Rick was a mess when Ford saw him.
He was lying on the table with a pile of bottles of alcohol threatening to fall to the floor, probably unconscious. Ford had to cover his nose because he reeked absolutely with booze.
He knew there was something wrong when the green portal closed behind him and Rick didn't stir from his sleep. Usually, he'd get jumpy whenever an unknown presence intruded the lab but Rick was barely showing any signs of life.
That was when Ford noticed the gun in Rick's hand.
"Oh my gosh, Rick?" Ford asked, panicked, grabbing Rick's shoulders and shaking him awake. Upon physical contact, Rick jerked away from it and shoved Ford. The six fingered man toppled backwards but managed to maintain his balance; Ford was too big for a lean person like Rick could knock down easily.
"The ffuuck is your problem, M-morty?!" He yelled at Ford without looking at him, his speech slurred as he tried to gather himself from his hangover. Ford took a step back, keen to give Rick space. He still had the gun in his hand and he wouldn't want to get shot, or for Rick to shoot himself. Rick looked up at Ford since he didn't get a response from this so called Morty. He groaned at the sight of the man with the red turtleneck sweater. "Fuck, it's you again."
Rick stood up with a bit more ease than Ford expected a hungover man could be capable of. The former glared at Ford before throwing the gun to the counter table beside other unfinished inventions of his.
"W-w-what do you want?" Rick asked, grabbing his flask from his lab coat and taking a sip from it.
Ford gulped and looked away from the intense gaze Rick aimed at him. It gave him shivers to have Rick's frustration directed at him not because he was naturally scary, but because it heavily resembled a particular demon's glare.
"I just came by for a visit." Ford told him, shrinking into his coat. He felt like he was suffocating under that stare.
"After what happened, you want to visit me?" Rick hissed at Ford. "Right after that motherfucker decided it would be a prettyyy fucking great idea to diss on me!?"
Ford buried his hands in his pockets. "It's been three years," Ford said quietly, trying not to invoke the rage of the man. "I didn't expect you'd still be all touchy about it."
Rick raised his monobrow. "The fuck are you talking about Ford? I'm pretty sure I got kicked out less than 24 hours ago."
Ford was confused at this point and so was Rick. "I swear, it's been three years since Weirdmageddon happened. It's been three years since I killed Bill."
Rick twitched at the mention of the demon's name. His glare faded almost immediately into a stoic expression. He looked away from Ford. "So, so that was it, huh?" He whispered, turning his back against Ford. "That was his grand scheme. Manipulate everyone so he could die." Rick's shoulders shook. Ford wanted to comfort him, somehow, to tell him Bill was just an asshole who he didn't have to care for anymore. He was an insane tyrannical ruler, nothing more, nothing less.
"I know both of you shared a friendship I never knew of," Ford said quietly in a comforting tone. "But he wasn't who you thought he was. I'm sorry. I... I know how it felt to be used, to be betrayed by him. It sucks. But he's dead now so it doesn't matter. You have to move on at some point."
Rick broke into delirious laughter. Ford was taken aback.
"First of fuckin' all Ford," Rick began, facing Ford with a scowl, "don't assume you have any idea what it was like being friends with B, or Bill, w-w-whatever you call him in your dimension. Don't force your abandonment experience on me because it's different. I-I-I know B more than you do." Rick took another drink from his flask before slamming his hand on the counter. "And do you fucking know why he pushed me away? It's not because he betrayed me like he did to you. It was because he's got a plan in motion that he didn't want me knowing, because he knows I'm gonna stop him. And, and just to make it pretty fucking clear, it's not genocide or some shit like taking over the world. Cccome on Fordy, you should know that B and I had done worse than that, and to tell you the fucking truth, I wouldn't even give a shit if that was the case. But it wasn't. He wanted me out because he was desperate to die and I wouldn't let that happen, not on my watch."
Ford was silent at Rick's outburst. The entire Weirdmageddon scheme was just... A suicide? 30 years in between dimensions, all the suffering of his and thousands of innocent beings, it was all just an overly convoluted way to kill himself? Ford clenched his fists. That was... That was so stupid. It was so pathetic, he couldn't believe it. Bill was smarter than that.
"Bill wouldn't do that," Ford replied smugly. "He wanted to conquer the third dimension, to spread his weirdness, to build his empire on the graves of all people who went against him. He wanted to see people suffer. He wa-"
"For the love of god Stanford, shut the fuck up!" Rick yelled furiously at Ford, hurling a bottle at him. Ford, quick on his feet, evaded the attack and the bottle shattered on the wall. "Even after you got dumped by your ex-god you still deify the hell outta him. Y-y-you assume he wants to conquer all of the dimensions when you don't even know the first thing about the god damn flatlander! Do you even know wwwhat a flatlander is? Tell me, Ford, what do you know about Bill?"
Ford couldn't answer. Rick was right. He didn't have the slightest idea about Bill, and he had the lunacy to follow him mindlessly back then. Even now, the most he knew about the demon were technical details. What he was, what he could do, what his weaknesses were. But nothing else about his destroyed home dimension, about how he became the feared demon he was. Ford's stomach churned in disgust.
Rick wasn't the slightest bit amused at this reaction. "Or do you want to believe that there's more to B's fucked up motives so you can feel that you're a part of something bigger?" Ford clenched his fists. "Well fuck that and fuck you." Rick spat at Ford. "He committed suicide that's it."
"Well how about you then?" Ford asked, finally finding the audacity to match Rick's tone. He wasn't taking this. For all he knew, Rick was lying, or he had been brainwashed by Bill. He wanted, no, needed proof. "Do YOU know Bill?"
Rick let out a bitter cackle. "Do I know him? Hmmm... Do I?" Rick mockingly scratched his chin as he pretended to be in deep thought. He bore his teeth in frustration. "Well fuck yeah I did." He said, pointing to himself. He procured a small old sketchbook from his coat and threw it over to Ford. Six fingers wrapped around the dirty cover and Ford picked it up. He began to skim it, finding different pyramidal drawings with unreadable scribbles here and there to give in depth details of how some of the figures. Ford felt like there was an ice cold spear that bore through his chest. He knew some of these figures. These were all too familiar forms Bill had taken during Weirdmageddon. Ford's jaw dropped.
"Wwwho do you think designed that corporeal form that two-dimensional triangle takes? Who the fuck do you think helped him navigate through the third dimension? Who the fuck do you think gave him the idea of uniting the second and third dimensions? Do you really think a being from the second dimension would be that smart, Stanford?
"I helped that backstabbing motherfucker. I was the one who taught him shit about how things work in our plane of existence."
Rick looked away. "And that was my mistake."
Ford's annoyance at Rick was doubled. "Yeah, it is." He knew he shouldn't be angry at him but Rick cost him his research, his friends and family, 30 years of his life! "I bet you regret ruining thousands of lives including mine."
Rick laughed a dry laugh. "The fuck? You think I'm upset because I ruined your life? Jeez. Stanford, do you really even have a PhD on psychology? Jesus Christ. Should I spoonfeed you the details of why B killed himself? He killed himself because, be-be-because he didn't know any better. Because I didn't know better. Yyyou just walked in on me passed out after I failed to kill myself do you fucking think I didn't influence him on that?
"Wubba lubba dub dub, bitch."
Ford looked down. He didn't know what else to say because he felt so betrayed now. His suffering was because of a useless whim, and his best friend was the reason he got into this shit in the first place. Ugh, Ford wanted to punch Rick in the face, to vent out his frustration on him. But he didn't, not because he knew he should've moved on by now, but mostly because he had been in that position before.
It was when he was exiled from his home, hiding out in the M dimension. He knew his chances of defeating Bill back then was close to zero, and there was no possible way out of the mess he was in. He tried thinking of so many ways to fix his mistakes but to no avail. He wanted to take the quick route out of the hell he got himself in, he really did mean to commit suicide - muicide - back then.
"Sorry," was the only thing Ford managed to say, keeping his head bowed down. "I was insensitive. I shouldn't have said anything."
"Ugh," Rick rolled his eyes before taking a long swig from his silver flask. "Don't be, Sixer." Ford winced at the nickname. "In the end of the day, you're right. B's dead, we move on. Don't look back. That's it. He's been dead for how long again?"
"Three years."
"See. Three years. He's been dead for th- what?" Rick's monobrow furrowed and for a moment the two scientists exchanged confused glances before Rick fumbled to the laptop on his desk. After swiftly tapping on the keyboard, he went over to one of the compartments built in on the counter and pulled out a miniature satellite with a USB connector.
Ford eyed the man curiously as he went back and forth his lab. "Uh, what are you doing?"
Rick plugged in the device to his laptop. "Checking the stability of the bridge between our universes." Rick said, typing away once more on his laptop. "I was serious when I told you the party was just yesterday."
Ford came closer, looking over Rick's shoulder to see what was the fuss all about. There was a line graph with the most inconsistent and fluctuating data Ford had ever seen in his life. Rick pressed a button on the device and the line graph was then overlayed on thousands of other graphs.
"Holy shit," Rick mumbled. Ford had to nod in agreement, whatever these readings were, it was a fucking catastrophe. This was not good.
"This should be one straight line!" He exclaimed, pointing at the screen. "Our timeline's messing up! Iiit's out of sync. The space between universes, it's collapsing!"
"Yes it is."
Ford and Rick both jumped in surprise and both of the scientists whirled around to face the source of the foreign voice.
The being behind them was peculiar, an alien with seven eyes on her face, all blinking in unison. She wore a pale, rose gold robe, with the hood draped over her head. Stanford knew who she was. She was the Oracle, the one who installed the metal plate on his head.
Rick growled beside Ford, shooting a glare at the being who appeared out of nowhere. "What the fuck are you doing here, you filthy hag?" Rick asked, arms crossed. "Did that frilly know-it-all send you?"
Ford looked at Rick, a bit shocked that he called the transdimensional god with the same nickname Bill used, though Ford knew he shouldn't be that surprised anymore, considering their past friendship.
"In actuality," the Oracle said with a smile, ignoring Rick and turning to Ford. "The Nightmare Realm should have collapsed by now. Stanford, haven't you stopped Bill Cipher?"
"I..." Ford said reluctantly. Rick took Ford's hand and gave it a very tight, urgent squeeze. He knew what Rick was telling him.
"I... I haven't," Ford lied to the Oracle, though he felt as if she knew he was lying. He decided to keep up the facade. "I-I'm asking Rick to repair my Quantum Destabilizer," he looked at Rick who nodded in confirmation. Ford looked back at the Oracle. "You know, so I could eradicate his existence."
The oracle smiled, pleased. Ford sighed inwardly. Great, he told himself. She took the bait.
"Well, best of luck may be blessed onto thee, Stanford." The Oracle said with a knowing smile. "I pray the Axolotl grant you success. Praise the Axolotl!"
And with that she disappeared into thin air, as if she wasn't there to begin with.
Rick and Ford looked at one another. They knew two things now. One was that they needed to stabilize the transdimensional link between universes; And two,
Bill was most certainly not dead.
Author's note: Okay that's the one shot. People might be confused with the past relationship of Bill and Rick, or the entire Bill suicide issue so here's the prompt: If bill could see into the future/his defeat was prophesized, why did he still follow through with his plan. The answer I came up with was because he was suicidal and literally the only two ways he could be killed was to be destroyed once the universe collapses on itself IF BILL UNLEASHED WEIRDMAGEDDON, or he could be erased in Stan's mind Wherever Bill is now its unknown so yeah stay tune. Narrative-wise I don't like how this came out BC it's too... Idk weird rushed and unnatural? Mostly bc its been a long time since I wrote fanfic and I'm real rusty at this. Plus its less fluff language and shit you know, not that creative. Idk I also feel like it shouldn't be overly detailed idk why. Sorry I suck at fic writing. Please do leave a comment I'd appreciate it! Tell me what you liked about it, what you didn't, constructive criticism is welcome! Also just a simple "hey nice read" would help my motivation uwu.