"Listen. There is no fate, there is no heaven or hell, and we don't understand everything in the cosmos; face it, we never really will, because it keeps expanding exponentially. The youngest you'll ever be again is the oldest you've been, and the only constant in our lives is not love, responsibility, legacy, or anything. You know what should be written in the Bible? The only thing? 'You will only get older.' Now, stop stressing about something no one will remember in another generation and take a hit, bitch."
Stanley Pines was not sure what to think of this 'old friend' of his brother's, he didn't know if the man's real name was Richard or Ricardo, or what language was his native one (he knew about four or five!), but he knew when someone spat the straight truth. They met in the bar, this Sanchez guy thought he was his twin Stanford, and of course one thing led to another and they ended up going back to Stan's place; where they sat and smoked and drank. Neither one of them cared much for a one night stand, instead they sat in bed and smoked until they saw colors.
The meeting took place only a few years before Stanford would soon be lost in his own portal, a story which Rick would be doomed to repeat in his own lifetime. Fresh out of college, jobless, punkass kids is all they were, living dime-to-dime cutting corners and testing the law to get by. Stan asked how Rick knew his brother, and what caused him to want to speak to his brother after so many years anyhow. Rick was one of those students who received a free-ride through Stanford's top university, only to be kicked out a little after first semester for his illegal, dangerous, and hedonistic behavior. An entire fourth of the freshman were unable to continue their year after Rick's shenanigans, most of them due to Rick selling 'the purest crystal meth' the school had ever seen. Why he did it? A quick bargain for money to buy weed and rum; the science was easy enough for Rick to manufacture his own Heisenberg scam. How did Stanford get caught up in this fuckwad's life? Well, this Latino kid couldn't deal with keeping his brain stagnant, and he got into the backup college that Stanford went to. He was the top of the class within the next quarter, and became Ford's intellectual enemy.
See, Rick showed up high to class every day, arrogantly didn't bring a notebook, did his homework in front of the teacher (and correctly too), and even did the old 'vodka in the water bottle' trick. Despite this? He was the top tier of the class, he constantly corrected the teacher, and made it his duty to leave his classmates hungover after every weekend. Their grades suffered horribly, but the only kid who really worked against this was Ford; who studied endlessly, only to just get under Rick's grade point average by a fraction of a decimal. This didn't mean Rick didn't like Ford, he actually quite fancied the Pines boy; he liked his cute glasses, his passion, his intelligence and perspective on the abnormal things Rick didn't see any interest in, and six fingers! He wondered how wild that would make a one night stand! To which he also had to explain as 'I'm pansexual, not perverted' when someone accused him of any sexual deviance on account of these claims. It was a simpler time, people questioned more but they also accepted answers easier. The thing that brought Ford against the tide is that he questioned everything and never accepted the answer until he searched into it himself, now Rick admired that. That was something challenging, something engaging, entertaining, and exciting. Of course, he made Ford his doofus shadow at every bar, and he'd show him off to his other science pals. Friendly competition was Rick's game, he knew he could one-up the Pines boy when he really put his wits to it.
Back to the 'now' though, Stanley was not intelligence like his brother; he was brute strength, beer chugging, and shoplifting. This was the badass Pines boy, and as Rick moved to a different phase of his life (the peak of his partying) right before he settled down, he was more appealing to Rick. Their banter was natural, they challenged each other with fun things that made Rick forget the damn science, the numbers, the pointlessness of this universe. Rick was drawn to this new way of living like a moth to a lantern, and learned just how easy it was to go off the radar from the government. Stanley and Rick were a toxic match in their collective youth. They were an ugly pair at the time too. Stan was all dense blocky muscles in a body with a head too big for his feet. His calloused massive hands always greased up his soft beginner's mullet when he touched his face too much. His sidekick? Rick Sanchez, greasy unkempt hair, scarred wrists, smoke, and a denim jacket that was too big (obviously not his to begin with). They were atrocious in public, depending on who was drunk at the grocery store. They coexisted in each other's lives, not as a 'couple' or even a 'pair' but as Rick and Stanley, and this went on for months on end. Every day each separately worked, but somehow ended up at one of their homes every single night. They went to the same parties, the same bars, the same alleys, and the same bed come midnight.
Then, when it came time for Stan to be run out of time, Rick came with him; he had nothing to do but be a wanderer too. They were both finding their respective places, and with hippies encouraging their road trip way of life, they were unstoppable...
Somewhere in all this fun, this carefree life they both built to avoid their insecurities, they became sickly attached to one another and altogether draining. In their young reckless age, with all their substance and being, they saw only through rose tinted glass; where red flags just didn't register. Stan took out his inferiority complex on Rick, who had the cruelest and bluntest remarks, and they were both quick to pick fights; more than once Rick had to frequent the gas station with a nasty shiner. That wasn't to say it was one sided, Rick usually picked a fight, he was the one who pulled out the gun and threatened to shoot himself if Stan left him. He was the one who was passed out in front of the open refrigerator smelling like he bathed in wine. He had all kinds of ideas to destroy the planet, just because he recognized its pointlessness, and destroy himself because of his pointlessness. He was a tyrant, who stopped working on anything at home and simply got drunk waiting for Stan to come home. This escalated until one day they both snapped and walked out on one another to go their own ways. Stan ended up in Gravity Falls a few years later, and Rick with the beautiful start of a family.
Years and years later, between far and few connections with Stanford again in his growing age, Rick finally came home to his family in his dimension. It was one thing to get out into the Multiverse, he was bound to be lost for twenty of those just trying to see it all and understand how he got home. Turns out, he wasn't the only one with a portal idea; yeah, he had a portal gun, but he was going in an aimless direction throughout the universe, all Stanford had to do was open his portal back home. And Rick wasn't someone to work hard out here, he was still a wanderer, instead of a conqueror. He only explored, but through that carefree exploring he found his new life; he found Bird Man, Unity, and the other versions of himself who had already come here. He got into some seriously illegal shit, he lost all the Mrs. Sanchez to this stupid rip in all time and existence he created, and made himself an enemy of the galaxy. Where could he hide? His own dimension was the one dimension with a Morty perfectly synced to his brainwaves, the perfect disguise. It was a bold move, he wasn't sure he could face a world that proved to him his wife was gone and his daughter was alone. Going to back to Earth C-137 was that slap in the face, that brutal reminder that he would be walking into an empty house, an empty life, and that he really had not left anything but a stain on the human race. That Beth was stuck in the confines of day-to-day life, and could not inherit the galaxy across every dimension because every Rick, and especially the Rickest Rick, had fucked himself over in his own self-loathing.
It was true, he could not wander around space forever and ever without end. Everything became the same, and when he stopped exploring he realized how little anything at all meant; how insignificant he as a person was, that he had become a government. He built confines for himself in the motherfucking galaxy. Every single Rick fucked up in his life, if he never had a family like Doofus Rick, or if he Rick C-137 single handedly murdered. Every single wife that every dimension of himself had. .
The silver lining of the entire situation was that the Mortiest Morty was his Morty, and no one had come to his dimension to murder anyone or anything. He was a dimension hopping bastard, taking the place of other Ricks on accident and killing what he believed was an evil version of himself coming to take his universe; when really he had been that Rick all along. He was the reason the Council of Ricks originally formed, since so many dimensions were Rickless due to murders. That all the Mrs. Sanchez's disappeared. That they found the Rickest Rick in all of existence. He had originally tried to make himself believe he was protecting his family by leaving them, but only realized they were in more danger without him. He had gone through so many dimensions and existences, including pieces of himself that were in war or government issued jobs, and took the memories of many versions of himself that fucked him over.
It was hard to reflect on, but here he was... He was supposed to meet up with Stanley Pines again, now that they had both ended up sentimental senior bastards with little sense or reason to their actions. Neither of them knew what emotion they would feel among seeing each other again. He was in some shitty empty bar, Morty wasn't with him, and he felt that old darkness creeping up on him. He felt like the demolition expert of his own self-esteem. The little bell at the top of the door rang, suddenly Rick found that he was painfully interested in the old dents in the bar booth. He felt a strong hand on his shoulder following some big guy sitting at the seat by him. "Rick, you old broken teacup." Stan said in his gravelly baritone.
"What the fuck did that come from?" Rick snorted at the unexpected phrase, raising his head to see the wrinkled blockhead that he knew as Stan. "W-whaaauurp is that? Ha. HA." He drunkenly belched out, a massive dumbass grin spread on his face as the pools of relief filled his veins.
Stan was grinning like a senile bastard, explaining his niece saying that about anyone or anything that looked unhappy or like it needed fixing.
"L-Listen (hic) El Fucko, you gotta meet Murrrrrrrrrrrrp-Morty, nn Summ-uurp. Andff... BETH." He barked obnoxiously, close enough in Stanley's face to get flecks of spit on his glasses. "They're my babygirls." He smiled, taking out some cheesy photos in what best resembled a wallet. A shitty school photo of Morty, a candid of Beth yelling at Jerry, and Summer posing with him in a selfie. This resulted in the sharing of photos, an entire collection of Mabel's sweaters she had given Grunkle Stan, and then a single awkward photo of Dipper Pines trying to be suave.
- TBC?