Let The Ricks Fall Where They May
Written by Kat_Aclysm
Beta Read by Unlvcrjchick
Rated: - T for language
Disclaimers + Copyrights: I don't own any of these characters, this is a work of fanfiction. Rick and Morty is an Adult Swim animated comedy, created by Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon. Please support the official content.
NOTE: This chapter content settles down a bit after the previous two. Enjoy!
Chapter 4 – New Rickality
Date Unknown, 7:15am Local Time, 2001
Birdperson's Tree House
Bird World, Dimension Unknown
The sun was coming up outside the window. Morty was already wide awake, having been roused from slumber by discomfort and hunger. He made a soft whimper to get Rick's attention and grabbed onto his shirt with both tiny hands, pulling on it. Nothing happened. He sat back for a moment and began to think of other strategies he could use in order to get his grandfather to wake up.
Meanwhile, Rick was still completely out of it and made soft snoring sounds as he slept. It was the first real rest he had gotten since everything had happened, and the only reason he had managed to fall asleep at all was because he had been utterly exhausted. That, and he had cried himself to sleep last night, though he would never admit that to anyone. When his assailant began to tug on his shirt, it didn't register. Then he felt the first whack to the face and his mind began to stir.
There was another whack to his face soon after that, but it was little and could easily be ignored. There was soon another and another, those ones harder this time, and he ignored those too. It was all relatively easy to put up with because it didn't hurt; it was only mildly annoying.
He heard cranky whining somewhere next to his left ear. He ignored that and tried to go back to sleep. It didn't work, though, because Morty had already woken him up enough to be aware of his surroundings. With that same awareness came his active mind and he was once again barraged with the full volley of thoughts that had swarmed his consciousness the night before. He would let them come this time, though, as he needed to work his way through all the noise and devise some kind of plan. There was no way in hell he could just stay here on Bird World with Morty indefinitely; the baby deserved some kind of long term care plan and a decent future. Rick needed to give it to him; he owed it to him after everything that had happened.
Meanwhile, the tiny whacking hands resumed their assault.
"St-stop..." Rick furrowed his brows in protest, turning his head away. Even though he was awake enough to be aware of everything around him, he still didn't want to get up because he was quite comfortable. He rolled away from his grandson and lay on his belly, burying his face in his pillow.
"Go back to sleep, buddy... it's too early for your shit." His response was muffled and he knew that Morty wasn't going to talk back or even understand most of what he had just said, but it still felt right talking to him and explaining the situation.
Morty was getting fed up. His strategy wasn't working: the big lump next to him wasn't doing what he wanted and his discomforts still hadn't been taken care of. He placed both hands on his grandfather's back, using it to steady his balance as he shakily hauled himself up onto his feet. He resumed his attack, striking the older man with open-palmed hands. He was cranky, he was wet, and he wanted to be fed; all of these factors added up to louder and more upset demands.
Rick just lay there despite the fact he knew it was only going to escalate further. Morty kept hitting him and he didn't mind about that too much, at least until the youngster had struck the heel of his hand straight onto one of his many stitched-up shrapnel injuries.
"Ghhh!" He gritted his teeth and flinched hard at that one, hot tears of pain pricking at the edges of his eyes. His entire back was still very raw and tender and he decided that enough was enough. Rick positioned his arms in such a way that he could prop himself up and rested for a moment on his elbows, needing a moment to let the pain subside.
"Kid... just stop. I'm damaged goods, you know." He shot the youngster a particularly disapproving glare. "I know you don't understand, b-but... be nice to Grandpa for a few days, huh? It hurts."
Morty obviously knew he had just done something wrong and leaned heavily onto his grandfather's shoulder, making short upset sounds that almost sounded like he was talking to him.
Rick raised his eyebrows in response; was he actually apologizing right now?
He sighed as he sat up properly, scooping the youngster up to place in his lap. "It's OK, little buddy, I-I know you didn't mean it." Rick's tone was mildly annoyed, but still gentle and soft as he spoke. He wasn't going to fault Morty for hurting him this time, as the little boy didn't know he was injured and likely didn't even know his own strength. However, it had still stung like a bitch.
"Come on, we need to get up anyway. I don't know what kind of food Birdperson has lying around, but both of us need to eat something..." He went quiet as he considered the fact that he couldn't climb down the tree house in his current state, and it meant they would be reliant on Birdperson's charity until he could make other arrangements. Although he knew his friend would more than tolerate the both of them, it still wasn't something he wanted to do.
As he watched Morty use his shirt to pull himself up again, he realized that the little boy was staring at him expectantly. He lowered his head and sighed; regardless of how he felt about scrounging from another, his grandson was depending on him to take care of his every need.
It was going to take some getting used to.
"Yeah, I know. You're probably hungry. You also smell like piss." He scooped Morty up in his arms and finally got out of bed. After another moment, he set the youngster down onto the floor and stood up to stretch out his limbs.
"Stay here for a mo-" Rick didn't finish his sentence; his own body decided to cut it short with a loud yawn. "S-stay here for a moment. I'll go into the main room and get your bag. Hopefully some of your food still survived, huh?" He twisted his mouth into an uncomfortable expression; he didn't know how much food was still accessible to them and it was really bothering him. He needed to go through that bag as soon as possible, as there were a couple of other questions he needed to answer right now.
Morty protested to being put down on the floor. He had wanted to be up high and as close as possible to the only familiar person he knew anymore. He wasn't willing to explore the room, nor was he interested in anything else. All he wanted right now was comfort and the closeness of his grandfather.
Rick dismissed the noise, figuring that Morty was just being himself: a grumbly little boy who had only just woken up. "Settle down, kiddo. I'll be back in a minute," he told him as he stepped out the doorway. However, the moment he turned into the hallway and was out of sight, Morty's whining exploded into a terrified wail.
Rick stopped in his tracks right there and then, immediately peering his head back around the doorway to look at the other, wide-eyed and a little baffled. "Oh god... what's wrong with you now?" He briskly moved back in to walk the distance across the room to the young boy, picking him up right away in the effort to make him stop crying again. There had been absolutely no warning with that one - not a crescendo of whimpering or any kind of lead up whatsoever.
Morty practically glued himself to Rick's chest and buried his face into his shirt. He threw his arms around the older man as far as he could reach, his tiny hands clinging onto him for dear life as he continued his loud, terrified crying.
This was new behavior; Rick had never seen it before. He pondered it for a moment, only to have his heart sink into his stomach when he realized what was probably going on. "Oh god... you're... this really screwed you up, didn't it? You're not going to let me out of your sight, a-are you?"
As he continued to hug the young boy, his sounds began to decrease in volume once more. Rick felt a sharp stab of guilt in his chest; his grandson wasn't even two years old yet, and he had been traumatized to the point of developing an abandonment issue overnight. Yet another thing he didn't know how to deal with and worse, it was all his fault.
"C-come on... let's get you sorted out." Rick tried to put it out of his mind again as he carried Morty out to the living room.
Once he was seated on the couch, he set Morty down beside him so he could get stuck into the cloth bag right away. However, he found himself distracted when he discovered that the remains of his portal gun and all of his electrical components were all laid out neatly on top of the table for him; Birdperson must have retrieved it all from his shredded clothing and left it there for him during the night.
Morty scooted over to lean heavily into his grandfather's side; he didn't want to be anywhere else right now.
Rick sighed as he reached over to pat Morty on the head. "I'm sorry you got tied up in my shit, little buddy... we'll fix it somehow..." He took all the disposable diapers out of the bag to scatter them across the spare space on the table. He tossed the damaged ones aside, counting the ones that were still good to work with.
Twenty six.
Not exactly what he wanted, though he was vaguely impressed it had been so well stocked for a bag that was only meant to be used for going out for a single day. He would have preferred that more of the items had survived, but he wasn't about to argue; it was what it was and he would have to work with it. As he began arranging the diapers into piles, his mind began to reason through how much time it would buy him; Morty typically went through an average of six to eight diapers a day, which meant he had just over three days to come up with a new portal gun before he could get more of them. Depending on what was in the boxes in the spare nest room, he could probably whip up something if he dedicated most of his time to it.
Upon taking inventory of the rest of the bag, Rick discovered that he only had two sets of clothing for Morty, a packet of baby wipes, three plastic bottles, some teething rings, and several sachets of powdered formula that were still intact. Some of the sachets had exploded in the bottom, but none of the food in glass jars had survived at all; the bottom of the bag was a complete discolored mess. After dumping the rest of the useful items out onto the coffee table, he threw the bag behind him and buried his face in his hands.
"Shit..." He hissed to himself; it meant that he would have to forage for food after all, or rely on Birdperson, which he really didn't want to do.
As Rick raised his head again, he began scanning the house, his mind racing for alternative solutions. His eyes quickly fell on the cupboards in Birdperson's kitchen and he had to raise an eyebrow at the thought that came next; birdpeople were mostly insectivores and grain eaters, but they were known to occasionally eat fruit if they could get it. Birdperson's kitchen would probably have something edible, even if it was only very basic.
Morty was trying to get his grandfather's attention again; his needs still hadn't been met and he resumed the chorus of pathetic whining noises he had been making before.
Rick looked down at him and sighed. "Yeah, I know. Sorry to make you wait, but... Grandpa's trying to work through some shit right now." He placed the supplies he needed on the edge of the coffee table and rolled his sleeves up out of the way. After sliding off the couch, he took the little boy up in his arms so he could lay him out on the floor before him and get to work.
Morty made a small noise of protest initially, but it seemed like Rick was going to hang close by. Simply watching his grandfather's face brought him a sense of calm.
Rick pulled Morty's pants off and set them aside, then found himself staring down at the odd bundle of cloth wrapped around the kid's legs. It only took him a moment to realize what it was; birdpeople always had their own way of doing things, and this was no exception. Birdperson's neighbor must have done it when Morty had been in her care yesterday. As Rick began trying to work out how it went together, just knowing about it at all was pretty helpful; it would buy him more time if he ran out of the supplies on the coffee table.
Rick fumbled with the cloth as he tried to work out how to get it off. It was intricately spiraled around Morty's legs and underside, ending at his lower torso in a weird shape; the whole thing almost looked like a thick heavy bandage. After finding the end, he began to unravel it, being careful not to go too quickly so he could work out how it went together. If he had to learn how to do it in the future, he would, but that wasn't important right now.
After pulling the weird piece of soggy fabric off entirely, he set it aside; he would probably just toss it out later, as it was wet and wasn't something he wanted to hand back. He reached a hand back towards the coffee table to grab up a fresh diaper and the pack of baby wipes.
Without warning, Morty began peeing everywhere.
Rick saw it coming and immediately scooted backwards out of the line of fire, grabbing up the piece of cloth he had just set aside to cover the little boy up with and to contain it. "Rule one, rule one!" He scowled as he held it there for a moment while he waited for the other to finish, then began using the same piece of cloth to clean up the mess, thankful for the fact that Birdperson's tree house had wooden floors instead of carpet.
"Ugh, gross..." Rick couldn't hide his disgust. "How about some kind of warning before you do that next time?" He knew there was absolutely no point in complaining; the kid wasn't old enough to have developed the ability to control his bodily functions just yet. It was a mild inconvenience at best but still annoying.
He wasted no time taping the new diaper on, and then placed a new set of clothes on the youngster, his mood still very clearly sour as he finished the chore. "You're lucky you didn't piss on me. Don't do that again!" He propped Morty back up on his feet and stood up, heading straight for the kitchen sink.
Morty watched his grandfather walking away and didn't like it one bit. He started yelling as he promptly ran after him.
Rick was already standing at the sink when he felt the soft bump at his left leg. A sense of hopelessness came over him; the little boy really was serious about not letting him out of his sight. He had no idea what to do about it.
"C-come on... I'm not going anywhere, you don't have to keep making that noise." Rick grumbled as he finished washing off his hands, wiping them off on his lab coat afterwards. He reached down to pick Morty up again, setting him over his shoulder. "We have to eat something... I feel like my stomach is going to digest itself if we wait it out much longer."
With Morty secure and quiet again, Rick began rummaging through the cupboards. He found jars of preserved red and purple worms floating in a rubbery-like substance and immediately moved on, disgusted by their appearance. He found a jar of dried leaves and pushed it to the back, not even remotely interested. Next, he found a hard sugary brick of something milky brown, almost like coffee. He pulled it out and gave it an experimental lick; it tasted like maple syrup candy and had similar flavor notes to a charred oak whiskey-barrel. It was the first useful thing he'd found, and at the very least, he could ask Birdperson what it was so he could make booze out of it.
He set it on the counter and kept looking.
Rick hadn't been quiet at all; the noise he made while moving containers and banging cupboard doors attracted the attention of Birdperson, who had been asleep in the master nest room of the tree house. In another moment, the feathery male had made his way out into the kitchen and stood in the doorway.
"Rick," Birdperson's voice was the same old monotone tenor he normally spoke in, however this time it was etched with tiredness, "I heard you moving around and wanted to know if everything was all right. I admit that I am glad to see you on your feet and busy. However, what you are doing concerns me," he paused, adding, "what are you doing to my kitchen?"
"I'm looking for food, Birdperson, isn't it obvious?" Rick's reply was a little sharp. He didn't even stop to look back even for a moment; hunger was driving him to continue searching. "We're starving, a-and I can't climb down the tree and forage." He pulled a white glass container off the top shelf and set it down on the counter to open up and sniff, immediately recoiling at the moldy stench inside. "Yeugh..." He put the lid back on and returned it to the cupboard.
"I have preserved nightcrawlers if you want those," Birdperson told him simply, "I probably have some dried beetles as well."
"No, Birdperson. No worms, a-and definitely no insects." Rick grumbled. "We're not insectivores. Don't you have any grain I can make into oatmeal or something? Seeds? Nuts? Fruit? Anything?" He poked Morty in the shoulder. "Got any input to this, little buddy?"
Morty didn't reply; he was too busy staring at the strange feathered man nearby, almost mesmerized by the patterns in his plumage.
Birdperson was quiet as he pondered the question. His attention soon drifted to Morty, and he regarded the young boy's gaze before turning back towards Rick. "I know somebody who makes what you might call 'bread'."
"That's a start." Rick replied as he pulled out a white ceramic container, popping the lid off. He gave it an experimental sniff and put it on the counter next to the brick of sugar. "Anything else?"
"I would not eat that if I were you," Birdperson began to explain, his voice calm. "That particular container is filled with dried berries of the siopp tree. We use them for crushing into a fine powder to treat feather-rot. We also turn them into a medicine for hatchlings to rid them of intestinal parasites. If you were to eat those berries in their unprepared state, they would probably make you very sick. Such a large dose may also render you impotent."
Rick's eyes were wide as he stared back at the other. Without saying another word, he very carefully placed the cap back on and returned the container to the cupboard, hastily brushing his hand on his lab coat afterwards.
Morty's mood was beginning to deteriorate again. He held onto to the fabric of Rick's lab coat in one hand, using the other to whack him, loudly grumbling at him.
"Fruit will probably sustain you for a few hours, but it is hard to come by in this season, and is often considered to be a treat here on Bird World. If you were to eat grain, it would keep your stomach full all day." Birdperson continued. "If that is what you want, then I will fly out and speak to the flock to see what they can do for you. This may take some time, however. All I can offer you until my return is my preserved nightcrawler stash and some beetles."
"Y-yeah yeah... no." Rick sighed as he deemed his search unsuccessful and closed the cupboards back up. "Look, I would take care of myself under normal circumstances, but," he shrugged. "Whatever. Who cares about me, the kid needs feeding now. Look at him, he's trying to beat me up about it." He couldn't help but smirk at Morty's antics as he shifted him off his shoulder, holding him at arm's length. "You're so mean, little buddy. Stop."
Morty's mood hadn't improved at all and he flailed both arms out, trying to grab at whatever he could reach.
Birdperson made a soft whistle in sudden realization. "I know something that will be suitable for both yourself and your hatchling. However, the preparation will take some time." He unfurled his wings, relaxing them at his sides. "Is this acceptable?"
"Y-yeah, however long it takes." Rick nodded once, he had little other choice but to agree right now. "Oh, before I forget... I need sterilized hot water. I'm going to need, uh," he went silent as he did the quick calculation in his head, "about four to six pints a day." It was probably an overestimation, but he wasn't about to chance any kind of risk.
Birdperson stood there, his expression remaining stoic. He was confused, but he knew better than to question it because he knew Rick would have had his reasons for asking. He simply moved to the far side of the kitchen and opened up the door of his water boiler and loaded the under compartment with lumps of coal and wood. After setting it to start burning, he closed it up again.
"This device is more commonly used for bathing. The main pipe is connected directly to my bathroom. However, this water would be safe to drink if you were to run the boiler for three to five minutes after it has reached its maximum temperature." Birdperson paused for a moment, quickly adding, "there is a small spigot on the side of the tank. You will find it rather easily."
"Thanks, BP." Rick sighed, feeling a little weight off his shoulders. Finally, some progress; while only a start and definitely small, at least it was something.
Rick watched Birdperson disappear out the front door and retreated to the couch while he waited for the water to heat up. He sat Morty down next to him and leaned over him, curious. He had a little bit of time to kill and decided that he might as well keep the young boy entertained. He hoped that if he spent lots of time with him, the kid might actually start feeling a little more secure and confident again. Rick wanted to see the curious little boy he had known before all this mess had started, one who was adventurous and keen to explore his environment. All he could see right now was a cowering, miserable mess and a crushed spirit; it didn't feel good to witness.
Though, it might take him a long time to get over; Rick simply didn't know. It had been a horrible experience for anyone to go through, let alone a small child. Staying nearby Morty and spending time with him was still worth a shot, though. He enjoyed spending time anyway, despite the fact he would never admit how ridiculously attached he was. Helping Morty to get over his insecurities would be totally worth the effort, however long it would take.
"Hey. Hey, little buddy," Rick lightly tapped the baby boy on the shoulder to get his attention. "Can you say 'Morty'?"
"Mmm..." Morty replied, his eyes attentively glued on Rick's face. "Mmmm."
"Eh, good start." Rick shrugged at him, grinning. "Hey, what about my name? Can you say 'Rick'?"
Morty frowned in concentration for a moment, then made a soft growling sound. "Rrrr."
"No, no, no. 'Rick'." He tapped his chest with an index finger as he pointed to himself, grinning further at the fact that the kid was so willing to get into it. "Rick. Rrr-ick. It's one syllable, i-it's not that hard. Come on, you can do it, kiddo. Talk to me."
"Rr-rrr-ri..." Morty stuttered slightly as he made the sound. He was quiet afterwards and shuffled over to grab at Rick's sleeve, pulling on it. He was still hungry. "Rrrih."
"Close enough." Rick sat up again, seeming pleased that Morty was so willing to talk back to him. "Heh, Beth doesn't know what she's talking about. Talk to you? What the hell? I talk to you all the time, and it's a pity you can't talk back to tell her tha..." Rick trailed off and went quiet again, suddenly hit by a sharp wave of guilt and regret.
He had gone straight into a rambling tirade without thinking about it, and now he regretted it because it really hurt; he would never see his daughter again to tell her anything. That heavy feeling in his chest had returned with a vengeance and he turned his head away as his breath came out in sharp heaves. He immediately began to fight himself, angry over the fact that it had hit him so suddenly and randomly. He didn't want to lose it so soon again and especially not in an open area like the living room. Needless to say, he wasn't hungry anymore.
Rick was so distracted trying to keep his emotions in check that he didn't hear the water boiler violently bubbling away in the kitchen.
Morty pulled on his grandfather's sleeve again, and loudly whimpering at him. He was getting so hungry that it was actually starting to hurt.
"H-hey..." It was enough to knock him out of his thoughts again. Rick sat up, turning his attention back towards the other; the sound his grandson kept making when he was hungry was very predictable in terms of pitch, and he could easily recognize it. "Y-yeah I know. We still have to fix your problem." He reached across the coffee table to pick up a sachet of formula and a bottle. "This will have to do until Birdperson gets back." He hesitated for a moment, then motioned towards the boiler with one hand. "I'm just going to be over there. Don't freak out." He made his way back out to the kitchen.
Morty wasted no time wiggling off the edge of the couch, thumping onto the floor below. Once he got to his feet, he ran across the room to follow his grandfather, grabbing onto his leg once again once he was in close enough proximity.
Rick sighed as he heard the loud wooden thud, and without even looking down, he already knew Morty was coming towards him. "At least you're not screaming about it this time..." He muttered as he prepared the powdered formula as per the instructions on the packaging, shaking the bottle up to distribute the powder through the hot water. When he felt the other grab him around the leg, he simply stood there and tolerated it, noting that Morty seemed to favor his left one for some reason.
He awkwardly hobbled across to the sink, Morty still clinging to his leg, and ran the bottle under cold water to cool it down. "You know, kiddo, this can't be a long term thing. We can't spend too much time fucking around." Once he was satisfied with how cool it was, he shook it up just to make sure, and then handed it down for Morty to take.
Morty greedily snatched the bottle with both hands and popped it straight into his mouth.
"Good. Hopefully that shuts you up for a while..." Rick muttered as he took the opportunity to get out of the way, stepping back into the living room. "Grandpa has too much shit to do. Y-you better not consume too much of my time today, we're basically running on a time limit here. We got three days before you run out of diapers. If we go over that, we gotta start getting more creative. And by that, I mean pulling it out of our asses... so, good advice, kiddo: leave Grandpa alone to work."
Now that the young boy was sorted out, at least for the time being, Rick was eager to focus on finally being able to work. He picked up the ray guns, components, and broken portal gun pieces up off the coffee table and shoved everything back into his lab coat pockets. He retrieved one of the whiskey bottles from the floor and then headed back into the spare nest room, Morty following close behind.
Once back in the room, Rick picked Morty up and set him back down onto the roll-away cot along with his bottle of formula. "Again, this is hard for you to understand, but try not to get in my face too much, little buddy. This is gonna sound cruel, but don't cry, I-I need you to be quiet. I've spent too much time on you already and I need to concentrate. Your damn crying will probably give Grandpa a headache." It was coming out very grumpy and a little harsh, but he was far too frustrated and anxious to hold back. He uncorked the whiskey bottle and took two large swigs, setting it down onto the work table afterwards. He hoped it would kick in quickly and make him feel better, because he badly needed something to calm himself down.
To his credit, Morty wasn't upset at all. He seemed to settle right away once being placed on the bed. Now that he was occupied, he lay back and simply watched his grandfather get to work.
Rick stepped away with a loud burp, his attention lingering on Morty for a moment. He actually felt bad about what he had just said, but had no time to dwell on it; he had a portal gun to make. The first thing he did was pull down the stacked boxes in the corner; he was sure he'd settle down again once he took a proper inventory of what was available to him.
He tore the lid off the first box and began placing things out across the work table. He found a screwdriver and an ionic soldering iron - essential basic items. He found several small crystal components along with some batteries which were fairly useful and wasted no time to place them onto the table as well. Over the next hour, he cleared out three more boxes and either placed the important items onto the table, or back into the boxes because they were either garbage or too old to bother with.
When he opened the fourth box, he was met with the welcome sight of his old electric guitar and amplifier. As much as he wanted to fire up his kit and belt out some riffs, he had more important things to do, so he abandoned them in the corner of the room.
What Rick found in the next boxes only got better. He found blank blueprint papers and drawing implements, etching equipment for circuit-board production, and several old prototype gun designs from his days in the resistance movement against the Galactic Federation. He found pots of sealed chemicals and casting equipment, firing mechanisms, gun batteries, as well as metalworking tools and box after box of screws. He also discovered that he had more electrical components than he knew what to do with. Rick had always hoarded useful things and although his ex-wife had perceived it to be a bad habit, he couldn't help but feel like it was his saving grace now.
The scientist finally stood back after everything was out on the work table, placing his hands on his hips as he admired the amount of clutter on his desk. He felt very satisfied; he was sure he could work out something with a lot of this stuff. It wasn't entirely optimal as some of the objects were quite old, but it would have to do.
Rick pulled up a chair and sat down at the desk, pulling out a blank sheet of blueprint paper to begin sketching. His first task was designing the circuit boards for the portal gun and now that he had to design the whole thing from scratch, he had much better ideas about how to go about it. His previous portal gun models had worked but were acceptable at best; they were completely subpar compared to what he was capable of accomplishing now. He wanted to build something much greater this time around, something that could track and record dimension coordinates, because he had always just previously punched them in from memory. In a strangely ironic way, he was actually kind of glad he had broken the old portal gun now; it was an obsolete design he had never bothered to upgrade because it had done what he needed it to.
Rick put his head down and buried his attention in the work ahead. Soon enough, he was entirely focused on what he was doing and the rest of the world was zoned out. He didn't feel the initial bump at his leg, nor the tap on his shoulder.
Birdperson was standing behind him. He had carried in a bowl of hot food in one hand and a small loaf of bread in the other. "Rick." He said simply.
Rick wasn't paying attention.
Morty was at his grandfather's feet again, having been attracted over by the smell. While the warm bottle of milk had filled the hole for a while, the wonderfully delicious smell that came in with the unfamiliar feathery person made him absolutely ravenous.
"Rick." Birdperson spoke again. His voice was quiet, for he did not want to startle him. "My neighbor has prepared you some food. It would do you well to stop what you are doing and take time out to care for yourself."
Rick jumped a little as he looked up. "Oh, hey, Birdperson. Didn't see you there." The smell of whatever Birdperson was carrying hit his senses and he suddenly realized how hungry he was. He set his drawing tools aside and turned around in the chair. "Oh yeah, that smells gooooood... what is it?"
Birdperson placed the wooden bowl onto the work table, being careful not to displace any of Rick's carefully laid out objects. "It is a soup consisting of root vegetables and grain. I do not know what humans eat, but when I gave Gresharak your food requirement list, she decided to cook this for you. She likes your hatchling and wants you to be well fed." He placed the small loaf of freshly baked crusty seeded bread down beside it.
Rick wasted no time picking up the wooden spoon out of the bowl to give the soup an experimental taste. He raised both eyebrows, seeming quite taken aback; it was actually pretty decent. "Holy shit, bring this woman over some time. I owe her for the shit she's been doing for me. Geez, she takes care of my kid and does this... why the hell haven't you snapped her up, BP?"
Birdperson's head feathers twitched slightly, yet his expression remained exactly the same. "She still has a soul bond with her spirit mate, Rick. He is currently out on migration, scouting Bird World for threats. If I were to move in on her while she was still bound to somebody, this would be considered a dick move."
"Bummer." Rick grunted. "Heh, women. Who needs 'em, right? Wubba lubba dub dub."
"Rick," Birdperson replied calmly, "please focus on what you are doing. You will have time to sort through your situation in good time." He turned away to walk out the door.
Rick leaned back in his chair, realizing that Birdperson had understood exactly what he had just said. He would have said something more about it, but his attention was diverted by the young boy who was now practically trying to climb him. "Uh, hey. How much of that food do you have left?"
"Enough to keep you going for a few days," Birdperson replied, "do you need more?"
"Y-yeah." Rick answered as he bent down to pick Morty up, placing him in his lap. Despite the fact he was starving, he began feeding the portion of the soup he had been given to Morty right away. "The kid is probably going to eat you out of house and home. Seriously, if there's anything I can do to pay this back, let me know. I can, uh... build you some shit."
Morty made hasty grabs at the spoon as he was fed, practically wolfing down everything he was offered without chewing. At one point he started coughing, but continued accepting whatever he was offered.
"Rick," Birdperson stood in the doorway, staring back at him now, "your quick thinking and innovative scientific designs almost single-handedly saved Bird World from total destruction at the hand of the Gromflomites. We are forever in your debt. Thus, you owe us nothing."
Rick simply flattened his brows, scowling. "Not this again..." When Morty coughed, he held the spoon back and waited for him to finish before offering more. "Hey, slow down, buddy; don't choke on that."
Birdperson disappeared out the door, leaving Rick to continue feeding his grandson. He didn't even need to do very much to modify the food for the young boy; the soup was pretty mushy already, but he still fed the other relatively slowly, not wanting to overfeed him because he still wasn't quite sure where Morty's limits were just yet.
When Morty didn't seem interested anymore, Rick took it as the cue to stop. He simply picked up the bowl and finished the rest off himself, no longer seeming to care that the spoon had baby slobber all over it. When Birdperson brought in the second bowl of soup, he finished that one off, too, as well as the bread; he had been absolutely starving.
Rick set both bowls aside and went back to work, feeling stupidly content with how full he felt right now. He took a quick sip from his whiskey bottle and worked on the circuit board sketch designs for a little while longer before taking Morty out for another diaper change. When he came back into the room, he set the youngster back down on his knee, letting him snuggle into his chest. He soon found himself in a balancing act: patting Morty's back with his left hand while he sketched up blueprints with his right.
Over the next couple of hours Morty fell asleep on him, so he shifted the little boy onto his lap properly. Now that he had both hands accessible, he resumed work without hindrance.
He was simultaneously in the mind of a scientist hard at work and a caring parent, the two sides in a state of precarious equilibrium. In that singular moment, he was fooled into thinking that the new reality he had found himself in might just work out after all.
He had no idea what was in store.
