Chapter Text
“I’m not changing another diaper,” Rick growled as he followed his co-worker. He stormed down the hall, irritation growing with every step.
The building was expansive. Higher ups at the citadel had paid top dollar to fund it. The walls seemed to stretch for decades, painted in gentle cream hues. Near the base boards, children’s scribbles were etched in colorful crayon.
Every five feet, there was a vase of colorful sunflowers or a painting, and every five seconds, a wailing baby.
B-93 Rick rolled his eyes. “Look, I get it,” he groaned, scratching at his painter’s brush mustache. “You don’t like Mortys.” The two trudged down the hall with purpose, quickly approaching the door to the furthest left. “But we’re short-staffed and we need someone to- to take over crybaby duty.”
Feigning politeness in place of assertiveness, he held open the door for his colleague. “So get in there and do your job.”
“Do my job?” Rick spat with indignance. With a scowl, Rick stomped through the open door. “How ‘bout I-”
Slam!
“-Shove my foot down your— down your ass?”
All around him, the wailing grew louder. He was getting closer. The scientist practically blew steam from his nose as he huffed.
This— crybaby duty— wasn’t his job. Rick wasn’t a babysitter for Christ’s sake; he was a receptionist.
Receptionists weren’t in charge of lulling obnoxious babies to sleep. They sat in the office, scheduled appointments and filled out forms… but with Care Corp suffering from severe understaffing, Rick was given very little choice in the matter.
The scientist made it down the last hall and into his designated room, labeled ‘F-65,’ in bubbly, yellow letters.
Upon entering the crybaby room, the man was hit with a piercing, painful shriek. “Jesus Christ,” he groaned, setting his supply bag on the nightstand. “Would it kill you to puUGH- pipe down a little?”
The room was dimly lit. A small, round projector provided warm stars on the ceiling, giving off a gentle light. The walls were painted a sanguine yellow with playful swirls and childlike designs carved into the baseboards. It was sentimental at best and pathetic at worst.
The recent Morty business had Ricks going outright domestic left and right… which was probably why care corp was so understaffed at the moment. Everyone was too busy gushing over their new diaper-shitting, drool-spitting, iq-lacking grandsons.
Rick scoffed as he fished around in his bag, pulling out a pair of orange ear plugs. With a victorious smirk, he shoved them in and chuckled. Then, turning to the crib in the center of the room, he hummed, “L-Let’s get this over with.”
Rick was careless as he reached into the crib. He cursed when he hit his head on the duck themed mobile, roughly snatching the boy out from under his pits.
And there he was. The baby who had every Rick swooning. Whining, wailing, Morty Smith.
Rick grimaced in disgust. He eyed the boy with a skeptical curiosity, wondering how a simpleton creature had won everyone’s total adoration so quickly.
Morty was… fine. He was cute as any other baby, Rick guessed. Plump, warm cheeks. Round, glassy eyes. Wispy, little curls and chubby, short fingers. Classic baby traits. By no means was this boy special or significant in the way he’d been portrayed.
And yet, everyone was head over heels for him. ‘Well, not for this one,’ Rick corrected himself, ‘not if he’s here of all places.’
The boy in Rick’s hold shrieked again, hands pulling down his face theatrically.
“Alright,” began the scientist, clearly impatient. He held Morty up to his eye level and glared sternly. “Stop it. Yyy-y-you’re embarrassing yourself.”
…and as if to be perfectly reasonable, Morty stopped. He stopped the crying. stopped the flailing. And simply stared.
Rick held the boy a little further away, a little shocked. “Gotta be honest, kiddo,” he breathed quietly, “I did not expect that to work”
Now that Morty had ceased his futile scrambling, Rick could see him better… The kid was kind of cute. If you squinted a little.
His yellow onesie was plush and soft and contrasted vibrantly against his dark brown eyes. His smile revealed a pearly tooth, barely peeking through pink gums, and his four hands reached out to— what?
Rick’s jaw dropped when he noticed. Had he been so blind?
Beneath Morty’s armpits—where Rick had been holding him— a second set of arms. Two more hands reached out and grabbed around aimlessly.
The scientist was shocked. He blinked at the boy wordlessly, struggling to come out of his sudden paralysis. “…well,” said Rick, almost breathless. “You’re either a genetic freak or from a dimension very, *urp* very far away from m-mine.”
Morty continued to stare at the man with leaps and bounds of twinkling curiosity. Four chubby hands extended as far as possible, playfully pulling at silver-blue locks.
“Ow,” Rick quietly hissed. He craned his neck and shifted Morty into his left arm, hoping to pry the fingers out his hair with the other. “Y'know, y-you’re pretty strong for a whiny brat.” Gently, he shook away the small hands and held Morty outward again.
“…Well, you definitely seem less— l-less bitchy now,” he noted rather skeptically. Placing Morty back in the crib, he took a step back. “I done good then, huh?” Quietly, he began to sling the duffel over his shoulders. “…unfortunately, K-19 isn’t looking for any f-freaky sidekicks at the moment so— sayonara!”
Rick was elated to have finally finished his task. Now he could go back to desk duty and never have to step foot in the Crybaby room again.
The scientist rushed to turn the knob… but stopped short at the sound of a broken whine. Something in his gut twisted as he turned around. “Oh no,” he began. “No, you don’t, you son of a bitch.” Wagging his finger, Rick scolded the boy. “I swear to god, you shed one tear, I’m goOUNa sell you to the freakshow.”
Another whine. Morty puffed out his cheeks, burning bright red as he began to have another meltdown.
Rick stood there with a scowl, hoping the boy would cease if he didn’t receive any attention. It didn’t work. Rick growled.
If he couldn’t shut the bastard up, he’d be stuck on crybaby duty twice as long! “Cut it out, you little- you little attention whore,” he sneered under his breath. “Find someone else to w-wipe your ass for you.” He leaned over the crib wall with a look of ire.
Now Morty was shrieking. He tossed his hands in the air and slammed them against the bedding of his crib. “Nnnn!”
“…Fucking bitch!” Admittedly defeated, Rick snatched the boy up.
The crying ceased like magic.
“Are you serious? You want someone to hold you?” Rick snarled, incredulous.
…Morty laughed. His little hands reached out to the scientist— all four of them— chubby fingers flexing to grab onto him.
Rick rolled his eyes, settling the boy on his chest. He ignored his content babbles in favor of complaining. “Close your mouth. Y-You’re getting drool on my- my work shirt.”
Again, Morty could only giggle.
A sense of calm filled the room. It was oddly warm as it flowed through Rick’s veins and into his heart, like some kind of poison. He was taken aback by how foreign it felt. A completely new feeling. As if something in him wasn't quite right before, but now clicked perfectly into place. Into the spot beneath Rick’s chin on his chest.
The scientist's heart almost stopped. Suddenly, all the Morty rage began to make sense. He looked down at the infant bundled in his arms, hardly a year old and huffed. “…son of a bitch.”