Chapter Text
Bullies. The big, buff brutes of school. The sadistic, idiots in another unfortunate child's life.
Morty had bullies. A group of them. White and black, bulky and tall, strong and fast jocks that would stalk him after school and beat his ass to a pulp. They were better than him in every way, but he still pitied them. He pitied how they chose the wrong kid to mess with. Morty had a grandfather capable of dimensional travel for fuck sake.
But Rick wasn't apart of the problem or solution. Morty didn't need him, Morty had himself. He also had a plan and he felt like a little evil genius. He was hesitant to follow through with his plan, but it would be so worth it, in the end, to see the horror on Jarred's face (also, Jarred? He's the worst of the bullies: the leader. Morty always hated him, but after Jarred sexually assaulted him, Morty wanted nothing but revenge).
When he was done with Jarred, he wouldn't harass Morty anymore. The bullies would learn that no one fucks around with Mortimer Smith; unless they wanted to see death forty years earlier.
All Morty needed was an isolated area, a lose cloth bag, gasoline, wood, and a certain someone's valuable pet.
***
"Where you running off to, punk!?" Jarred's angry voice echoed from behind Morty, but the boy kept running. All he had to do was lead the fucker to the right place.
Morty wasn't even surprised that the smallest little insult got Jarred mad. The fucker was honestly just a sensitive piece of shit that took his anger and insecurity out on other people. Morty despised those kinds of people. They were the scum of the Earth, yet, here he was; about to do a horrible atrocity just because he hated someone. Morty knew he was being hypocritical, but he was sure Jarred had done worse or would do worse. Sexually assaulting Morty was nothing compared to this.
It wasn't planned that Jarred got physically hurt, only emotionally and mentally hurt, but he knew Jarred would try to attack him. So, Morty did have a feeling that Jarred would probably die today, but he really didn't fucking care.
The small boy hopped over a fallen log, ducked under an ugly branch, and nearly tripped over a badly placed piece of wood before finally arriving at the place. 'The place', being an abandoned junkyard. Not a car junkyard, it was more of a rubbish tip, just most of the rubbish had either decomposed or blown away into the wind, so all that was left was just dirt.
He could hear Jarred's thunderous footsteps behind him, so Morty quickly ran to the place of interest; a huge area only consisting of dirt and trash. He grabbed a large, snapped piece of wood. It already had a combustible material on its tip so he could light the fire. He smiled and dipped the end of the stick in the fire (he lit the fire ages ago. It was a makeshift campfire, honestly), watching as the tip became lit and a ball of flame danced from it. He grabbed the gasoline and waddled next to his scheme's main victim: a bag.
Jarred finally ran around the corner, stopping once he saw the fire and gasping when he saw what Morty was holding.
"Oh, shit! Mort, you little twat. What are you doing with that?"
"Shut up!" Morty yelled, frustrated by the nickname. "You see this bag?" He pointed the lit torch at the bag next to him. It was just a lose bag of cloth and was tied closed, but it was wriggling. A distressed sound came from inside it, and it sounded like an animal more than a human. The creature within the bag struggled violently, groaning and whimpering in fear.
Jarred realised it was a dog and immediately felt sick.
"You sick fuck."
Morty honestly laughed. Him? Sick? No, he didn't sexually harass young boys and beat them up for fun. He was doing the dog a favour, the poor thing probably got beat itself.
"You're an idiot, you know that, right?" Morty spoke softly, but he sounded hysterical and on the verge of laughter.
Jarred grunted angrily, gritting his teeth. He couldn't decide what to do. Either run away, beat up Morty, or help the dog. He may have been a brute, God, he knew that, but he wasn't going to let a dog die.
"Also, the dog? It's Brutus." Morty grinned.
Jarred frowned until his lips almost fell off his face. Brutus was his dog. His beautiful German Shepard! What the fuck was Morty doing with his dog?!
"You LITTLE FUCKER!" Jarred screamed, his whole body launching forward with fury as his said his words. His fists were clenched so tight that they felt numb. "Don't do this, Morty! I will fucking kill your entire family in front of you! I'll slit your mother's THROAT IN HER SLEEP!"
Morty didn't feel anything. He didn't feel threatened, not by a dead man walking.
"Coolzies." Morty in a flash, poured gasoline onto the wriggling bag, ignoring the frantic screams of Jarred. He didn't, however, ignore the raging approaching footsteps of the furious teen.
Morty did what he had to and dropped the stick, letting the fire immediately spread onto the gasoline's sleek surface and start an even bigger one. A burst of flame went up, the orange flames erupting into the sky like a dragon's breath. The heat itself burnt Morty's side, but Jarred only screamed in rage and despair, but it only fueled his adrenaline filled sprint.
Between the bellows of Jarred and the agonising howls of the burning dog, Morty could only smile. He felt bad and all, but it's not like anyone would care that they died.
Just before Jarred could land a punch, Morty feebly evaded, letting the teen fall straight into the raging fire. His mind was running on hate and had no time to calculate the oncoming danger. He realised it too late; Morty realised that when he heard the shriek emit from him.
The boy glanced back, his eyes went wide when he saw Jarred in the fire. The flames were already licking his clothes and up his arms. Jarred was shrieking in pain and terror and the shock completely fried his brain.
Morty just poured the rest of the gasoline on him and watched as his entire body set alight. A huge ball of fire exploded and the large body of fire caught onto Jarred's clothes and skin within seconds. It was quite amazing to watch as the fire's deadly teeth made quick work of his clothes and body, leaving horrible blisters and boils in their wake. The epidermis was peeling away and melting from the superheated assault and within minutes he would already be loosing blood fast from damaged capillaries. The fire continued to consume his skin, ripping and eating away at his body like a litter of maggots. His skin was melting slowly under the flame's fatal touch. He desperately tried to escape the fire, fingers scraping through dirt and nails digging into the dusty ground, but he only kept falling back onto the ground with a wet fleshy thud. His legs were useless to him now; he was in too much pain to even try and move them.
The hissing of flames and the horrible screams of Jarred were almost painful to listen to and the smell itself was making Morty sick. But he kept watching. He couldn't look away. This is all his fault, so the least he could do was watch it happen.
As Jarred's shaking body was still fighting for life, the flames kept growing. They were taking him into their deathly hot embrace, soon spreading to his face and eating away at the skin like a pack of hungry hyenas. Flesh cooked and boiled, the fire hissed as his hair was set alight, and finally, his eyes were turning to gore in their own sockets.
Five minutes past, he was still cooking, but he was deathly silent. A hoarse croak erupted from his throat suddenly and then... Nothing. His muscles started to contract as the fire licked at the exposed tendons and flesh. The dermis was starting to burn and the thick layer of skin shrunk and split, letting the fat leak out like pus. The body fat was just another fuel for the fire, and it grew larger once again, still eating at the melting corpse.
The dog was long gone, too.
It took a moment to process fully in Morty's head, but once he realised what he had done, he gagged and felt bile burn at his throat. Even when he tried to keep it in, he couldn't and found himself leaning over and spewing the disgusting, acidic waste from his stomach onto the dirt below him. The yellowish chunky fluid hit the ground with a sickeningly wet splash and it mixed into the dirt like water and oil. The burn in his throat, the rich smell of puke and the horrible stench of tinged and cooked flesh was too much for him. He felt like he was going to have a sensory overload in a mere second, so in a quick haste, he ran like hell.
He kept running and running, ignoring the hot burn in his lungs as they tried to keep up with him. He didn't stop until he reached home, in which he went straight to the garage for Rick. He needed Rick.
"RICK!" His grandfather's name ripped from his throat in a shrill scream before he even entered the garage. Even Rick knew shit had gone down just by the tone of Morty's voice.
"Morty?!" The gravelly voice called back out, replaced with a sigh once he saw Morty hunched over in the doorway.
"Rick..."
"What the fuck's going on?"
Morty took heavy, deep breaths, trying to push away the pain in his frantic heart. He couldn't even speak. "Rick, I--" he stopped to breathe again.
"Just come over here and sit down." Rick directed him to a chair, where Morty then sat down, still out of breath. Or maybe he was just in shock.
A minute passed, and Morty was still silent. Rick knew something actually serious had happened, otherwise, Morty wouldn't have been a literal mute for a minute. So he waited calmly for Morty's response, a reassuring hand placed lightly on Morty's shoulder.
"Rick... I fucked up!" Morty blurted out, tears welling in his blue eyes. His lips were trembling in fear, but mostly because he was on the verge of outright sobbing.
"Tell me what you did."
"I-- It wasn't my fault! Well, it was, but I was angry and vengeful and--"
"Morty! Calm down."
"I can't calm down, Rick! I just fucking murdered someone in cold blood just because I was angry? Like, who does that? Maybe a fucking psychopath?!"
Rick had both his hands on Morty's shoulders and he was shaking him hard. "Listen to me, Morty! If you don't calm down I will slap you!"
"I even killed his dog! Cooked it alive! Oh god--" he broke under the pressure and started wailing, letting the barrage of tears pour from his eyes as loud sobs tore from his throat.
Rick felt his heart split in two. He was conflicted. He was worried and anxious and he hoped whatever Morty said wasn't true, and he couldn't bare watch Morty cry like this. So the old man stood up from his chair.
"Don't leave me!" Morty hung on like a parasite, his small arms wrapped tight around Rick's waist.
"I won't." With Morty still clinging to him, he walked over to a drawer and pulled a syringe out. It had an opaque fluid in it. "I just need you to calm down." Morty didn't know Rick had a syringe since his head was buried in Rick's coat. He still didn't notice when the tip of the syringe was inserted into his neck. What he did realise was that soon enough he was falling into a sleep, and his eyelids grew tired and closed together.
"Rick..."
Black.