Disclaimer: I don't own "Rick and Morty". It's owned by Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon and Adult Swim.

Author's Note: Sorry for the hiatus. Been having a bit of writer's block.

"Wake up, Rick."

Go away…

"Wake the fuck UP, RICK."

Go the FUCK away….

A rough hand shook him abruptly awake. Rick froze as he found himself looking up into the worn out, sad eyes of….Hitler?-NO-Abe Lincoln! (NO!) It couldn't possibly be-

ABRADOLF LINCLER.

Rick had never felt like a child (even when he was a child), but he did now as he cowered under the shadow of the tall dark-haired man with a moustache that stared looming like a giant over his bed.

Abradolf Lincler...he was an experiment in DNA, as Rick had brought together the genes of Hitler and Lincoln to create what he'd thought would be a monumental fighting machine, but Lincler had wound up being a complete descrace, someone Rick hadn't wanted to be associated with AT all. And then he'd gotten himself killed on a mission to find Colaxion Crystals….wait-KILLED!-and yet-

"No-no, you, you're a mirage-a simple figment of my liquor lusting brain," Rick sputtered as his trembling hands fought to hold the blanket close in a poor attempt to shield himself, "you-you're d-d-d-dead in another d-d-dimension-"

Rick squealed as the shadow completely consumed him, as Lincler dove forward and snatched him up by the shirt collar, hissing and spitting inches away from his face, "YOU are the reason I was ever alive. YOU are the reason for my DEATH."

"B-b-bullshit-" Rick was barely able to choke out the words. "Y-you make your own ch-choices-"

"I looked UP to you!" Lincler roared in his face, "you were my FATHER-and you didn't even CARE that I DIED!"

"S-s-see," Rick forced a smirk in his attacker's face, "there's p-proof that you're not really here-you're my m-mind playing tricks on me-I can tell the diff-difference-"

"And look at you now!" Lincler tossed Rick back to the bed, dropping him back downlike a sack of potatoes, "you're a pathetic excuse of a human being! You can't even go FIVE DAYS without a drink! Just LOOK at yourself-and you call yourself 'The Smartest man in the Universe'!"

"I AM," Rick spat back through his chattering teeth, his tone growing dark and threatening, "and you were one mistake I will NEVER make again."

"Except you DID." Another voice smarmily interupted. A voice that was VERY sure of itself-TOO sure.

Rick flinched at the recognition of the voice. Lincler gasped in shock as well as another figure appeared over his bed.

"M-m-mMORTY!?" Rick shrank back in shock, shivering in spite of the sweat that pooled on his forehead, startled to see his grandson-why would he...be…?- "What the hell-you're not supposed to b-b-be here-"

"No shit Sherlock." His grandson's face came into view, a smirking smile on his face that all to closely resembled what too often became his own. Rick gasped as he noticed one side of his face was covered with an eye patch. His stutter is gone, Rick thought with astonishment, Why is his stutter gone?

"What-M-Morty, what happend to y-your-"

"Doesn't matter Rick." Morty was still smiling as he whipped out A GUN. Except: he wasn't pointing it at Rick; he was pointing it at...LINCLER?

Lincler shrieked in fear like a little girl. "NO-PLEASE-I'm gonna change! Really I'm gonna change-" Rick shut his eyes tight and covered his ears as the gun exploded, filling the room with smoke, which quickly filled his lungs, and he gasped for air, the smoke nearly choking him.

"Wh-wh-why would you do that!?" Rick stared in horror at Morty was the smoke finaly cleared.

"He was useless," Morty shrugged simply as he twirled the gun a little with pride before he promptly returned it to its holster. "Just like you."

Rick froze as the gun was suddenly pointed straight at him.

Squeezing his eyes shut, he braced himself for the inevitable-

"NO!"

Rick snapped awake, horrified and shivering in his own sweat as he hugged himself and tried to return to his present surroundings. The padded cell he had forced Squanchy to lock himself in was not the most reassuring environment to come out of a terrifying nightmare; his head was spinning, and his stomach was in knots.

He hadn't asked why there was a padded cell in Squanchy's basement (you simply didn't ask questions for the existence of things when on Planet Squanch; you were better off that way). But it was better than reguar walls, because five days without booze and he was already suppressing the urge to bash his own skull in. At least Squanchy had been able to get wireless health monitors, which were actually tatoos that could only be rubbed off with special material (he would have ripped any else off, and he needed Squanchy to keep an eye on him in case he really lost it.)

So far, he was still here-he'd been vomiting every few hours, barely able to eat the bread and butter that Squanchy slipped through the small opening in the door, but water was a different story. He could hardly keep that down, and he was nearing dehydration; if it kept up like this, he'd have to stop, and he couldn't afford to do so (his life literally depended on it).

Still shivering, Rick looked down at himself, at his stained clothes; he stank, and he felt like the waking dead. The dream had left a pit in his stomach; the firey eyes of Lincler boring deep into his brain.

He would NOT feel bad for Lincler. Lincler fucked up on that mission-NOT him.

"He thought of you as a fa-father…."

Morty's tearful voice filtered through his clouded, hazy mind.

"Get the FUCK out of my head MORTY!" Rick shouted, slamming his fist into the padded wall, but all he could hear was the sound of crying, endlessly echoing, on repeat, over and over in his head.

It might have been Morty's. It might have been anyone's.

It might have been his own.