Soon, another 8 years had passed, and Chase had just turned 17, while his little sister, Beth, was already 8 years old. Both Chase and Rick were on the final stretch in creating portal travel, and this was only possible as in most recent years, Rick had turned to Chase for assistance. Rick had seen that as Chase grew older, his inventions were matching and sometimes even surpassing that of his own, so Rick decided to involve Chase in the creation of portal travel, and upon Chase's involvement, the two were like a rocket as the once stagnating progress began to shoot up at super speeds. But today was a day that would mark another fate altering change to Chase's peaceful and loving life.
As both Chase and Rick were working together in the garage, a green portal appeared next to them with a man appearing exactly the same as Rick having stepped through. With the sudden intrusion, both Rick and Chase were caught by surprise as they turned to meet the man who looked exactly like Chase's father.
"D-Dad?!"
Chase blurted out without thinking, and this call aroused the interest in the Rick who wore a black tactical outfit as he observed the young man who bore a striking resemblance to both himself and his wife, and then turning to the Rick of this universe, he began to explain his purpose for arrival.
"Hello, Rick! I am you, but from another universe. I created portal travel and have been hopping from universe to universe spreading the knowledge of portal travel to all Ricks in the multiverse, with the idea of creating the counsel of Ricks. So, do you want to join me?"
When Chase heard this, his mind began to flash back to his previous life as memories about what would happen next resurfaced, and knowing that his family was about to die caused him to panic as he tried to intervene.
"No! You need to leave, you're not welcome here!"
As Chase spoke up, his hostility apparent, but the alternate Rick just looked over at him with cold indifference as he scoffed and with a wave of the portal gun in his hand, he shot open a portal beneath Chase's feet as the feeling of gravity quickly pulled him down into the portal as it quickly closed behind him.
"No!! My son! What did you do? Where did you send him!?"
"Don't know, don't care! So, will you join me, or not?"
When Rick looked into the cold and nihilistic eyes of his alternate self, it became obvious that whatever this version of himself has experienced has left him cold and ruthless, something that he never wanted to experience, so his immediate answer was to decline.
"No, I won't be joining you. Just bring my son back and leave"
When alternate Rick heard the refusal, he felt a bit of surprise, as he had wandered through hundreds of universes and met countless Rick's all of them super geniuses, all of them eager to explore the vase multiverse, all of them willing to join him for the knowledge of portal travel. This is the first time he had met a Rick who refused his offer, and this both angered him and amazed him to the point that he almost respected the Rick in front of him.
"Well if you don't want to join, that's fine. But I hate to tell you that the kid I just sent away, I don't know where he is, I just opened a random portal and sent him off. He could be wandering on some alien planet, or dead in the blender dimension. If he gets sent there, then there is no chance he will survive, so sorry about your luck… Anyway, I'm gonna dip"
"No, wait! Bring me son back!!!"
Rick could only be left to watch as his cold, alternate self opened a portal and disappeared. Upon realizing that his son was now missing, Rick felt he needed to do something to get him back, so he quickly got up and dusted himself off before gathering his keys, prepared to go buy some new materials to create his own portal gun and find his son, but as he opened the garage and prepared to get in the car, the sound of his wife came from behind.
"Honey? Where are you going? What was all that shouting? Where did Chase go?"
"Diane! Don't worry, I need to run out to the store for a bit, I'll be back with Chase in a moment"
As Rick prepared to get in the car with the weight of anxiety pressing down on him, the sound of a sweet girl calling out from behind drew his attention.
"Daddy!!! When you get back, can you and brother Chase help my teddy bear shoot lasers from its eyes?"
A small 8 year old Beth came out while holding a blue teddy bear in her arms, but neither her nor Diane noticed as a small portal opened above their heads as a small purple explosive grenade dropped to their feet, but Rick did, and before he could warn them, it blew up, killing both Diane and Beth while throwing Rick out into the street, his clothes in tatters, blood covering his face and body. Rick was forced to watch as his wife and daughter were killed in the blast while his son was lost in some unknown universe or dimension. All this emotional pain sent a shock of pain and trauma through his heart and soul as he lost consciousness, and upon awakening in the hospital, Rick could only sulk in silence, unresponsive to anyone who tried to talk to him.
After checking himself out, Rick made his way to the bar and began drinking away his sorrows, but that didn't stop him from finishing the portal gun that would give him access to portal travel. 3 weeks after Rick got out of the hospital, he finally completed the portal gun and prepared himself to complete two goals, the first was to find his son, the second to kill the bastard who ruined his life and separated him from his family.
This triggered the creation of the man who would be feared by all as he hops from universe to universe showing everyone two photos, one of himself and the other of a boy who looks like him as he scours the universe looking for these individuals and killing all who stand in his way.
Meanwhile, 3 weeks earlier, as Chase was forcefully sent to an alternate universe, he quickly found himself surrounded by a bunch of unknown plantlife and alien creatures.
"Fuck!! That fucking nihilistic bastard! He sent me to god knows where, and now my family is in danger!!"
Chase began to pace around, but his movements quickly drew the attention of surrounding alien beasts that were obviously of the carnivore variety as the began to close in, but their movements didn't go unnoticed as Chase pulled out a stylish laser pistol from the holster on the side of his hip and began to shoot beams of purple laser lights that eviscerated the prowling beasts, sending chunks of multicolored flesh and blood splattering the surrounding area.
'Fucking hell! I need to find a way to return. Good thing I have a bunch of material kept in my bracelet! Hehe, 9 year old me was so smart to come up with this item"
Chase quickly began to take out materials as he began piecing together the framework of a gun with a dial interface connected to a wavelength sensor. Using a quartz crystal to filter irrelevant radio waves, and a ruby crystal to focus in on the surrounding natural frequencies, Chase was able to complete the framework of the portal gun, now all that was left was to create the portal fluid. This was where both he and his father Rick had gotten stuck and were on the verge of a breakthrough, but now Chase needed to return to square one, as he is on a completely unknown planet in an unknown universe and needs to discover what materials can be used to compensate for the required materials.
Chase put away the portal gun and began gathering any and all materials and began running tests on them using the special lab equipment he has stored in his bracelet. Over the next 3 weeks, Chase had discovered most of the materials he needed while the final material seemed rare on this planet, and surviving on alien beast meat that tasted like shit was starting to get boring, so Chase decided to hunt for the final material immediately.
"Ahah! I found it! This blue crystal-like dust should be capable of compensating for Geminite, now I just need to being the mixing process"
Chase made sure to gather enough materials to make enough fluid to last a few leaps until he can find a place to gather more material, but in the process of making the portal fluid, Chase was surprised to find that the blue crystal-like dust that worked to fill in for the main Geminite material was more than 200 times stronger than Geminite, meaning one portion of the blue dust can be comparable to 200 portions of Geminite. This lucky find was actually an improvement to that bastard Rick Prime's portal fluid.
"Haha… Ahahaha! Fucking bastard, I'm going to hunt you down and prove that I, Chase Sanchez am better than Rick Prime!"
Upon taking the portal fluid out of the centrifugal mixer, Chase took note of the color of the portal fluid. Unlike the usual green that all Rick's use, this fluid was a light cyan blue in color, a little darker in color than his hair, and upon loading it up into his portal gun, Chase began to calibrate the gun using the natural electrical frequency waves of the ambient universe. After a few minutes, Chase was notified with an electric beep that the calibration was complete, and quickly began to take note of the current universe's information.
Chase found it funny to find that the universe itself has its own designation, and the frequency it gives off is what dictates the universe name, while names like the blender dimension are just what other Rick's call the dimension based on what's inside the dimension. Chase's current universe was A-334 While his target universe is C-137. One might wonder why that universe specifically, and this is because Chase has a feeling that his family was that of the protagonist Rick of Rick and Morty, meaning his home dimension is C-137.
With a feeling of anxiety, Chase prepared himself for the worst, but hoped for the best as he turned the frequency dial to tune into the frequency waves of the C-137 universe and then entered the coordinates for Earth and opened the portal. As the blue portal fluid shot out onto the ground, a beautiful blue gateway appeared, while a blue film rippled like water, and on the other side of the film the familiar scenery of Earth appeared. Chase's portal gun had two modes, one was the opaque portals that are normally seen on Rick and Morty that give a sense of mystery to travel, while the other mode is the transparent portal that the dinosaurs use that allow for prior observation before stepping through.
Chase created this for two reasons, the first being that he didn't want to accidentally step into the blender dimension if his calculations were off in the creation of the portal gun, the second being that he liked the idea of seeing where you are about to travel, as you might end up over an ocean. Chase wanted to be safe with his creations, as that's what his father had always instilled in him when inventing. The only reason the future version of Rick is so reckless is because he has nothing else to live for, and even if he did die, he has clones to back him up.
"Seems like the right place, now, time to go and see if my existence changed anything, or if I just lost my family in this life as well"
With a deep breath, Chase stepped into the portal and appeared on Earth in the C-137 dimension. As he fully arrived, the automatic jump detector built in to detect when the portal jump had been completely activated and automatically closed the portal behind Chase. Upon seeing his portal gun work as intended, Chase took out the small and compact hover board he had made to make travel more fun and began coasting back towards his home, but when he arrived, it was obvious that something had happened, as the garage where both he and Rick had once spent time building things together had obviously been destroyed, the question now was if there were any casualties.
Chase quickly got off the hover board and put it back into his storage bracelet before walking up to the front door and unlocking it with his key, but as he did, the obvious smell of alcohol hit his nose, and as he walked inside it was obvious that whoever lived there was a big drinker, or had experienced something that resulted in them drinking the pain away.
"Oh, no… It seems the world has tried its best to correct itself"
Chase began to feel the sadness bubble up, as tears began to fill his eyes, and he quickly began to scour the house for any sign of his family, but all he found were empty bottles and nasty throwup stains. The house was empty with the only signs that a once loving family had resided there being the family photo's on the wall. Chase walked up to a portrait that contained a picture of him, his father, mother, and little sister. All happy, all smiling. Chase sat at the center holding Beth on his lap as she happily raised her arms with dolls in each hand, while behind him stood both his parents. Rick with a vibrant and happy expression stood with one hand placed atop Chase's hend, ruffling his hair, while his other hand lay resting on his shoulder, while on the other side of Rick, stood Diane who also stood smiling brightly while one of her hands lay resting on Chase's shoulder while her other wrapped around Rick's waist. A beautiful family photo expressing joy and cohesion.
"My family… Shattered"
Chase couldn't help but shed tears, as he took the photo from its frame and pulled out a miniature photo copier from the nearby office room and made a scan of the photo before placing the original back into the frame and putting it back in its place. With a copy in hand, Chase decided to go out for a drink to ease his mind and help suppress the grief and sorrow he currently felt. If one were to look at this scene, one would truly compare the scene to that of "like father like son", but this wasn't the first time Chase has drowned his tears in sorrow at the bar, so this was the only path he knew. Chase made his way to the nearby bar and began to drink away his pain. Although he was only 17, his skill in forgery through digital software was top class, so making himself a fake ID was child's play. Chase spent the next two weeks drinking in the bar until he caught the eye of a girl who also seemed to be drinking to hide the pain, and as the two got to know each other, they felt that it might be easier to confide in each other than to numb the pain through booze. Chase followed her back to her place where he learned that her father had just died and she decided to go drinking to forget the heartache, and when she learned that Chase lost both his mother and little sister in an explosion while his father disappeared after drinking himself into numbness, she immediately felt that Chase had it worse and the two began to comfort each other.
"Chase, would you be willing to stay with me a while longer?"
The next morning, Chase had gotten up from the bed and began to dress himself, while still nestled in the bed while only draped in a sheet for cover lay a beautiful brunette with dazzling green eyes. The night prior, the two of them let the drunken haze result in a night of pain and passion, and upon waking Chase realized he had done something stupid.
"I'm sorry, but I need to go find my dad. I worry that if he isn't found, he might end up hurting himself more than he already has"
While most might take this excuse as a way to flake off responsibility, the brunette obviously felt different, she understood that Chase wanted to protect the only remaining family he had left in this world, and she could understand, as if she were in his position, she would have done the same.