Chapter Text
"It's good to see you, Rick. And it's nice to meet you, Morty. You have his eyes." One of the planet's most beautiful women leaned down and kissed the teenager on the cheek, causing him to erupt into an embarrassed giggling fit. "Please, my little world is your playground."
Rick sipped from his flask, watching as Morty was whisked away by a bunch of aliens his own age. "Have fun, kid! Make sure you wrap it up!"
"Wh-Whaa?"
Unity laughed, having missed Rick's dirty humor. It hugged its friend and smiled when he returned the gesture. "He's adorable. I'm sure to a busy man like you he's super annoying, huh?"
"You have no fucking idea, but uh, we kind of have something goin'," Rick said, scratching his neck awkwardly. "Yeahh, pretty heated." He was worried Unity would hate him, think he was repulsive and stab him with a million pitchforks, but its expression didn't change. "You're not m-maahhhh... excuse me. You're not mad, Une?"
"I can't be mad at you. You're the most brilliant mind I've ever met, and one of the kindest. As long as you're happy, I'm happy."
Kind? Oh god. Rick felt his face warm up and brushed Unity's words off, a hard habit to break. "Nahh, it's a relationship of convenience. I keep him cheerful with, you know, everything I got to offer, and he keeps traveling through space and time with me so the feds don't track my brainwaves."
That made Unity's eyes droop sadly. "Oh. So... it's heated, but that's as far as it goes?"
Rick winced, knowing he had said the wrong thing. He was never good at talking, just thinking. "W-Well, I uh. He's my grandkid, and I need him around but... what else is there?"
"Oh no, oh..." Unity turned away from Rick to see someone pushing through the blue-skinned crowd. "Morty, sweetie..."
"Th-Thank you for having me, Unity. It was nice to meet you but I'm leaving now, g'bye!" The flash of yellow was getting farther away, and Unity didn't know if it should stall him by blocking his path or let him go. Rick cursed and gave chase, and Unity was conflicted twofold: should it let Rick catch Morty while the wound was still bleeding, or make him wait for the teen to calm down?
"R-Rick, I don't think you should go after him yet. You don't know how to fix it." It took ten people, but Unity got her old flame to stop. "He needs a minute."
"To what, a minute to what?" the scientist said, desperation creeping into his tone. "I don't even know what I did wrong! Une?"
The woman he was facing rubbed her arm. "He thinks you don't love him, Rick. That he's just a thing you need for your projects. He... says he knew you kept it. Do you know what he's talking about?"
Rick's fists clenched, then released. "Sh-Shit." He quickly checked the pockets of his lab coat, failing to find something. "Crap-shit-damn it. I'll be back, Unity. Don't go anywhere!" he called, running toward the place where the SS Independence touched down. Unlocking his car, Rick climbed in and searched from top to bottom. "Morty!" he growled.
~
Sitting by a lake with a waterfall, Morty's eyes leaked tears onto a slip of golden paper in his hands. It was laminated, but that was ruined because Rick folded it so many times. Morty looked at the picture of his face on the slip, scratching it with his thumbnail. He hated that other Mortys existed more than anything, that if he died or became useless he could be thrown away, replaced by another. More tears fell from the boy's eyes, and he was tempted to throw the voucher into the lake. "If I die, it's your fault and you should be alone!" Morty screamed to no one.
"Morty," said a young man with dark, blue-green hair and glasses. For his race, he was a beautiful person, at least to Morty. "There you are."
"Oh, uh h-hi, Unity." Morty pulled his knees up and hid the voucher in his pocket. "Sorry I ran away before, but I-I couldn't be around him."
Unity put its hands on the brunette's shoulders and pulled him into the safety and warmth of its chest. "Shh, there there, honey. I'm just sorry you're in pain."
For a while they sat in silence, Morty listening to the alien's steady heartbeat and the constant pounding of water against the rocks. He continued to silently cry, hoping Rick wouldn't find them out here. "U-Unity, in another time, you and Rick got back together. I saw him destroy your carefully-made world with sex parties and drugs... but when you left, I saw him look broken for the first time in my life. He loved you. If I just... disappeared, or died in an accident, he would just move on like nothing ha-happened. Because he has th-this fucking thing!"
"No, honey, Rick does lo..." Unity stopped the moment Morty shoved the Free Replacement Morty! voucher into its hands. "What the hell is this? It's a joke, right? Rick is a prankster, h-he always has been."
Morty shook his head, not wanting to upset the hive mind that had been nothing but kind to him. "The Council of Ricks gave it to him. It was a consolation prize after they wrongly accused him of killing thirty other Ricks. Sorry, it's a long story, and if it's okay I'd rather go home to my family now." He didn't want to tell Unity that all he could think about was hurting Rick, like his grandfather hurt him on a regular basis. "I... I just wanna go home."