the principal’a door swarmed through his mind. How long had pa had his bag packed? Was this always the plan? Was Stanley really that worthless?
But that didn’t matter because Ford wouldn’t choose a school over him! They were going to sail the world together and that would be that, to hell with Pa if he wanted Stan gone then fine he didn’t need him, he didn’t need anyone but his brother and the sea!
At first Stan wants to tell Ford about what he found, but decides not to because in the end it won’t be important. So he keeps quiet and decides to take the bag into his car, after all hey 20 bucks and he gets his stuff back! He can’t leave it in his room cause if Pa finds out he was snooping through his stuff, well he’d rather not think about that.
Then the conversation on the swing set happens, and Stan’s head starts spinning. So it wasn’t just Pa who wanted Stan out, Ford was willing to ditch him too. Stan feels betrayed and hurt, he doesn’t know what to say or what to do. He starts to question his theory, did ford help pack his bag? Was that why he had been so distant lately, feeling guilty for letting his Pa kick him out and even helping him with the bag?
Did ma know? Eventually Ford leaves, huffing from Stan’s lack of enthusiasm and response, mumbling about being jealous that he has a better future up ahead, not just some silly childish dream. Stan snaps, not physically, not with his words: just emotionally.
Fine if they don’t want him there then he’ll just leave. That night while everyone is asleep he grabs all of his money, more clothing, a sketch book, his comics— a picture of him and ford on the stan’o’war— and some other things he thinks might be valuable or just handy. And he drives away.
Nobody notices Stanley’s disappearance the next day, not until night has fallen. Ford cheerfully excited with his new full ride scholarship, goes and tells his parents. Caryn is happy, tears of joy falling down her face as she hugs her intelligent baby boy, his father gives a small smile and a nod— he gives his approval. But the mood changes once he questions where Stanley is. No one has seen him in hours, actually his car has been gone since early morning. They wait awake all night, hoping for some sign, some clue!
Filbrick grunts as he walks up to the closet, his eyebrows furrow ever so slightly, his lips pressed in a tight line. He sighs deeply.
Eventually a report is filed, but there is not much they can do, if Stanley ran away then he isn’t missing, and the police refuse to do anything about that.
Anyways thats like yk the beginning of how this whole thing happens but here are some other thoughts and ideas:
Without Filbrick telling him he’s not allowed back into the family without a million dollars, Stan isn’t as driven by money as in canon. He doesn’t have a need for large amounts of money therefore he doesn’t have a need to do sketchy jobs just to satisfy his need to have his family back. In other words he doesn’t have as much trauma as in canon and is actually more able to settle down without being on the run or in survival mode. The first couple of months he just spends driving as far away from the East as possible making his way over to New Mexico where he settles down, first as a bar tender then eventually as a mechanic, he lives comfortably in a crummy apartment but hey he doesn’t really need much
Unfortunately he does get bored, even if it’s not with his brother he does crave adventure. And while fixing a this guys truck he overhears of a town called Gravity Falls, where weird creatures tend to reside in. So you guessed it, he picks up and drives from New Mexico over to Gravity Falls Oregon.
He gets a small but nicer apartment this time around and first he works as a mechanic. Immediately he starts to get a sense of the place and its weirdness and he loves it! (Ford would love it here-) .
Since the blind eye isn’t a thing people have two reactions to the weirdness of gravity falls: freak tf out or shrug and go on with their day. Stanley being Stanley gets the great idea to act sort of like a monster hunter/ putting small attractions up with the less violent creatures, not the mystery shack, but more like the mystery circus!
Eventually Stanley gets the name Monster-Lee for his ability to be able to fight off creatures so easily (mostly through bribery or fists)
He still leaves for West Tech, but now he's fallen into extreme stress/anxiety and a bit of depression. Why did his brother leave? Why didn't he say anything? Is he okay? Why did he ever let their father get between them, he should've spent more time with him when he had the chance-
Unlike canon, Ford has no resentment/grudges to hold over Stanley, rather he holds that anger towards Filbrick especially when he found out that he had planned to kick Stanley out-- for being the reason Stanley left.
While Ford does still want to study anomalies, he also takes engineering classes, he wants to develop better technology and hopefully resources for run away teens/homeless teens.
While he doesn't meet Fiddleford as his roommate, he does meet him at a robotics convention where they instantly become friends. After college they develop a small company based around the idea of being able to find people, now expanding into different areas.
Ford is a lot more open with the fact the not only is he a twin, but he likes to talk about his younger twin brother who supported him and always stood up for him.
Part of the development with the technology involved finding people in forest dense areas, especially with a lot of caves (please tell me someones seen that one chart) Which then leads them to gravity falls as their first test area, small enough to test their tech, but still forest dense to get sufficient results.
and then these three bozos find each other lol. anyways thats all i got , i thought of this in the shower like 30 minutes ago and decided to procrastinate on my HW writing this lol. anyways
