Omniverse

Chapter 1

It had been two weeks since you commenced the testing phase for your new simulated reality project. This would be the best of them all, no doubt it'd beat those idiots at Dream Catcher (they couldn't even come up with something original for a name, still, they had been your biggest rivals in the past few years). You enjoyed every second of your work, creating and planting artificial neurons in hundreds of test subjects' brains, feeding them millions of images whilst duplicating every tiny detail of their lives and surroundings.

You were a perfectionist, taking pleasure in constantly challenging yourself. Well, this time you had certainly hit the jackpot with sticking the most intelligent man in the universe into a simulation for two weeks without him noticing it.

You had never made acquaintance with professor Rick Sanchez, however, during your experimental simulation on various planets of the intergalactic empire (to perfect your multi-level simulated reality), you developed a true admiration towards this intellectual titan. He could single-handedly build or destroy whole universes in no time. Adding him to the list of test-candidates was an insane idea -- you didn't even bother to share it with your commissioner; he would've gone crazy. Fortunately, since you were one of the top 5 developers of the growing virtual world technologies, you owed no explanation to anyone.

It took you a while to find the perfect moment for implanting the transitional neuron (which would freeze his reality for a nanosecond and transfer the whole into the simulator) into professor Sanchez's skull. You used one of your favourite spy drones, the one you had stolen from the Department of Defence. It was a tiny insect with a 3-cm wingspan that could be used for taking DNA-samples or implanting radio-frequency identification chips into people.

Usually it took only a few seconds to insert the Nano drones into hundreds of test subjects; most people hadn't even realised they were in a simulation. You had built every tiny detail to perfection; it had to be convincing even for participants with the most advanced IQs. Some of them volunteered to be test subjects, and it gave you a glow of pride to realise even they couldn't tell the difference between simulation and reality.

The biggest test of your career was still to come. If you managed to trap professor Sanchez in your artificial reality without him noticing it for the duration of the test, you would've become cream of the cream.

The task seemed so much simpler in your head; you really had to keep your wits about you. The man was ultra-vigilant at all times, even when he drank himself to oblivion. You had never come across anyone like him, and the fact he could perform the most complicated tasks whilst completely wasted -- without a single mistake -- started alarms in your brain. Had you completely lost your mind? Did you seriously think he wouldn't figure this out in a heartbeat? But then the idea of being able to fool Rick Sanchez -- even for a short time -- gave you a shot in the arm. If you had succeeded you would be without doubt the most awesome developer in the universe! You couldn't deny that stroking your ego made you cum a little in your pants.

You spent long weeks of studying professor Sanchez's environment before acting. Your drone was ready to implant the chip, hiding in a safe underground compartment in the Smith's neighbourhood. Just for safety, you camouflaged the device and obscured the coding, so in case anyone was to scan the area for any spy apparatus, they couldn't detect it. You had to take a risk with the timing, after all, you couldn't hang around forever, waiting for the professor to be comatose. Finally, one night you caught him stumbling over heaps of empty vodka-bottles when aligning from his space-ship and dropping unconsciously to the floor.

Your time finally arrived. Your heart was racing, found it hard to believe this could work at all -- and it still did.

You slept with one eye open after this. A mix of anxiety and a state of excitement took over every time you plugged in to review the progress. Even though you felt victorious that professor Sanchez had not noticed your little trick yet, you were also certain it could happen any moment now and when it did, you couldn't afford to be caught in an off-guard moment.

1 day before launch

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From the corner of your eye you saw a vortex of emerald substance suddenly appear in your studio. Great. The professor was not wasting any time; his timing was just damn inconvenient! You were supposed to launch tomorrow, you couldn't spare a single second today, not to mention throwing yourself into a fucking war with an infallible genius!

Even though you had studied professor Sanchez for weeks; managed to break his security code and stuck him into your ten-level simulation reality, you had always dreaded the moment of meeting him. The guy had been unpredictable, and you were damn sure he wasn't going to take it lightly to be defeated by anyone, especially a woman.

Your muscles were tense; it took a few seconds to calm your racing heart down. You certainly couldn't show any sign of fear, for fuck's sake! You reminded yourself you had defeated hard-core intergalactic prisoners and took the best con artists of the universe for a ride; this was no time for shitting your pants.

Rick stepped out of the green circle. His face was dead serious and stone-calm. You expected him to be furious -- which he certainly was, just hid it behind a perfectly controlled poker face.

You quickly saved your work and exited the program; your carefully built safety measures kicked in automatically. Even if the whole studio would be destroyed today -- which, by knowing Rick could happen -- your work would be safe.

You weren't sure what to say. He just stood there, without a single word, hands in his lab coat, piercing his eyes right into yours. You stood up and tried not to look intimidated.

'Dr Sanchez, I presume?' -- finally the words found you, and couldn't help a self-satisfying smirk playing across your lips: 'It took you longer than I expected'.

The moment you've said that, you knew it was the most stupid thing you could've said. It was the equivalent of pissing all over Rick's lab and claiming it yours.

You couldn't even process what was going on, and he was standing right in front of you, towering over you, his right hand on your neck, like an iron manacle, squeezing it. If you had any doubt about him being furious, all confusion was gone. He was raging; fireballs exploding in his dilated pupils.

'You little slut! Who do you think you are?' he hissed, squeezing around your throat. Even though he had surprised you with his incredibly quick movement, you weren't going to give in. This wasn't the first time someone was choking you -- for different reasons, some of them extremely pleasant-, so you knew how to brace yourself. Even though you were a bit afraid of what he could do to you, you couldn't deny his proximity, body warmth and dominance turned you on. Your nipples hardened and pushed against the soft fabric of your sleeveless black top.

Rick was much stronger than you had presumed, and now it seemed he was holding all the cards. You were gasping for air, but you weren't going to show any weakness. Your ego took over again and even though you knew nothing clever had ever come out of that, you acted hastily. You gathered all your strength and spat in Rick's face. As expected, this took him by surprise. You knew you didn't have much time, had to act quickly, so you took advantage of his loosening grip and kicked him in the lower abdomen. Whilst he was crouching down with pain, you reached for your plasma gun, unlocked and pointed it at him.

'I understand your frustration, professor, but I don't appreciate you breaking into my apartment and attacking me in such manner' you said with confidence. The ball was in your court again. Rick seemed defeated.

At least that's what you thought.

The next moment you felt a sharp sting, similar to an electric shock passing through your body, causing all your muscles to spasm at once. You dropped your gun unintentionally and fell to your knees. From the corner of your eye you saw Rick reaching into his pocket. At the same time, he pounced and tackled you to the floor, pushed your head onto the ground and pulled your arms roughly behind your back. In no time your wrists were tied and held firmly; Rick was straddling you. Ensuring you weren't going to struggle, he lowered his upper body, leaning against yours and whispered into your ear:

' Now, that-that's better. Not so confident now, are we? You are about to learn your place, sweetheart' you could swear he was grimacing with a smirk. Whatever he shot you with embodied itself into your nerves, causing all your muscles to freeze, being incapable of moving, but you could hear and feel everything.

Well, you couldn't blame anyone but yourself.

With one determined move he flipped you over, causing your arms and shoulders to strain, being tucked underneath your body in an extremely uncomfortable angle. Fortunately you felt the stinging pain and lack of control over your muscles fade away, and you managed to utter a few words:

'Fair...enough...what do you want then?'

Rick leaned back on top of you, put his weight on his hands on either side of your legs and threw you a confident smile.

'I'll teach you a lesson for your rude intrusion. L-let's see how you can deal with it. I'll enjoy watching you, sweetie' -- and he quickly injected your neck. You didn't even had time to react, when he added 'D-don't even think you can scan your body and extract this stuff, it's totally untraceable and only I can turn it off'.

Rick stopped and was staring at you for a few seconds; the glare was so fierce you could hardly breathe. Even though his anger seemed to fade, you felt it was being replaced by something much more uncomfortable. He was looking at you as if he had an x-ray vision and could monitor every single thought you had. You quickly recalled every possible spy-device you had ever come across, but had never heard about one with these specific parameters.

Your ability to think straight froze when Rick slowly ran his jet injector from your face through your breasts down to your pelvis. He also awarded you with a satisfied grin. This motherfucker was rather handsome in real life. His piercing eyes, rough skin and skinny yet shockingly strong body made your core tremble. No one ever had such an intense effect on you.

With that he stood up, pointed his gun to the wall and threw you a good-bye before disappearing in the dazzling emerald light

'I'll see you tomorrow right after the launch party'

And he was gone.

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You took Rick's word for not being able to scan whatever implant he had inserted into your neck -- well, not without him noticing it. It must've been some sort of tracing device or a grain that could record everything around you, including your own actions. Clearly he wanted to see the big finale of your project, before launching. An alarm went off in your head: what if he wanted to tamper with it right before unveiling your best work, causing utter destruction? And what if this device in your neck could create a transcript of your thoughts, thus you became an open book? The project was almost finished, but you still had to run your final tests and make sure the last levels are totally compatible with all multi-dimensional platforms. This would mean revealing your whole coding to Rick, but at this point you were rather frustrated and just wanted to get it over with. You reminded yourself of your previous achievements and for some strange reason that calmed your nerves. Rick could've already stolen or destroyed your project, for some reason he didn't. And what was that weird good-bye message that he would see you after the launch party? You became more and more certain he hadn't planned to crash your simulation at all. Maybe he became a bit fascinated by your triumph over him -- you were hoping that was the case, after all, only a tiny number of entities had been able to fool Rick Sanchez. You were hoping he was going to acknowledge your success in some way.

With a huge sigh you turned your computers on again and started troubleshooting. 'Fuck you, Rick, do you want to see how I work? Fine! But I'll get back at you for this' you mumbled, forgetting for a moment he could see and hear everything you were doing, most likely could "read" your thoughts, also. You were concentrating hard to neglect the growing arousal when you recalled Rick being on top of you, dominating you. 'Goddam it, get your shit together!' you snapped at your stupid self, trying to empty your thoughts completely when Rick's image came to your mind. After a while you managed to focus entirely on the execution of your code and graphics; you had the thorough knowledge of ins and outs of a successful multi-level simulation reality on a multi-dimensional basis. You were the technical master and you were going to become the utmost top developer once this simulation reality launched.

'Screw you, Sanchez!' this was your last thought before you hit the sack.

You woke up with a start. Your body was squirming, aching with desire. You just had a wet dream about Rick. If it hadn't been for the constantly intense hotness in your groins you would've thought he had infected your brains with these images. There were a lot of things Rick Sanchez had been responsible for, but your growing fascination with this guy wasn't one of them. This was completely on you. Your damn body betrayed you.

This was fucking ridiculous, why on earth couldn't you just erase the memory of Rick? After all, he was just a test subject, a rather fascinating one, but that should have been the end of the story. Yeah, he intruded your home and made you furious -- big deal; it wasn't the first time this happened. Whoever had the guts to break into your apartment, didn't leave in one piece. Before killing them, you subtracted some of their DNAs and created digital copies of their attributes to be used in various phases of your early VR-infinity games.

You'd never do that to Rick. Most likely you couldn't, anyway, the man's a fucking genius; would've probably beaten you to it.

This thought drove you up the wall. You'd always been the queen of your world, a competitive prick most of the time, and proud of it. You had a kick out of defeating the most intelligent people of the universe. Being exposed to Rick to such a great extreme was a real pain in your neck --literally.

Your curiosity overrode your dignity. You had to find out what this substance or 'thing' was, even if that meant you'd reveal a lot of your secrets to Rick. You were certain you could override the program and remove it from your body, but first you had to find out what you were dealing with.

You were familiar with most mind controlling technologies; you could also scan and retract most of them. You had implanted a security scanner chip into your brain right after the fatal incident with the Shadow Council of C-145.

You couldn't afford anyone to control your thoughts without your knowledge, therefore this tiny chip was going to trigger an alarm in your brain whenever an alien substance or entity was trying to infest your body. It felt like a dim buzzer in your head -- instant and effective. Well, until know -- the fact the buzz didn't go off right after Rick had injected you, sent a clear message: he was absolutely right when he said it was untraceable and only he could remove it.

This didn't give you much time.

Your alarm was going to go off in about four hours. A thousand thoughts were whirling in your mind, you simply couldn't go back to sleep. You could just as much use this time to educate yourself on the latest breakthroughs in intergalactic mind reading technology.

Suddenly you heard -- no, rather sensed -- a sharp, vibrating noise, similar to a high-frequency radio wave in your brain, close to your security chip. Then you heard a low, gravelling voice:

'What did I tell you about messing around with my device? If I g-give...order you to do something, I expect fucking compliance!'

Bastard, he must've installed a smartphone microchip into you. This technology had only been used in the 46th Dimension. The developers were extremely discreet, always keeping a low profile. The chips were officially 'under testing' - originally built for crime-prevention, improving defence and health; but most people in the tech communities knew they had been sold in the intergalactic black markets. These babies could easily reprint all your security codes and darkest secrets; furthermore, they could alter a person's behaviour and manipulate them.

The thought of being a puppet made your blood boil.

'Just cut the crap and tell me what do you want from me!' you shouted. 'And don't you dare to give me any orders!'

If you had any doubt about Rick being a complete lunatic, it was time to face reality. He snapped. You could easily imagine his expression twisting with anger.

'Listen h-here, you fucking bitch! You'd better not get f-feisty with me! I'm in control here! What do you think you deserve for taking me for a fu-uurp-cking ride?! You think you are a smartass! You should know better, what happens to people who cross me!'

Your heart was racing, but it wasn't fear this time, it was fury and -- embarrassingly enough, sexual desire. You were still wet from your dream, and the memory hit you hard, at the worst time possible. You were about to start a frantic Armageddon here, the last thing you needed was some nonsense biological weakness taking over your mind. Or was it your mind, indeed?

'What the hell did you do to my dreams?' you hissed. 'You had your fun, now turn this fucking thing off!' You felt mentally naked and vulnerable, something you had never experienced before.

You expected Rick to go mental at you, but to your greatest surprise, his voice turned into chuckle.

'C-can't hold me responsible for your di-uurp-dirty fantasies, sweetheart. That's all on you'

Fucking great. That's what you were afraid of. At least if Rick had infected your brain with those dreams and images of him fucking you, you would've had an excuse.

Ok, you really need to concentrate! -- You commanded yourself, but you could hear Rick's remote chuckles at the same time. This was getting unbearable. This motherfucker could read your thoughts even before they manifested themselves. Still, you couldn't just simply give in to him.

'Fine' -- you said 'Do you want to play this way? You really think I couldn't turn this off without your help?'

That wasn't a bluff; you envisaged a plan: freeze your thoughts for a few seconds, whilst activating your own fake-reality shield. You had developed this as a last-minute security measure, it could only buy you a couple of minutes, but it had proven to be a lifesaver. You faced your greatest challenge yet -- had to execute the whole thing under Rick's full surveillance, which meant you had to be extra vigilant with not thinking of anything.

You pressed a button on your watch and the whole room was surrounded by a laser shield -- you could compare it to a frosted glass-dome: anyone spying from outside couldn't see through.

You had to act quickly and retain the necessary info from the simulation prototypes. All you had to do was to scan through your saved files and find the bit where Rick had brought the microchip back from his multi-dimensional travels. Then you could simply run the picture of the device on the Intergalactic Police database and find out how to turn it off.

It was going smoother than you had ever imagined. You allowed yourself to giggle a bit when you had the full program analysis of the phone chip called Senso-Cell just under two minutes. The next move was to infect it with a virus, but you were running out of time. Your shield started to fade; you really should've invested more power into this. Still, you were far too close to victory to give up now. You kept working frantically. Just before you executed the virus and corrupted the whole system, the last square of your laser shield disappeared. You hit the button and released the payload. It was instant success; you could sense the chip fading away and your security system rebooting itself.