Chapter Text
He could barely hear his friends over the loud roar of the bar. They were packed in like sardines tonight. It was a huge misfortune that they’d picked today of all days to go out for a drink. He should have known a quiet night was too much to ask for. One of the local chapters to whatever house was having their formal dance and the party goers had migrated here for specials. Morty wished he could go back and tell himself not to come. He tried to focus on what his friends were saying.
“Sorry it’s so crowded, Mort.” Savanna, his classmate from English, was saying.
“Well, we can still take birthday shots!” Brandon half yelled over the noise.
“N-no, I’ve already had so many…” Morty started to say but was drowned out by the blasting of the jukebox. The shorter boy just smiled at him and turned to go to the bar anyways. Morty watched him shove his way through the crowd before groaning and laying his head on the table.
“What’s the matter?” Jessica asked, leaning over his shoulder to peer down at his face.
“Nothing.” He muttered, eye dropping to his beer and he took a swing just to avoid having to say anything else. Jessica raised an eyebrow at him but turned to chat with Savanna without prompting him any further. He sunk into his chair a little.
He wanted to be having a good night, it was his birthday after all, but he just couldn’t enjoy himself in a bar. It was loud and crowded and smelled like booze and cheap beer. He didn’t mind drinking and he’d been out to the bar more than a handful of times since he’d turned 21 last year. Still, the bar always reminded him of Rick and he wasn’t too fond of his thoughts turning to his grandfather these days. He found himself turning to them anyways, sipping his beer silently. They hadn’t talked since he’d left for college when he was 18. Sure, he’d never been too great in school but during his senior year he had a realization that he’d wanted to become a vet like his mom. It had actually been an off handed comment from Rick that spurred the idea for Morty. It was a strange thought to have and it stuck with him until he couldn’t ignore it anymore. When he told his parents they had hugged him and talked about helping him apply for schools. Summer had snorted over the phone. She’d just dropped out the year before. She wished him luck sarcastically.
Rick didn’t even acknowledge the information. In fact, he started to ignore Morty completely right up until the day he moved into the dorms. Beth had insisted he portal them to the campus, it was far and it would be much easier than driving it all. He only grunted in reply but pulled his portal his portal gun out anyways. Morty was tense while the three of them moved the few boxes he had through the portal into his dorm. Rick watched him the whole time from where he leaned on the wall near Morty’s new bed. When they were done his parents hugged him goodbye, his dad shedding more than a few tears, and they headed home through the portal. Morty expected Rick to wordlessly follow them but instead he lingered for a moment, eyeing the room with detached interest. Morty rubbed the back of his neck nervously.
“Uh, hey Rick?” Morty started, unsure of himself. “I know we haven’t really… talked lately but I just wanted to say I’m going to miss you. Traveling with you was a lot of fun! I learned a lot about myself and about w-well everything. I don’t hold any of that- that stuff against you so-“
Rick cut him off by grabbing a fistful of his shirt and tugging him into a fierce hug. Morty could almost feel his arms bruising at the tightness of Rick’s grip on him. Morty pulled away enough to look up at him with some difficulty and Rick suddenly leaned further in, seemingly dazed and desperate. He pressed his mouth to Morty’s quickly before pulling back to fish something out of his pocket. Morty struggled against the arms still holding him.
“W-what the hell, Rick!” Morty yelled, flustered and angry. Rick hadn’t done something like that in years and Morty had secretly hoped he’d gotten over whatever it was that was going on inside that fucked up brain of his. “I told you not to fuckin touch me like that-“
“Shut up.” Rick growled. It was the first thing he’d said to the young man in months. Morty almost cried out loud. Memories of gooey green hands and slimy walls bubbled to the surface of his mind but before he could let his rising panic set in Rick had pulled an object out of his pocket. He felt Rick shift again and something snagged painfully in his hair. He winced and felt Rick pull it free before settling the object around Morty’s neck. He let the boy go and Morty took several steps away from him, staring down at his chest in confusion.
A cold metal chain was draped around his neck and hung low below his collarbone. At the end of it was a round copper locket with a latch on one side. Something was carved into the front of it in Spanish. Morty squinted at it and then looked back up to Rick to ask him was it was. Rick just shrugged.
“Wait to open it until you’re ready.” He said, a lot softer than Morty was used to. He was taken aback by this. He studied the older man, surprised to see a slight blush under the dark smudges below his eyes. He was embarrassed? It took him a moment to realize this wasn’t an elaborate joke.
“Rick?” Morty asked, not really knowing what he wanted to ask first. Rick just pulled his lab coat up and hunched further into it, almost like he was trying to hide. He pushed off the wall and walked through the portal without looking back at the stunned boy. No sooner had the portal dissipated that his door opened and a smiling boy with blonde hair walked through it with an armful of bedsheets.
“Oh! You must be Mortimer! I’m Brandon.” He extended a hand to Morty around the sheets in his arms.
“It’s just Morty, actually.” He corrected, taking the hand after a moment to shake it. He was still red and flustered from Rick’s bizarre behavior and it took him a while to come back to reality. Brandon was understanding at the time though.
He turned his gaze now to the present Brandon who was coming back with a load of shots for the table. He was glad to have his friend still with him now, years later. He had helped him through a lot of rough times in the last year, and vice versa. They were practically inseparable at times and Brandon was the only one Morty could really trust his secrets to. They were in the same program and took a lot of the same classes together, but they didn’t live together in the same dorm anymore. They worked better as friends then roommates anyways. Morty had learned that he realized living in such close proximity to the shorter, handsome as hell man was bad for his small bisexual heart. He had moved in with Jessica for a while when they dated but after their break up he’d started living on his own. It was a little lonely and mostly he spent his time at home studying, so he was a little glad to be out with his friends deep down. It was good for him to get out of the small one bedroom apartment from time to time and get some fresh air. He sighed, resigning himself to a long night out despite his introverted longing to be at home. He was graduating at the end of the spring, this was his last semester to really be around his friends and he wasn’t about to waste it just because he was socially exhausted.
He took the shot with this pals, clinking their glasses together cheerfully. He tried to drown out the way the beer he was drinking smelled like the one Rick had been the most fond of with half shouted conversations and a couple more birthday shots. It wasn’t long before he felt himself starting to get farther and farther away from sobriety, eventually excusing himself to the restroom after his third beer had been finished. Morty chuckled while he relieved himself, finding humor in the fact that he always seemed to realize just how drunk he’d gotten while alone in the bathroom. He fumbled with the sink for a while, leaning on the edges and letting the water run over his hands long after the soap had been washed away. He looked at himself in the reflection, squinting.
He wasn’t a kid anymore. He’d realized that somewhere along the wild ride that was puberty, but he wasn’t very old looking either. His round baby face was always getting him into trouble with bouncers who didn’t believe his ID could be real. He’d started growing out his sideburns extra-long, grew an anchor style bread, and had started refusing to trim his now bushy eyebrows in hopes that it made him look “manlier”, but to little avail. Despite not having changed much since he was 18, he felt like he looked a lot more mature now. In his eyes at least. Older, wiser maybe. Maybe he was just drunk. He switched off the water and dried his hands, pausing to lean against the wall near the hand dryers and tug a small chain out from beneath his faded yellow sweater.
He twisted the locket around in his fingers, watching the light reflect off of it in strange ways. He still hadn’t opened it- first it had been out of spite and later because he’d just plain forgotten about it being able to open at all. He wore it every day, not really thinking about it or who it came from but wearing it almost religiously none-the-less. He looked back up at his disheveled and drunken form in the mirror. Something about his hazy state of mind and the unwanted remembrance of the past was making him feel incredibly sentimental. Morty shrugged and popped the latch on the side open. It was probably bullshit anyways and if Rick did everything drunk he sure as hell could open the stupid thing wasted off his ass.
He tipped open the locket carefully and was instantly blinded by a bright flash of light. His ears started ringing and he dropped the chunk of copper in his hand. It thudded against his chest as he slid down the wall with his hands pressed over his ears. The ringing subsided, leaving Morty dazed and stunned on the ground. He fumbled with the necklace and pulled the now open locket up to his face. It was empty except for a note scratched into the back that read ‘Save Me’ in crisp handwriting. Morty blinked down at it in confusion before snapping it closed and getting to his feet. He pushed the bathroom door open and went back into the bar area.
Still hazy, he went and sat at the table he’d been at out of habit, not looking around until he did. There was no one on the stools. He glanced around. There wasn’t really anyone here at all anymore. The huge crowd that had been causing such a ruckus was nowhere to be found. Neither were any of his friends. He blinked slowly. Now that he was looking, this barely seemed like the same bar he’d been in a moment ago at all. The layout was the same but most of the furniture was different and the large TVs that were hanging around the place had been replaced by a single old box on the bar. The jukebox even looked completely different, like it was straight out of an old movie. Maybe he really was a lot drunker than he thought he was.
He stood up and asked the bartender if he’d seen his friends leave. The man, who was the same as before but had a lot less grey in his pulled back hair, raised an eyebrow at him and said he’d never even seen Morty before- let alone his friends. He wouldn’t even let Morty pay his tab, claiming that he’d never opened one to begin with. Morty stood shell shocked for a moment before excusing himself and walking out onto the street. It was cold out, the air a little crisp for this time of year, and Morty rubbed his arms fruitlessly against the chilly wind. His sweater didn’t do much for warmth and he hadn’t thought it’d be this cold tonight. He looked around for a moment before taking out his phone and attempting to call Brandon. To his surprise, he didn’t have any cell service. He scowled down at his phone, annoyed.
“What? The tower is right there you can see it from the-“ He was muttering to himself as he looked up to the familiar skyline. Despite seeing it every day on his way to and from class for the last few years, the tower that he’d grown so accustomed to had seemed to disappear. He stared at the empty space in the sky in awe before he felt panic rise up in his gut. He whipped his head around, peering up and down the streets. The buildings were all wrong. Some of them he recognized but there were empty lots where he knew store were supposed to be and some of the stores looked like the might be houses instead. Since when were there houses on this street? He groaned out loud, “Rick, what did you do...?”
He turned and walked down the street for a while, taking his time to think. The first logical reason for the sudden change was a shift in dimension. Had Rick sent him to a different dimension for revenge? It didn’t seem too unlike him but the note inside and his strange behavior when he’d given it to him made Morty think that might not be the case. He mulled it over in his mind for a while, vaguely wondering if his apartment was still his own as he wondered in that direction. He was about half way there when something down a dark alley caught his attention.
Someone was not far down, whispering to themselves in the dark. They sounded like they were in pain. They kept repeating the same phrase in an almost delirious trance. “Oh God, please don’t let me die. I don’t want to die like this. God, if you’re fuckin out there please-“
The words were foreign to Morty’s ears but he recognized the voice instantly. Slowly, quietly, he stepped into the alley. The person was sprawled out just out of sight behind a dumpster only a few steps down the alley and as Morty approached him he felt the buzz drain from him instantly. The man was tall, lanky limbs hanging over bags of trash at odd angles. His clothing was dirty and bloodied, a large red patch beginning over the left side of his stomach and leaking down to stain his ripped blue jeans. He was clutching a hand over the darkest spot, his eyes shut tight with his long, pierced brow knitted in agony. Stark, long blue hair was tied messily in a ponytail and a bright bruise flared purpled against his scarred tan skin. He was cut up in several places, including his neck and face, one cut barely missing the metal ring in his bottom lip. He swallowed heavily. Despite looking strange and almost 50 years younger, Morty recognized immediately that this was Rick. He’d seen dozens of alternate Ricks, but never a Rick this young. He stepped forward, calling out weakly.
“R-rick?” He asked uncertainty. The young man in the trash flung his eyes opened and focused with difficulty on his face.
“Do I know you?” He croaked, leaning forward to snap at Morty but the stinging of his wound made him hiss and lay back down. “You come to finish me off for your buddies? About time, prick.” He spat.
“N-no, Rick-“ Morty started, he had begun backing away but the thought of his locket kept him rooted to the ground. ‘Save Me.’ Maybe this is what it meant. “I w-want to help.”
“Oh thank fuckin god.” Rick sighed, closing his eyes and resting his head on the bags of trash again. His labored breathing evened out a little, like a weight had been pulled of his chest and Morty stooped down to help him stand.
“Where’s the nearest hospital?” Morty asked, unsure if it was in the same place still.
“No.” Rick groaned as he swayed against Morty’s side. “No hospitals.”
“Rick-“
“No!”
“Fine.” Morty grumbled, alcohol still running through his veins and making him cranky. “Where do you want me to take you then?”
It took Morty a full 5 minutes to get Rick’s address out of him. He kept insisting on going to Morty’s but the brunette knew it was unlikely his key would open the door. It finally took a shouted insult and a threat to throw him back in with the bags that Rick had finally given in and gave Morty directions. They trudged to the address slowly, Morty stumbling slightly from booze and the added weight of Rick while Rick barely managed to hold on, dragging his feet behind him. By the time they got to the yard of Rick’s apartment complex he couldn’t stand on his own anymore. Morty was starting to think he really was going to bleed out and carried him bridal style up the stairs into Rick’s loft to save time. He placed Rick on the huge, old red couch and peeled back the blood soaked shirt to get a better look at the wound. It was obvious to Morty that he’d been stabbed. A knife fight gone wrong most likely. Morty sighed and straightened his back.
“Do you have first-aid stuff?” Morty asked, placing his hands on his hips. Rick cracked open a single eye to peer up at him. It rolled into his skull again and he pointed behind him. Morty followed his finger down the small hallway off the living room/kitchen combo and entered the bathroom on the left side of the hall. It was tiny and cluttered beyond belief but Morty managed to find what he needed and was back at Rick’s side in no time. Along with band-aids, a suture kit, and cotton pads he also brought a large bottle of what looked like vodka. He placed everything down before opening the bottle and nudging it into Rick’s hand.
Without looking at the injured man took a long swing from the bottle and held it out for Morty. He took a much smaller sip, sanitized his hands and tools, and then poured the bottle slowly over the oozing wound. Rick hissed and gripped the sides of the couch harder as Morty dabbed the area dry with one of the cotton pads. He made quick work of cleaning the gaping hole and moved to threading the needle. A couple of stitches in, Rick finally opened his eyes to look down at him.
“You’re surprisingly good that this.” Rick commented dryly.
“I’ve had a lot of practice.” Morty said in reply, not really thinking about it. He glanced up when Rick was silent and frown at his arched eyebrow. “I’m training to be a vet. I’ve given more than a few dogs stitches before.”
Rick hummed in thought and Morty continued to work. “How did you say you knew me again?”
“I didn’t.”
“But you do know me.”
“Yes.” Morty gritted his teeth. He found it hard to believe that any Rick in any universe wouldn’t recognize a Morty when he saw one.
“So what, did I like to give you a hand job at some gas station or something? I don’t even remember you.” He mused, taking another sip from the vodka bottle. “Oh, I know. Must have been a gloryhole, right? That’s why I don’t know your face.”
“What?!” Morty exclaimed, flushing red at the very idea of Rick doing something like that. “No! God, just no. I’m your grandson. Jesus, Rick.”
“Grandson?” Rick laughed, flinching when Morty dug in a little too deep because of the movement. “You’ve got to be fucking nuts. I ain’t got kids. How the hell would I have a grandson?”
“I’m serious.” Morty said, frowning at him as he snipped the end of the string.
“Whatever you say, pal.” Rick rolled his eyes but allowed Morty to apply more cotton pads and begin to wrap the bandages around his torso. Morty could tell he didn’t believe him and he felt himself growing suddenly very tired. He wrapped the last of the bandage and tied it off, taking a swig from the bottle for himself again. “Guess I owe you my life.”
“I guess.” Morty said softly. Rick said it so nonchalantly but his face was strained and twisted in pain still. “Maybe you should get some rest?” He suggested as Rick started to nod off a little without answering back properly. Rick didn’t protest and Morty lead him to his room, which was across from the bathroom. It was a mess and Morty tried not to snoop too much while he set Rick down in his bed and covered him with the sheets. The man was snoring instantly, a sign of how exhausted he’d been, and Morty sighed. He returned to the living room and sat heavily on the couch. He opened the locket on his neck again, but nothing happened.
“I saved you, you giant ass. Now take me home.” He muttered to the necklace. It didn’t pop, beam, or even sizzle. It’s silence left Morty frustrated and he flopped onto the couch angrily. His mind turned to his Rick, the old Rick. He could barely believe after all these years the locket had just been a trick to get a favor out of him after all. He rubbed his palms into his eye sockets and tried to calm his wildly racing thoughts. Morty let out a low whisper, full of venom and aimed towards the Rick who’d given him the locket in the first place.
“Fuck you Rick. What the hell did you get me into this time?”