It didn't take long for Rick to put his plan into action. In fact, he could hardly even call it a plan. Like many things Rick did, it started off with an idea and was then executed in a quick succession of simple steps. Things like infiltrating the ranks of the University of Washington and effectively becoming the new professor of cosmology was child's play.

Step one was to wait for the current professor (hilariously named "Mr. Cox") to come home to his condo for the night and inject him with a dangerous amount of Thiopental, instantaneously rendering him unconscious.

Step two was obvious - a classic dimensional switcheroo. Mr. Cox of dimension C-137 would wake up in dimension Beta-D-40 in an (almost) identical condo - terrified and confused, yes, but unharmed. The only divergence in this new dimension would be a moderate change in varying political issues - ones Mr. Cox would swear he was going senile by, considering he kept avid watch of the world's events and had apparently not grasped them correctly. There would be a strange, faded brown stain on the underside of his mattress (Rick made sure to clean it and flip it over) that he would never notice. That was from the original Beta-D-40 Mr. Cox slitting his wrists and creating a wonderful opportunity for Rick. Said Mr. Cox was then placed in the C-137 dimension, and with a little synthesized blood matching his DNA, his suicide was effectively staged.

Step three was to wait until his body got found to the horror of all his friends and family, the faculty, etc. However, despite the tragedy, the UW was a goddamn institute of higher education. They needed a replacement.

Step four - become the new motherfucking professor.

It didn't take much - the community of UW thanked their lucky stars to be graced with such an astounding figure in the scientific community. Rick thanked his own lucky stars for bothering to get a degree at one point and grace the world with his genius breakthroughs in multiple theories. Social wealth, bitch. He had that shit.

All he had to do now was… teach. Rick just hoped he wouldn't blow his brains out due to boredom. Perhaps he'd invent some sort of mechanism or artificial intelligence to grade everyone's work. That would somewhat relieve him of the drudgery.

The worst part was Morty wouldn't even be able to be fucking grateful for all the stupid shit he was doing to assist his crackhead ass.

Well. Rick's done crazier than this for Morty. Like sacrificing himself when they broke time, intent on floating through hypothetical cat-space for him indefinitely - or definitely, you can't really know - that was pretty wild.

Not only that, but it was uncanny. It didn't follow his typical code of self-preservation. Rick excelled beyond every other lifeform in the universe in terms of logic. He excelled in matters of strategy. Improvisation. Cataloguing and making sense of factual information - one of those facts being that he was a fucking genius at pretty much everything, more so than pretty much everyone.

All that emotional bullshit, though? Family? Love?

That was different.

Irrational.

For once, Rick didn't know how this was going to play out for himself. Morty would be unaware, he would make sure of that. But… while Rick's heart may have been a pit from some unripe fruit, hardened and inedible, his soul was intact. Whatever you consider a soul to be - a driving force, a consciousness, the last semblance of emotion encased in the slowly rotting body of a living organism - it was there. However small. And Rick's was a frayed knot, close to snapping. Not even science can detect and measure the intricacies of something like that. Rick's a genius. He would know. But if he let his tiny, withered soul do the walking this far already...

He might actually be fucked.

Morty still couldn't believe Mr. Cox committed suicide. The school tried to keep the circumstances of his death on the downlow, but of course the media came through as always.

It was just bizarre. Mr. Cox, though an inconsequential man, never seemed depressed or even that wearied by life. Mostly he seemed a bit bored. Even then, his eyes lit up with passion whenever he spoke to the class. He didn't seem like the type to kill himself. Though Morty supposed you never really know. He was old, probably widowed. It happened all the time. Still it was depressing. Mr. Cox was a nice enough man, he didn't deserve to die. Morty seemed to have a weakness for men that were sad and old. They were just so… well… sad and old.

Of course, the class had to continue, and it was sitting in the silent, grim classroom with his peers three days later that he saw Professor Sanchez for the first time.

The first thing Morty noticed was how good he looked for his age. He didn't look a day over fifty - although something unexplainable told him he must have been around sixty. He had wild, white hair that appeared blue in the light. He had a strong jaw and hard set eyes.

The second thing he noticed was he wore a fucking labcoat, like he just came back from mixing a bunch of chemicals together. Maybe he could accessorize with some lab goggles around his neck, Morty thought, almost snorting out loud.

The third thing he noticed was how FUCKING intimidating he was. He all but threw the doors open, silencing the last remaining whispers among the students with the abrasive sound. He walked with purpose, quickly and fluidly like a jaguar on the hunt. The most striking thing, however, was his expression. Entirely stoic. The kind of emotionless look that spoke of more than being zoned out or bored. It was a blank slate that somehow expressed, "I am filled to the brim, I have seen and done so many things, and still you will never know about any of them".

He looked like a guy you'd cross the street to get away from.

Morty glanced around the classroom quickly to see if any of his classmates noticed this. It looked like they were struck by something, that's for sure. Everyone's attention was intently focused on the stranger.

The man scribbled his name on the whiteboard. "Rick Sanchez". Then he turned to face the class, fixing them all with an almost bored look.

"Alright, kids, so I know your old professor… w - w - what was his name again? Mr. Cox? Jesus, I would kill myself too," - gasps all around, Morty's mouth dropped open - "yeah, yeah I know. I'm sorry that he, you know, offed himself. I'm sure you guys are pretty - pretty broken up about that, knowing him so dearly over the course of an ENTIRE semester, wow. Personally, I'm not so affected. I didn't know the guy. Anyway, as you can see, my name is Rick Sanchez, you can call me whatever the fuck you want, I - I don't care. As long as you're not fucking around in class, you know, you're just here to learn some shit. So. Let's just jump right into it," as he finished his introduction, he took a swig from a flask and burped loudly, then turned around again to start writing.

The whole class sat in shocked silence. No one had the balls to yell or scream at him about his horrifying disregard for Mr. Cox's life. It was like everyone's brains were short-circuiting. Who did this guy think he was?

"Okay, so I know Mr. Cox - " Rick paused to snort " - jesus, I will never get over that - well, I'm assuming he taught you guys about the start of the universe? The Big Bang? I - Is that ringing a bell?"

A spattering of nods, a small "yeah".

"So I'm also going to assume he taught you about the eventual fate of the universe?"

Silence. Wary looks.

Rick hid his face behind his palm and sighed. "Jesus fucking - okay, that's - that's just stupid. What did - what did he teach you after the Big Bang?"

A couple hands went into the air, including Morty's. "Yeah, you," Rick pointed at some brown haired chick with glasses.

"Primordial background radiation…"

"God. Okay. That's - wow. You guys are lucky I'm here." He drew a crude graph with some vectors on it. "Look, so - this is just your basic overview, by the way, it's way more fucking complex than this - scientists used to think the universe's expansion was slowing down due to gravity, right? Newton obviously was the one to really - really back up this theory. Makes sense, right?" Rick's eyes scanned the class. Morty jerked when his eyes went over his. They didn't linger or anything. But fuck. He could tell how blue they were from his seat in the back.

"So. Matter has a gravitational pull. That's why the universe can only expand for so long, right? Wrong. Very wrong. It has been observed that galaxies are getting FARTHER away from each other, stars are dimmer than they were originally - this is what tells us that the universe is expanding. You guys - you know Einstein's theory of general relativity? I - It tells us gravity can repel, kind of. If I'm gonna - gonna dumb that down for you. That's how we know about dark energy - an 'invisible'," Rick air quotes this and rolls his eyes, "force that is propelling the universe's expansion. The universe is growing - it's actually accelerating in speed. It's growing faster and faster. You guys should know this."

Rick paused to drink in the expressions of his students. They looked like they had heard it before, but were still paying close attention. He smirked.

"Pretty fucking cool still, yeah?" A few giggles. "Well, what you don't know it what this means for the fate of the universe." Silence again. "Y - yeah, that got your attention, huh? There's two major theories: The Big Crunch, and The Big Rip. The Big Crunch is where the universe is basically gonna collapse in on itself because the gravitational pull of matter will be enough to override the repulsive nature of dark energy. Think - think of it like this. You're pulling a rubber band, it's stretching - that's our universe expanding now, still being propelled by the Big Bang. When you let go, the tension of the band overrides your - your pulling… and it snaps back. Okay, that was - that was kind of a shitty fucking metaphor. You get the idea though, right? I mean, i - i - it's called The Big Crunch. Pretty self explanatory." Rick picked up a random piece of paper off the desk and crushed it into a ball. "Crunch."

The class was enraptured once again, looks ranging from existential crisis to awed wonder. Rick smirked again, then hid it behind his flask. He gave them a moment to process all of this, then gave another searching look. He couldn't help looking at Morty again quickly, which he regretted. He was not prepared for the painful twinge in his chest caused by looking into those eyes. Right there, right fucking there - that was the childish look he remembered. Naive. Caught up in the magic. Filled with love, filled with lust - oh shit - fuck, okay, "So that's The Big Crunch theory. Now, The Big Rip is like, basically if the opposite happens. If the repulsive force is strong enough to keep accelerating the universe, eventually everything is just gonna - just gonna fucking rip apart. Like, galaxies, stars, fucking - people, your girlfriend - everything, really - it's just gonna get ripped apart by the force of the universe, atom by atom. Fucking crazy, really. I - I mean, can you imagine? You're just walking your dog, and everything just gets pulled apart." Rick unraveled the ball of paper in his hands and started shredding it, letting little pieces fly to the floor. "Rip."

The class looked horrified again. Someone timidly raised their hand.

"Yeah?" Rick called on them.

"Are those… the only theories out there?"

Rick rolled his eyes. "Some idealists think it'll even itself out and just stop expanding and everything will be fine. I tend to disagree, as most scientists do. Here, let's - let's just get more in depth with this." He started scribbling on the whiteboard again.

Morty was… intoxicated.

He was always in love with this class - but this man, this crazy, eccentric douchebag of a man pulled him along the tales of space like Mr. Cox never did. As Rick continued rambling, pausing at moments to look at them wide-eyed and frantic, spilling liquor occasionally, Morty realized Rick was just like him - if not more so. His earlier dark demeanor spoke nothing of joy or excitement. Now? He had begun to pace around the classroom, going from one topic to the next and somehow having it make sense. Morty felt like Rick was that guy from A Beautiful Mind - fucking formulas and numbers flying across his vision and shit.

He could not take his eyes off of him. Rick was a star himself, fire, blazing. Something… Morty wondered… if right now, his heart was ripping or crunching. It felt like both. It was so fucking weird. Why? Why was his chest…?

It felt like only fifteen minutes had passed by the time the hour was over.

"Oh shit, we're five minutes over time." Everyone looked around, surprised. No one had noticed class had ended. "Alright kids, no fucking - no homework. You hate doing it. I hate grading it. Just read - I, I don't know - read some of the textbook, if you feel like it. We'll have a test… soon." With that, Rick unscrewed his flask once more and seemed to take the longest pull of all as he flopped into the black spinning chair behind his desk.

As everyone got up to leave, he held up a finger. "Oh, and if any of you decide to be snitches and tell anyone I'm drinking and swearing in here - y - you're gonna fail this course and probably get your computer hacked by me. I - I - I'm not fucking around, here. You'll be ruined."

No one doubted him.

As Morty left the classroom, he couldn't help but imagine Rick's eyes on him as he left, so strongly it almost felt real. He wanted a friendship with this man like never before, like nothing else he had ever wanted. He was so… raw. Unadulterated. Brash. And intelligent beyond anyone he's ever personally met. Not to mention the rudest, and certainly craziest.

And he loved the same thing he did. Space. The universe. The beginning of it. The fate of it.

Morty knew he liked him… but he couldn't help hating him too. He was incredibly insensitive. Only a monster would disregard someone's life like that, seriously. It was horrible. Regardless… his presence seemed to pull at him like magnetism.

"What an asshole… but he really knows his stuff…"

"Yeah, he's smart, but… suicide isn't a joke…"

"That's the hottest old guy I've ever fucking seen..."

"He's hilarious, oh my god… did you know he's famous…?"

The whispers of his classmates sent Morty's heart into a weird, harsh beating. Rick circled his skull, pounded on it.

Morty couldn't wait for the next class.