I'm gonna move to the southwest, and, I don't know...

"Remind me again," said Beth, frowning for a moment at the screen in front of her before her fingers clacked over the keyboard, "why we're hacking into the scheduling database for a Luxureon space spa?"

Summer, watching carefully over her mother's shoulder, sighed and rolled her eyes. "Well, I thought you were doing it no-questions-asked because I'm your daughter and you love me and you have twenty-one years of misplaced resentment to make up for, but if you really have to know, two of my best friends just got dumped in, like, the harshest ways possible within an honestly worryingly close time frame, right on the cusp of February, so I really wanted to do something nice to help get their minds off of it for a while and treat themselves, but the whole fucking place is pretty much booked solid for months."

Beth arched a cool, scarred brow at Summer, and Summer continued.

"So I figured...we hack into their database, cross-reference it with the list of Federation sympathizers we collected both before and after the fall of the NaIGF, see if there's any matches, and if there is, bam, crotch-punt those Federation bootlickers off the list, put me and my crew in there instead, not only depriving them of a sweet ass spa day, but also making them super embarrassed when they show up expecting to get one and are rejected and shamed, and will probably make a whole scene that'll totally go viral on Space TikTok or whatever."

"I don't know whether to be proud of you," Beth admitted, shaking her head as she went back to the computer, "or worried about you."

"It's the first one," Summer assured her. "Or it should be. Anything else only reflects negatively on your as a mother and highlights your failings as a strong parental influence in raising me."

"In my defense," Beth countered, "we don't actually know for sure if I raised you..." But, thankfully, before she needed to go into that, there was a little blip from the screen. "We're in. Okay, now to upload and crossreference to our own database for a match..."

They both leaned in with eager anticipation at the little wheel circling around in the middle of the screen, and then there was another ding.

"Got one," Beth announced. "Krombopulos Amy. Reservation for four. February 10th."

"Perfect!" said Summer, who was not at all going to question why a different planet in a different galaxy somehow still managed to use the same calander as this one; it was apparently a thing even in different dimensions, don't @ her! "Scratch it, put my name in there instead. Wait! No! Not my name, then if it comes out who got their reservation, I don't want some stupid assassins coming after me. I'll make up an alias. Mmm, let's see. Put down....Autumn Jones.

"Wait, no!" Summer seemed to realize that was dumb just as Beth was about to point it out. "Make it...~WinterBlade~."

Her voice dropped into a mysterious hush as she said it, and it was clearly that this was clearly what she was going for and no argument on her mother's part was going to change her mind, so she just shook her head and made the adjustment. "Alright," she said, "reservation now for..." She might not argue, but she was going to sigh and shake her head. " ~WinterBlade~, party of four, for the tenth. Anything else?"

"Nope!" said Summer, beaming, and already on her phone to send out texts to the rest of this party of four. "Thanks, Mom! You're the beeeeeesssst!" And absently gave her a quick hug with one arm before going back to her texts.

"I still don't see why you couldn't have just gotten your boyfr--"

"Shhhh," Summer cut her off. "Mother-daughter bonding moment. Just soak it in."

[[ mostly establishly, NFB for distance, but totes open for calls and texts! ]]

"Damn." Home again in front of the Smith household, everyone was gathered around Space Beth's ship, scoping it out and expressing their admiration, Morty especially. "This thing has twin turbines? I'll forgive you for abandoning us if you let me drive it!"

"That works for me," said Space Beth, shrugging a little as she grinned over at him and pulled something out of her pocket. "I was just going to give you space cigarettes."

( Just the typical aftermath of saving the world, gaining a whole ass space mom on a Friday night, and more evil galactic empires that can't stop REBOOTING themselves, nbd. )

[[ and fin! Continued from here, and that's a wrap on Season 4! Now to figure out what the frick to do with Season 5 or possibly just wait a million years until Season 6! Many thanks to badassprodigy for being there. NFB, NFI, OOC is loooove! ]]

Meanwhile, after a series of events that happened off-screen while Summer and Barry were chasing her brother out of a girls' locker room, on a previously quiet suburban street not too far from the Smith household, an argument in front of Rick's crashed ship between his daughter, his daughter's clone, and himself was being abruptly interrupted.

Look. A lot had happened off screen while they were chasing an invisible Morty out of a girl's locker room. We didn't even touch on what happened at Dr. Wong's!

"Drop it!" A voice called out, interrupting Rick's appeal for a trip to get fast food (McDonald's? No, Wendy's! Wendy's. They might have given them some money!). This command was then overlaid with various other voices alternately making other demands, to get on the ground, to not move, to drop their weapons, in the form of a small horde of gun-wielding bug-like aliens flanking a badly burned young woman with a short bob of brown hair.

( TWO Beths, Product Placement that Might even Make a Chocobro Jealous, the Impending Destruction of a Planet, and A Fucking Piece of Shit Space Battles. CW for death of a villain we're literally JUST technically meeting, lol, SPOILER ALERT. )

[[ continued from here! NFB, NFI, OOC YAY BLAH BLAH BLAH! Taken from S04 E10 of Rick and Morty, "Starmort Rickturn of the Jerri", with modifications and a little help from badassprodigy! This is clearly where the good stuff starts! Nothing like a little planet destroying on a Friday evening, am I right?? ]]