To Waste A Breath On Words
Summary: Rick and Morty go on another of their adventures, except this time something happens which causes Morty to shut down and refuse to speak. Rick finds himself pressed to fix it before he loses Morty.
Warning: T, allusion/innuendo, nothing graphic. I don't know how to not write something dark when it comes to Rick and Morty, probably because the show is already dark and funny, so something pretty serious has to occur for the characters to take it serious. No beta, grammatical mistakes ahead. Set prior to season 3.
A/N: I intend to fluff more, don't worry.
Chapter 2
The next morning, Morty didn't show up at the breakfast table. Jerry was too preoccupied in his own current woes of unemployment to blame Rick, and Summer had her phone in hand. Beth seemed to be in a more reconciling mood, not outright asking her father about her son but rather sending him furtive glances.
The table was tense and awkward, Jerry ignorantly prattling on about how terrible his last job interview had gone. Rick sighed, appetite gone. He smiled fakely and stood up, his fork clattering on the plate.
"G-good breakfast, Beth, reaaal good."
He saw his daughter smile, eyes tearing with the simple compliment.
"Thanks, dad." Her voice was it's usual adoring tone.
Rick started to walk away, headed for the garage, when Beth spoke again.
"Was Morty okay, yesterday?" The question was hesitant and concerned, a mother worried about her son and a daughter terrified of scaring her father away.
"Yeah, of course he was, I k-keep Morty safe, he's alright. Wh-what kind of grandpa do you think I am?"
Beth's gaze fell, the part of her the little girl that was abandoned beating out the worried mother.
"Of course, I know you take care of Morty."
Jerry let out a derisive snort, "I don't want to beat a dead horse, Beth, but we have this conversation every morning. Your dad is not a good influence on our son."
"T-takes one to know one, Jerrry. What k-kind of example do you set, huh, Jerry, huh, setting your son up to be jobless and dependent, depend on, on his daughter for spending money, huh Jeeerrrry."
Jerry's face flushed with anger.
"Dad!" Beth cried in remonstration.
Summer let out a scoff of disgust and stood up, leaving to the front room with a mutter under her breath about not being hungry.
Rick left the destruction in his wake, breakfast officially ruined and ignoring Jerry's shouts after him. In the garage he began fiddling with his portal gun, he'd been working on formulating a way to make it more energy efficient, hopefully, if he was successful, this would deal with anymore incidents where they ran out of charge while on an adventure.
With half-hearted interest he heard the car start up twenty minutes later and pull out of the drive, unintelligible voices drifting into the garage. He knew it was Jerry taking the kids to school, however he found himself disappointed to not hear Morty's high and pubescent voice among them.
Rick was pretty good at timing adventures, always before lunch because he was well aware that lunch was the time in which Morty usually got bullied the most, bruises marring his skin and shoulders hunched on the days Rick failed to show up. Rick would solve all Morty's problems for him but then again, most of the time he was too drunk to process much beyond where his mind took him. The problems of an adolescent weren't high on his list of to do. Didn't mean he liked seeing bruises on Morty though.
That was the thing though, Rick thought absently as he opened a portal into Morty's math class, quickly grabbing his grandson and pulling through another portal, this time Morty didn't have any bruises, but his face said he did.
The portal took them to the high spired city on the planet Kluck Klucky. It was populated by a group of mutant chickens, all beady eyed and suspicious, easy to upset but generally pretty harmless since they viewed humans as spineless cowards, animals far beneath them. The buildings were huge spirals rising into the sky, a brilliant spread of colors as the light flashed off of their nacreous material.
Rick smiled surreptitiously, a bit of joyful anticipation filling him at seeing that wide amazed look which was bound to come onto Morty's face when he saw this world. There was something pleasing about being able to put that look on Morty's face, to see the childish innocence of his curiosity and amazement. It didn't come though, Morty staring at the ground, eyes dull and body hunched. Rick frowned.
"C-Come on Morty, haven't got all day. We gotta get meet up with Gizzard Brains, the biggest chicken of them all, he's the prelate of Kluck Klucky."
Morty didn't say anything, just giving a tiny nod. Rick's frown grew but he still turned, walking down the street as every passing chicken eyed them with suspicion and distrust. Rick kept waiting for Morty to make some comment about the chickens, but Morty was silent and disinterested, it was making it difficult to enjoy the hilarity that was a chicken giving him a stare down.
They made their way to the tallest spire and Rick easily entered, by accident he'd kind of sort of saved the entire population of the world, accidentally making them a cure to an epidemic which had threatened the entire species. Rick chuckled to himself, he'd been really drunk for that.
They were greeted by a secretary chicken who took them into an elevator which went to the top floor. Once there, they were ushered into an office where a Cochin chicken sat behind a desk, golden feathers primped grandiosely.
"Heeyyya, Gizzard Brains, long time no see, my mcnugget friend."
Gizzard Brains let out a cluck and got up, extending a wing out.
"Hello, my friend, you look older than last time I saw you."
"Yeah, well, y-you're no spring chicken yourself."
The bad humor went over Gizzard Brains head, but Rick had really said it for the benefit of himself and Morty. Morty however didn't crack a smile, appearing to not even being paying attention. Rick's smile faded and he continued on with his meeting.
They left soon enough, a much needed material in Rick's coat pocket and nothing dangerous having occurred. They climbed into the ship and headed home, Morty immediately going to his room. Rick hadn't overlooked the fact that Morty hadn't spoken a single word.
Rick tried to work on his project, the material he'd gotten from Gizzard Brains a part of his effort to rework his portal gun, but his mind couldn't let alone the fact that something was definitely wrong with Morty. Letting out a frustrated breath he slammed his gun down, and ran hand through his hair.
"Stupid little shit," he grumbled under his breath before making his way out of the garage and up the stairs.
He opened Morty's door without knocking and walked in to Morty sitting on his bed, looking out the window with his arms wrapped around his knees.
"W-what are you doing, Morty?"
Morty looked over at Rick, eyes the same wide, empty as before. Morty shrugged, starting to get up and pulling on his shoes. They stood there awkwardly, apparently Morty thought they were going on an adventure. Rick narrowed his eyes and just looked at his grandson who was standing, looking at the ground. Morty was still hunched on himself, nervous and completely following Rick without complaint.
"I aBLUuurghsked you a question, Morty."
Morty shrugged once again. Rick tried to think of what had happened, Morty was usually always with him and Morty was honestly too thick skinned to be bothered by what happened at school. Morty had been by his side, so, Rick stopped. Morty hadn't, at the Citadel of Ricks, Morty had been by himself for several hours. Rick frowned, the Citadel was supposed to be safe for Mortys.
"N-Not speaking, that was this is, yo-you think that'll help?"
Morty didn't respond, gaze still fixed on the floor.
Rick got angry, a very good response in his opinion to most things next to apathy and dismissal. He stepped forward, shoving Morty so that his grandson fell to the floor.
"You not g-gonna talk, that it, Morty, think that'll solve your problems!? Make make 'em go away!? It's stupid Morty, real stupid! You-yo-"
Rick stopped short because Morty was shaking from where he was on the floor, absolutely terrified of Rick. Rick backed off, blinking as it made sense. Morty was terrified, of him. Then the strange smell from yesterday came back to him and he realized that he knew what it was: Fix'er All. It was a low-density polymer which had a low melting temp, a thermoplastic like it could be applied and would melt due to the skin's temperature, it healed basic injuries on carbon based life forms nearly instantly and was a commonly used invention of Ricks and was genearlly only used by Ricks.
Someone had hurt Morty, someone who knew enough about Mortys to hurt his Morty bad and then had the brains and ability to make it look like nothing had happened. A Rick had done this. Anger coursed through Rick, someone had hurt Morty.
They stood there, in silence. Morty still cowering on the ground while Rick tried to rein in his anger. It took a few minutes before he could stop clenching his fists and grinding his teeth. Finally though he was back in control, anger channeled into his thinking rather than his physical response. Rick crouched down next to Morty, hand extending out to his grandson. Morty flinched, then hesitantly took his grandpa's hand.
Gently he pulled Morty to his feet, setting a hand on his shoulder. Morty was staring up at him, a hint of confusion in his gaze. Rick stood with his hand there before pulling Morty into a hug. Morty was stiff at first before he relaxed. It lasted a few moments before Rick pulled away.
He left then, not looking back, knowing that Morty was watching him go. Rick headed down the stairs, brushing past Jerry who tried making a snide comment before frowning in confusion and then slight fear, he'd never seen Rick walk that way before, cold and straight, with purpose and danger that made Jerry remember that his wife's father was a terrorist and mass murderer, someone, who according to the gromflomites, had committed countless crimes.
Rick was often latently dangerous, a hazard like an out of control car is, not intentional. This was different, intent to harm and destroy, every part of his mind thinking of the best way to kill. Jerry was terrified by it and stuttered out an apology that was ignored as much as his insult had been.
Rick swept into the garage, assembling a few items. He pocketed a few homemade bombs, grabbed some strange liquids in small vials, and several other things. The last thing he grabbed was his portal gun. Rick pointed his portal gun, firing and then stepping through the circular green portal.
Rick 90-PL-0008 was a Rick who was notoriously good at paperwork, as such he'd been placed in the Citadel customs center, having to process all the Ricks that wanted to go in and out of the Citadel. Looking in boredom at the next Rick in line he droned out the usual question about paperwork.
The papers were slid over the desk. He looked at the papers and then blinked as he saw the dimension name of the Rick he was servicing, C-137. He blinked. Looking up he took in the Rick before him. C-137 was famous, well more of infamous, but still, this was unusual.
"C-137?" 90-PL-0008 asked, still unsure if this was 'the rogue' standing in front of him, filling out paperwork.
"Just what it says on the paper, dumbass."
90-PL-0008 just nodded.
"Purpose of visit?"
"It's on the friggin' paper, moron."
"Purpose of visit?"
Rick glared at him, non-existent patience gone. A moment passed before C-137 acquiesced.
"Council sanctioned revenge."
90-PL-0008 raised a brow but nodded again.
"Oooookay. Head on in."
Rick glared at the customs Rick before moving quickly off. 90-PL-0008 watched him go, intrigue and curiosity in his gaze. Revenge, huh? Laws in the Citadel were a little different than Earth law, here revenge was encouraged and promoted, they had a way of determining how much revenge you could get and supplied resources to exact it. The way they figured, Ricks were going to do it anyway, why not stop it from being a law enforcing headache? This Rick had given him the willies though, with a cold gaze and his unfortunate connection to those horrifying rickicides. 90-PL-0008 was glad that cool gaze had no patience for him, he pitied the men who had invoked the ire of a Rick without moral restraint and governed by no laws.
Rick made his way into the formal part of the Citadel, headed for the records section. He passed the entrance and then ducked behind the building. Rick approached one of the many windows of the government building before finding the one he wanted, slamming his elbow into it, he shattered the glass. The occupants of the room looked up in startled fear, some sort of stupid meeting going on. Rick then proceeded to pull out one of his handmade bombs and throw it in through the broken window.
A few seconds later it exploded, letting a bright yellow gas flood the room. Rick moved back through the building, tugging the baseball cap he had on off and throwing it to the side. He waited ten seconds before walking into the records building. Once he was in the foyer the alarms in the building went off and Ricks came pouring out. Rick ignored them, pulling a gas mask from a bag he had and putting it on. The thick yellow smoke began coming from out of a door that burst open, Ricks coughing and stumbling to get away from it. It spread quickly, overtaking the hallway Rick was walking down.
He appeared a figure, silent and steady, alien with the mask on and hazy from the thick yellow smoke which blurred the view. He entered one of the rooms, one lined with large, ceiling tall computers. The control screen was at the center, placed on a desk that had a chair at it. Rick sank into it and then proceeded to hack the computer. He found what he wanted quickly.
The video image was clear, two Ricks who grabbed his Morty and dragged him to an alley, beat on him a little and then took him to a rent-a-room. Rick downsized the video and brought up something else. A few minutes later, the only sounds the loud, shrieking wail of the siren and the fast paced click of computer keys, a page turned up. On it were two pictures of Ricks, a JP-98 and Epsilon Epsilon 55590. Pushing a chip into the computer, Rick typed a few more things. A few moments passed before he unplugged the chip and got up. He placed the chip in his portal gun. Rick drew the gun up and fired, the large portal coming into existence. Without a word he stepped through.
Thank you to all who read, reviewed, followed, and favorited. If you have any suggestions, thoughts, criticisms, or just want to drop a word, feel free to PM me or leave a review! By the way, Epsilon and Theta are just Greek letters, I just picked up on the shows use of Greek letters in naming dimensions.
