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“Where’s Morty?” Beth asked as she sliced into her pancakes. It was way past the time he’d usually be downstairs. “Dad, did you leave him behind again?”
“What, no?” Wait, did he? No, he definitely brought Morty home last night. Kid was out like a light as soon as they got back. “Of course not. Prob- UUREERP- probably sleeping or something. Fuck if I know.”
“I’ll get him.” Jerry sounded excited to be useful for once. He came back from Morty’s room with a furrowed brow. “He’s not here. Rick, are you sure you didn’t leave Morty behind?” Jerry placed his hands on his hips in an attempt at assertiveness.
“S-Summer sneaks out all the time. Coulda gone with her.” Rick gargled through his orange juice.
“Ugh, you’re literally the worst, Rick!” Summer whined.
“Oh come on- we all know you sneak out, Sum-sum.”
“Well he wasn’t with me.” She crossed her arms as she glared at Rick.
“Rick…” Beth began.
“Jesus Christ, I-I’ll pull up his tracker.” Rick groaned. Something akin to anxiety panged in the back of his head, but he easily ignored it. Morty’s stupid. Easily could have snuck out on his own and got lost or something.
“Wait, you put a tracker in my son?” Jerry asked incredulously.
“Uh, yeah? You’re welcome.” Rick rolled his eyes as he pulled up a holograph of Morty’s tracking monitor.
OFFLINE.
In big red text.
…
What?
“Oh my god does that mean he’s dead?” Summer gasped.
“No! No he-“ Rick pushed himself out of his chair. Was that bile creeping in the back of his throat? It better not be- vomit and orange juice was a nasty combo. “It still works when he’s dead. Th-that’s like half of its purpose.”
There was no way in hell Morty could have disabled that himself. Unless he had gotten some fucking advanced alien to surgically remove it then- wait, had he gotten someone to remove it? Shit. Shit he needed to check if the car and portal gun were still in the garage.
Rick quickly stumbled out of the dining room, Beth calling something he didn’t care to pay attention to.
“Fuckin…teenage..teenage angst…” Rick mumbled under his breath as he sorted through his shelves. Why the hell would Morty run away? Rick couldn’t have been that awful last night. The whole thing was a little blurry ‘cause he had been blasted out of his mind. But he was always blasted out of his mind! The car was still there. If Morty had run away, he used the portal gun.
Except the portal gun was right there, on the second shelf.
Right where Rick had last left it.
Okay. Okay. Whatever. This was fine. He needed to think. There should be some sort of backlog pinging Morty’s last location. Yeah. He could start there. There should also be a failsafe mechanism to reactivate the tracker. Rick ran a hand over his face and jumped through a few screens to find the backlogs.
Morty’s bedroom, 3:04 am.
And then nothing.
Really, it was like Morty had never existed at all. One moment he was in his room the next the tracker was disabled. Which means somehow Morty had disabled the tracker with shit he had in his room, or someone had made it inside the house.
Rick dug through the garage again, searching for something that could scan whatever traces had been left in Morty’s room. If Morty had been kidnapped, whatever particles the kidnappers had left behind would get flagged. If Morty had disabled his own tracker, then whatever weird tech he had stashed in his room would also get flagged.
“Dad, what’s going on?” Beth’s voice sounded strained as Rick headed towards the stairs.
“Rick, if you lost Morty-“ Jerry chided.
“Shut the fuck up, Jerry. I-I don’t exactly see you helping.” Rick snapped as he made his way upstairs.
“So you did lose Morty!”
“Jerry…” Beth grabbed onto her husband’s arm, stopping him from following Rick.
“How can you be so calm about this? Our son is missing and Rick hasn’t left so he clearly has no idea where-”
Rick didn’t have time for this. He let the sound of their argument fade away as he went to scan Morty’s room. Was there seriously nothing? How could there be nothing? Morty could not have vanished out of existence. No, wait-
There was a leftover radiation signal floating around near Morty’s bed. Stupidly similar to the one his portal gun emitted, but there was absolutely no way Morty had used his portal gun. Unless Morty had stolen it from another Rick during one of their adventures?
Or someone else had stolen a portal gun and used it to kidnap Morty. Clearly a shitty one too- his didn’t leave behind a radiation signature.
Whatever. He was gonna match that signature and get his damn grandson back.
++++++++++
This was fucking ridiculous.
He was the smartest man in the universe. The Rickest Rick. This was actually fucking ridiculous. It had been seventy two hours and he still hadn’t found Morty. He had slept maybe once. Morty could be dead by now. Morty could have been dead from the start.
What even- what even was the point of taking Morty? No ransom, no note, no demands. The Citadel had nothing for him either. Portal guns got stolen and modified more frequently than the Council liked to admit. He felt…he felt stupid. Rick didn’t like feeling stupid because he wasn’t fucking stupid. He was a god.
How was he failing?
If Morty wasn’t at these coordinates Rick was gonna bomb the nearest planet. This was his only solid lead. So far he was looking at a lot of empty space. He was gonna blow that gormfom’s head off if these coords seriously went to the middle of nowhere.
He took another hearty swig of alcohol in a desperate attempt to stamp down his heart palpitations. He was pretty sober but god was he twitchy. Rick blinked and-
He was inside a windowless room. Smooth metal walls surrounded him, and the car had disappeared entirely. All the weapons he had stashed, all the healing mixtures in his pockets were simply gone. Rick tried to activate his cybernetic enhancements to get a scan of his surroundings, but nothing happened. His flesh felt annoyingly organic.
“That won’t work here.” A rich voice laughed as a door slid open. Someone he had never seen in his goddamn life was being flanked by two crylons. He couldn’t even recognize the species of this guy. He was large- at least seven feet- with two tentacles protruding from his jaw. “Looking for something, Sanchez?”
“Where the fuck is my grandson?” Come on- surely all his stuff couldn’t be gone? Was this a simulation? It had to be. He had broken out of simulations countless times. Easy. He just needed to find Morty…
“Don’t be hasty now.” The alien’s brow raised. “We have all the time in the world.”
Jesus, he was backed into a corner. No weapons. No enhancements. He could fight but there were still three of them, and the tentacle guy definitely had control over this space. Punching him would either have no effect on him or crash the whole simulation.
That was a bet he was willing to take. If he woke up, that means Morty would wake up too. Then all he had to do was find his grandson wherever they were in reality. Rick quickly ran up to the trio and went in to knock both crylons off their feet, but he knocked directly into a force field.
“None of that now.” The alien tsked as Rick began to float. Rick tried to squirm his muscles but he was fully suspended. Both crylons punched him straight in the gut, and he couldn’t bend over in pain. “You’re nothing here, Sanchez.”
“Who- URRRPP- who the hell are you?” At least he could speak. If he could figure out whatever the fuck he did to this guy then maybe he could bargain for Morty back. Rick hated bargaining but he was running out of options here. He had broken out of simulations before- he just needed to figure out how to do it here.
“You took everything from me.” He stepped forward, his tentacles trembling with rage.
“Get in line, broh. I’ve taken everything from a lotta people.” Rick feigned boredom as he tried to wrack his mind. Did he fuck this guy over in a deal? Fail to kill him?? Put him in a torture nexus??? He needed to know just how dead Morty was. Not that he cared.
The walls of the metal room faded, and Rick found himself on a mars like planet. Market stalls surrounded him. Standing inside the center of a fountain was himself, blackout drunk.
“HELLLooOoooo party people!…I-I-I’m gonna…do a magic trick..” Past Rick slurred. A group of onlookers had gathered around him. Rick pushed a button on his arm, activating some sort of invisible force field around himself. “This is..URRERP..this is uh…a fuckin atomic bomb. Y-yep. Atomic bomb, baby.”
Rick could feel his sinew burn away as the bomb went off. He could feel every atom painfully shred itself apart with how close he was to the explosion. His body began to reconstruct itself, but just barely. Just enough to keep him alive.
“My wife. My kids. My friends. Each and every one died because you found it funny. You know why I lived Sanchez?” He dug his fingers into Rick’s exposed flesh. “I had been off planet. I lived by chance.”
“Wh-what do you want me to say? I-” Rick’s face spasmed as the alien’s fingers pushed hard on a major artery. “I do- I do stupid shit while drunk-” Goddamn this was a realistic simulation. Suppose that’s the point but like goddamn. He wished he could at least react to the pain. Yeah curling in on himself wouldn’t help at all, but the misery felt worse like this.
“I want you-” He stomped on Rick’s foot. “to fucking remember me for the rest of your life. I want you to never-” He uppercut Rick’s jaw. “forget how insignificant you are. How powerless you are when you don’t pay attention.”
And that one hurt. All it took was one moment, one slip and he would lose whatever he valued. Smartest man in the universe and everything good slipped through his fingers like water. He shouldn’t even be here. He should have left Morty to die and gotten a new one. Stupid irrational attachments. Ruining his goddamn life all the time.
“He was so easy to take. Really, I thought a man of your caliber would be more prepared.” A smirk plated his face as he tilted his head. Rick’s blood ran cold. Had he killed Morty? It was really starting to sound like he killed Morty. Rick couldn’t even trust if a body was shown because nothing actually existed in this space.
“Listen, I-I-I can make clones of your whole family. They’ll all- they’ll be identical. Like they never died.” He gargled through the blood pooling in the back of his throat.
“If I wanted replicas, I’d make them in here.”
“Then what do you want?!” Rick hated the twinge of desperation coloring his voice. He hated the sound of his fleshy heart beat and how human he felt right now. He hated that everything was falling apart and he couldn’t do a single thing about it.
“To see you squirm. To see you fail.” The scene faded to an exact copy of the Smith house. Morty and a replica of himself were inside the garage, with fake Rick tinkering away at god knows what. “He’s quite happy, actually. Hasn't even noticed he’s been kidnapped. The whole area he’s in is just a manifestation of his more ideal life. I’m not so sure he’ll want to leave, Sanchez.”
Wow, he felt like shit. All Rick had to do was be a touch nicer and Morty wouldn’t even notice the universe was fake. That’s how starved for affection that kid was. That’s how much of an asshole Rick was.
“He’s a smart kid. You think he’ll just accept it when he realizes it’s a simulation?” Rick growled. Morty tripped and nearly banged into a shelf, but replica Rick extended a cybernetic limb and caught him before he could fall. Replica Rick lightly bonked Morty on the back of the head, and then ruffled his hair. Morty gave a stupid grin at the sign of affection from Rick.
“Oh, you still think this is a simulation?” His tentacles wiggled in amusement. “This is as real as it gets. You’re in a pocket dimension and I’m god here. You know what sets us apart though? I am a benevolent god. I’ll give you back your grandson, on a condition.”
Always a goddamn condition.
“Morty has to choose to come back with you.”
“Of- of fucking course Morty would want to come back with me!”
…Right?
Replica Rick was clearly working on something Morty had asked him to make. That was obvious enough with the way Morty was excitedly buzzing around the work bench. Replica Rick swatted his grandson away lazily.
“And if you check behind to see he’s come with? He stays with me. You will not be able to hear him. You will not be able to see him or feel him, but he will be behind you if he so chooses.”
“So obviously- UEERRP- you’re not gonna give him back.” Rick growled as they faded back into the metal room. This was a real elaborate trap. “Why the hell would I ever take your word? An-and with such a stupid condition.”
“Because I don’t think you can do it.” The alien smirked. “I think for all your big talk about being the smartest man in the universe, you’re weak. You’ll simply have to trust me.”
Rick’s body finally unfroze, and he ragdolled onto the cold floor. The double doors slid open once again, revealing a long and dimly lit hallway. Various pipes ran along across the walls.
“Go.” He shoo’d Rick away. “Morty might be waiting.”
Rick cursed under his breath as he entered the hallway, and the doors slammed shut behind him. A hellish, warm red light was the only source of illumination.
One set of footsteps. That’s all he could hear as he walked. One set of his very loud footsteps banging against the metal. He tried walking at weird intervals, hoping his different strides would allow him to hear Morty’s.
Nothing changed.
…
“Okay, Morty. Obviously there’s a way around this. S-so, say something. Anything.” He could hear water dripping nearby. If he could find the pipe it was leaking from… “Morty, put your hand under there.” Rick waited for the sound to change- to hear it drip against flesh instead of metal.
Nothing.
…
Morty wouldn’t choose a fake reality over him, right? Rick and Morty, a hundred years. That’s the bit they always had. It wasn’t a hundred years if it was all fake. So what if his replica was a little nicer? So what if it was basically reality? So what if it was everything Morty wanted?
…
Maybe the bastard hadn’t even told Morty. Maybe Morty was chained up in some torture dungeon, and the whole sequence he watched had been fake. Rick was wasting his time here.
The hallway wasn’t bright enough and the metal lacked luster for him to see the bounce light of Morty’s clothing. That bright yellow t-shirt would stick out like a sore thumb on the walls, but there was nothing.
Just him and his obnoxiously loud breathing. Did he always breathe that loudly? Jesus. If he were Morty, he would abandon his ass too. Not that Morty had abandoned him.
Probably.
…
“Kick me, Morty. Not hard enough for my legs to give out, but kick me.”
The dripping sound was distant, but it felt like a drum banging against his skull. It was the loudest sound here besides his one set of footsteps and his ragged breath.
Drip. Drip. Drip.
He wasn’t weak. Yeah, he had seriously fucked this one up but he wasn’t weak. He didn’t need to check. Morty would follow him to the ends of the earth if he asked. Morty had put up with his ass for this long now. Yeah he complained and yeah he sobbed and yeah they nearly died all the time.
So what?
…
Morty wasn’t even his. He was Prime’s. Not like Morty knew that one. Prime would have figured a work around to this shit already, if the bastard could care enough to save anyone.
…
What if he had already lost Morty? It was in his nature, wasn’t it? He wasn’t built for affection. He wasn’t built to keep whatever he loved. He was the smartest man in the universe and the loneliest. Shit like this happened when he cared too much.
Morty could have died alone, wondering when Rick was coming to save him. Wondering why Rick hadn’t already found him. In some fucked up way, at least he had seen Diane and Beth die. At least he had watched it happen, because it gave him a sense of certainty. He knew they were gone and who had done it. Rick didn’t even know this bastard’s name.
“W-we’ll get ice cream, Morty. When we get out of here. You like that, Morty? Gloppy drop system ice cream. Y-you can even get double.” Step. Step. Step.
One pair of foot steps.
…
Rick could see a light in the distance. Way too far for his liking. Whatever. If- if Morty wasn’t behind him, then he’d find another way. He would find the pocket dimension again. He would bargain. He’d dismantle the whole place and fucking notice he had slipped into an invisible portal before it was too late. He was gonna find this guy and drop another atomic bomb.
Just a few more feet. Rick paused, hoping his sudden stop would make Morty bump into him. Nothing. He couldn’t hear the slight movement of wind from Morty stopping. He couldn’t feel the radiation of body heat.
It was only Rick and his heart beat.
He so badly wanted to check. His fingers twitched. The buzzing in his skull grew louder. He so badly wanted to check, but he couldn’t. He knew he couldn’t. It was too high of a risk.
Rick didn’t need to turn around. If he was being played then he would simply out play the other guy. If Morty was dead then…well, Rick would probably blow his shit straight off after avenging his grandson.
He inhaled sharply, and stepped through the threshold.
Rick found himself on a random moon. The ship was haphazardly parked a few yards away. And-
“Awh jeez, Rick. Y-you really scared me there.” Morty laughed nervously as Rick’s head whipped around. “Y-y-you really seemed like you were gonna...gonna turn around.”
Oh thank fuck. Rick finally exhaled, the tension ebbing out of his body.
“Obviously I wasn’t going to, Morty.” Rick snarled. “I knew you were there.”
“R-right...” Morty felt stupid for thinking Rick hadn’t been in control. It was Rick, for crying out loud. His grandpa wasn’t capable of doubt. He probably had felt Morty kick him, and kept up the whole frustrated act since they were being watched. “That guy sure was something, am I right?”
Morty’s face slowly fell as Rick just stared at him. He seriously hadn’t noticed that the last several days were fake. He thought…he thought things were just going well. They had high and low patches- he thought it was just one of those highs.
“Come on.” Rick placed a hand on Morty’s back and began leading him to the car. He could actually hear Morty’s footsteps this time. “Let’s- let’s get ice cream. You can still get two.”
“…Thanks, Rick.” Morty beamed.
“Don’t get used to it.” He grumbled.