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Your name is Morty Smith. Or…at least you think it is. Some days you aren’t really sure who you are anymore. Lately, more and more things have just blurred together. Days have turned into weeks, weeks into months, months into years. You aren’t the naïve fourteen year old boy you once were anymore. You’ve aged, changed. You’re different now. You’re a man, an adult with bashed dreams and aspirations, just like every other adult on this earth. At least you think that’s how adults are supposed to be, right? Eh, whatever, not like it really matters.
You don’t exactly remember when this lab coat became a part of your daily attire, or when you stopped caring about making your hair look neat. You also don’t remember when this flask got into your hand, or this portal gun into your other. Not like you really care. Lately it seems like you don’t care about much of anything anymore. You’ve seen too much shit to care. Too much has happened.
Over the years, you’ve gained much more knowledge than you thought was possible. You learned a lot from Rick, and a lot from all those adventures he used to take you on. You don’t go on adventures anymore. At least not with him. Now all the adventures you have are done on your own, with your own portal gun. It’s not the same though. You don’t think it’s ever going to be the same.
As you stare at the plans for a spaceship you’re working on, your mind starts to drift. You remember when Rick first taught you how to fly one, and how great you felt. You were happy then. You take another swig out of the flask you’re holding, honestly unsure of what’s even in there anymore. Probably some alien booze you picked up from a shitty, scum covered planet in the middle of space. Like it even matters.
You honestly can’t remember what happiness even feels like anymore. All you feel is cold, harsh pain, and a lingering numbness that lasts into eternity. Is this what adulthood is supposed to be? You hope not. You think Summer is probably still able to be happy, with her little family and children. At least you hope she is. She doesn’t deserve to feel this way. She doesn’t deserve this numb, empty feeling that you experience on a daily basis. She deserves to be better than you.
You’re so lost in your thoughts that you don’t even hear someone approaching. As you sense someone behind you, you quietly curse yourself for not being more aware. It’s the difference between life and death, being aware of your surroundings. At least in the life that you lead. You turn around to face the source, staring at the once proud old man you called Rick.
The years have certainly done a number on him. His once arrogant, self-assured posture has faded, leaving him hunched over and frail-looking. It’s slightly jarring to see him like this, but at the same time you understand that he can’t stay the same forever. He’s dying slowly, and its apparent in his features. The face that once held a glimmer of disdain for everything in the world now just holds a look of sadness, maybe a hint of fear.
Rick never had been someone who expected death to catch up to him. Maybe that was why he was always running, always getting himself into some kind of trouble. He believed he was invincible, that he could outrun death no matter where he was. But now that he realized that he couldn’t, it had changed him. He was no longer so sure of his existence. He was no longer sure of anything, really. Everything he once believed in, all the constants in his life had suddenly turned upside down, leaving him lost.
You sighed, staring at him, wondering if he would speak, or if you would have to speak first. You decided to speed the process up. You had a ship to build after all. “What do you need, Rick? I’m-I’m kinda busy here.”
Rick just frowns, sighing, and running a now shaking hand through his hair. “I-I’m sorry, Morty…”
“What th-the hell are you even a-apologizing for? You didn’t do anything….” You roll your eyes, going back to looking over your plans. You don’t have time for the ramblings of some dumb old man. It’s kinda ironic, that you once looked up to him. You admired his brilliance, his pride, even his arrogance. And now here you are, seeing him for what he truly is: a weak, overconfident old man who doesn’t even know how to accept his own fate. What a dumbass.
“I-I didn’t mean for you to turn out like…like this. I…I just wanted to show y-you the universe. Not…not have you end up like….like…”
“like what?” You were getting impatient, honestly tempted to throw him out of your garage. A part of you wondered why you hadn’t put him in a home already. Oh right. No home would hold the infamous Rick Sanchez. He would probably lay down and die before that happened. And as much as he annoyed you, you didn’t want him to die just yet. Some part of you still cared about him, even though he was too old for really anything anymore.
“like me, Morty. I d-didn’t want you to become like me,” he spit out, a hint of that once constantly pissed old man showing through the frailty. His voice didn’t waiver, and his frustration was evident. Whether towards you, or himself, you weren’t exactly sure. But from his words, you assumed it to be the latter.
After you didn’t respond, he turned to leave, obviously feeling like he was finished here. He’d gotten his point across, and it was up to you to have it catch on or not. You stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Rick, wait.” Your plans forgotten, you were more focused on him now. It was obvious, the guilt and selfhatred that was constantly radiating off him stronger than ever. You couldn’t let him leave like that.
He shrugged you off, whirling around to look at you, fire in his eyes. “What? Y-you wanna kick me out? Is that what you wanna tell me? Go ahead. Make my day.”
“No that’s…that’s not….Ugh.” You yank him into a hug, unsure of exactly how to explain yourself currently. The alcohol is clouding over your brain too much for you to really care, anyways.
Rick seems surprised by the hug. It’s been years since you have hugged him after all. As you got older, you started to dislike him more and more. Honestly, you weren’t even sure why. He was still the same old Rick. Just older, and more unsure. Maybe it was you that changed.
“Stop-stop blaming yourself, you old asshole. It’s not your fault. W-well…it kinda is. But…you-you weren’t doing it on purpose,” you mumbled to him, hoping it was reassuring. It’s been a while since you’ve actually tried to comfort someone. You’d become too self-absorbed to focus on anyone else, in honesty.
“But…I-I caused this still. I dragged you-you on all those adventures. I coulda let you stay home or some shit. Never bring you…never bring you into it.”
“Shut the fuck up. I w-wanted to go anyways. It’s not like you forced me completely. I coulda…I coulda said no if I really didn’t wanna deal with it.”
“But I-“
“I said shut the fuck up. Or do I-I have to kick your ass, old man?” you joked, hoping to lighten the mood some.
It worked. Rick grinned slightly, pulling away and punching your arm. Somehow it still was as strong as it always had been, and you rubbed the spot he hit. “H-hey! That hurt!” you yelped, grinning back.
“It was supposed to, you idiot. You-you know you could never kick my ass. You might be stronger than me now, but I’d beat you any day of the-URP-week. Now what are y-you workin on, anyways?”
“A spaceship. O-one kinda like yours.” You showed him the plans, moving some stuff aside so he could see.
“Wow. Jeeze M-Morty. It looks like an idiot wrote these plans. A-and here I thought you were getting smart. Boy, was I sure fucking wrong. Cmon. Let’s fix this. Don’t want you cra-URP-crashing on the first test run.” He shoved you aside, taking the plans and crumpling them up.
“H-hey! I worked all night on th-those plans,” you yelped indignantly. Fucking Rick. Thinking he knew better than anyone else.
“Only…only idiots use plans Morty. And from what I’ve seen y-you’re no idiot. So let’s get to work, Sanchez style. Think you can build a spaceship from scratch?”
“Of course I can. What do I look like? Ch-chopped beckleloaf?” You rolled your eyes. Like he even needed to ask.
Rick looked to you then, crossing his arms and smirking. “Th-then prove it, hotshot. Show me what the new and improved M-Morty can do.”
And so you did, demanding tools and putting together parts, taking a few swigs of alcohol in between. It was then that you had realized exactly what you had become. You finally realized just how you changed. Even before, when Rick was standing there feeling guilty and blaming himself, you hadn’t caught on. You denied it. But as you sat there, building a spaceship in a lab coat, drunk as hell and not a care in the world, you saw it. You’d become the one thing you swore you would never become. You’d become Rick, down to the very last cynical drop.
And yet, as you sat there, this realization dawning upon you, your grandfather looking on, you realized that you didn’t even care. You liked it even. You liked the pain, the selfhatred. You enjoyed drowning it all in alcohol and feeling numb on a daily basis. It made you feel invincible in a way. It made you feel that as long as you continued like this, you could never die. If you could take on all the inner demons you had bottled up inside, you could take on the entire universe. Who cares if you had become cold and unfeeling? You were fuckin immortal.
But at the same time, as you stared at your grandfather, freezing in your work to consider it all, you realized where exactly it would lead to. This road you were taking would eventually lead to your downfall, and you wouldn’t even see it coming. One day you would be on top of it all, basking in the glory of this feeling of freedom, and the next you would have it all crashing down at your feet. Everyone you loved eventually leaving you, probably hating you. The things you once enjoyed just becoming a painful chore. The once invincible feeling fading into a mist of realization that you can’t outrun death. It will always catch up to you, no matter when or where you are.
This is what Rick was saying. It was the reason he was so very sorry. It was because he knew. He knew that the road you were heading down was one of destruction, of total self-annihilation. It was the same road he had gone down, and he knew exactly where it led. He also knew there was no escape.
You dropped the tool you were holding, something wet staining your cheeks as you started to shake. You hadn’t cried in so long, you had forgotten exactly what it felt like. But now here you were, sobbing as you realized what exactly you had become. You didn’t even notice when Rick had come behind you, wrapping his arms around you.
He knew. He knew all along and the pain radiating off him was all the sign you needed. There was no escape from the path you were headed, and soon you wouldn’t even have a friend there to help you through it. Soon you’d be alone in the universe, fighting against everyone just to survive. You’d carry the weight of all the people you let die on your shoulders, the weight of all the opportunities for your happiness that you lost.
And as you sat there, sobbing into your dying grandfather’s arms, you finally saw the pain, the pain that constantly lingered inside you, for what it was. Regret.