I've been working (very) slowly on a big story for you all, but because that's coming so unpredictably, I thought it might be nice to treat you to some one-shots and drabbles? I have quite a store on my hard drive. These won't follow any particular theme or continuity or pairing – they're mostly all meant to stand alone.

Also expect the occasional shipping drabble, just because I'll probably never write a big romantic story and these drabbles are the only place I can get my ship on. I'll try and label shippy one-shots accordingly. This first one is not.


Zim's foot was dragging the ground as he walked into the house. His heel squeaked against the tiling, accompanied by a low growl deep in his throat. In a few hours his leg would be straightened out and the dull ache in it would subside, but that did little to calm his foul mood.

He didn't need to get hurt at all. That transformer at the power plant he'd been trying to convert hadn't needed to explode and toss him backwards. And it wouldn't have, if not for –

"Reeeaaah!" came the familiar screeching as GIR dashed into the living room from the yard. His arms were thrown out to the side and he pretend-zoomed around Zim as he played his own bizarre version of the airplane game.

Zim's eyes narrowed at GIR. It had been his defective little robot who'd rammed a chopstick into that panel. All GIR's fault. He could have been controlling the east-side of the city's power grid by now.

Hunching his shoulders, Zim stomped deeper into the house. He clambered up into the trash-can lift, still fuming, antenna going flat on his head when GIR crawled up in after him.

"We's squished," GIR said cheerfully, butting his head into Zim's chest as the lift descended deeper into the base.

Zim inched himself closer to the wall of the narrow lift. The idea of being so close to the little bucket of screwed-up bolts nearly made Zim sick. Then again, maybe it was GIR's awful smell. Always hard to tell.

"Doop de doop," sang GIR softly, tapping his foot against the ground as the lift went lower still. Zim could feel the vibrations as he spoke against his stomach and every muscle in his body tensed at the contact.

Finally the door slid open. Computer processing floor. Fresh air flooded the lift and Zim used the newfound space to knock GIR roughly out onto the ground.

"Get AWAY from me!" he snapped.

GIR ignored him. He tottered over to an open space on the floor and sat down, rocking from side to side, his head sporadically snapping to the side at nothing as if he was seeing things. Once or twice he mumbled a random word at full-volume, something like "bacon," or "cellar door."

Zim stared after him.

"You're broken, GIR," Zim said, eyeing the little robot, fully aware that he was functionally talking to himself. After all, GIR was currently busy trying to eat one of his own feet.

Zim stalked over to him. He glanced over the silvery chassis and healthy glowing eyes. GIR's hardware was perfectly fine – better than average, Zim reckoned – it was his insides that were rotten from the inside out. Festering since day one and only getting worse on this stupid, pandering planet.

All those little software patches, those chip updates and driver repairs had been futile. He was still ruined. His only companion, his only assistant on this lonely, putrid rock was still crippled in the head, despite all Zim's efforts to fix him.

Zim felt the muscles in his face starting to twitch, the teeth in his jaw aching as he ground them together. His knuckles shown white as he stared at GIR, who noticed his master no more than he noticed the molecules in the air. GIR's metal head clanged annoyingly as he chomped down on the end of his leg, giggling as sparks flew from his mouth.

Had it really taken him this long to figure it out? Zim bit into his bottom lip as he thought. Had this really never occurred to him?

So many ruined plans. So many near-deaths. So many actual deaths. Zim's back still ached in the right weather from that time GIR had tried to see if he could fit one of his rubber piggies into the Voot Cruiser's hyperspace release valve. All this failure at the hands of an insane little robot.

Zim's hands had started shaking without his notice. Quickly, too fast for GIR to react, Zim stomped forward and seized him by his shoulders. He heaved GIR up onto his back, feeling him go limp and heavy like a doll. Likely he was expected a piggy-back ride or something equally stupid.

"Where we goin'?"

"You're going to be fixed, GIR. For the last time."

He'd wasted so many years. It had taken him so long to put the pieces together – he, Zim, master of all technology, a super genius himself – and now, now things were going to be different.

Once a computer's far enough gone, you don't repair it. You wipe it completely.

GIR wriggled on Zim's shoulder as he walked deeper into the base. He felt the tiny clawed hand running circles around his Pak, GIR's little voice humming a weird tune into his ear. Zim gritted his teeth and walked faster.

He carried GIR into one of the server rooms, searching for an appropriate spot to plug him in. The house was flexible and dynamic and really could fulfill just about any need Zim had at any time – and right now he needed to reconfigure his SIR.

"Computer, prepare a SIR containment frame," Zim commanded. With a whirring of metallic clicks and flashes of pink steel, a rack-like table popped into existence right in front of him. It even had a few indentations for GIR's giant head and floating legs.

Zim slammed the little robot onto the rack, keeping one hand planted on his chest to hold him still until the wires could attach. The machine whirred to life, chords snaking out of it like vines that wrapped around GIR's tiny frame.

"It feels creepy," GIR said softly. He latched a hand around Zim's wrist. Zim shook it off.

The cables fed into GIR's head, into the little door in his chest, wrapping around his limbs to hold him down. His bright eyes darted worriedly back and forth beneath the nest of cables. A squeaking, humming whimper leaked out of his zippered mouth.

Zim huffed quietly at the sound. Robots weren't supposed to feel fear.

He calibrated the containment frame, flipping a few switches and clicking frantically at the computer screen. This program wasn't terribly different from the machines that Control Brains used to deactivate Irken Paks. It would just be a simple wipe, and afterward he could re-build GIR's personality from scratch.

He wouldn't even need to call him GIR anymore.

Zim pounded the "enter" button and grinned as sparks erupted from the ends of the cables, code and energy shooting through them. The crackling of electricity sounded through the room, flashes of light illuminating the dusty corners, and Zim and his robot at the center of it all.

GIR went perfectly still in the containment frame. The cables tightened around him, holding his arms and legs tightly, his eyes wide and vacant for an instant or two.

And then he screamed.

GIR shrieked. His voice rang throughout the base, high-pitched and pained, piercing through Zim's brain like a needle. GIR's eyes flashed a through a dozen colors, his arms yanked against wires, but mostly he screamed.

Clamminess rose up on Zim's skin at the sound, rattling some sickness to the surface. He tried to watch the progress bar as it crawled across the computer screen, wringing his hands, but his gaze kept flicking over to the screaming robot.

He kept crying out. GIR's childish little voice roaring in fear was freakish and obscene. It sounded like madness, like agony down to the bone, a noise that made Zim feel like his mind was turning inside out.

"This needs to be done, GIR! It will be over soon and then you'll be better. So much better," Zim said, hands pressed to the sides of his head, but his voice was drowned out the instant the words left his mouth. He curled into himself, trying to escape the sound as it soaked down into his body.

The shrieking didn't stop.

There was nothing wrong with fixing something broken, right? There couldn't be. That's all he was doing. Correcting something that should have been corrected so long ago. How could doing this be the wrong thing to do?

Zim had read somewhere once that being deactivated felt like having your brains scraped right out of your skull. That was what needed to be done to GIR, didn't it? For the good of the mission?

(The screaming went on. Zim whined silently and wide-eyed.)

None of GIR would be left. Not a single byte of mission-ruining, taco-eating, hug-given data. The robot that came out of this machine would be sterile. Default. Just like every other SIR unit that had ever been distributed.

The robot who GIR was supposed to be would be cold.

Zim shuttered, teeth grinding in his skull, arms wrapped protectively around his body. One eye winced open, staring at the progress screen, forcing himself to avoid GIR's mad, wide-eyed gaze. The bright red "CANCEL" button hovered just below.

Zim uncurled himself and smashed one fist down on the plastic circle.

Immediately the machine shuddered to a halt. Its humming quieted, the sparks dimmed, and the coils wrapped tightly around GIR's little body loosened like dead snakes. Zim grabbed handfuls of them, yanking them out of GIR's head, freeing his limp body from the nest of wires.

GIR wasn't moving. He'd stopped screaming only to have his eyes dim to grey. Zim seized his shoulders and dragged him out of the containment frame, dropping to the floor with the little robot on his lap.

"GIR, wake up!" Zim roared into his face as he shook GIR, hard, until his antenna rattled back and forth. He stayed still. "GIR! I didn't give you permission to abandon m- this mission!"

Zim waited. In the soft buzzing of the computer room, the weird red light and the sharp tang of metal, he waited. GIR's body grew heavy in his arms as he studied every inch of the little chassis for a sign of light or movement.

Minutes or hours.

Then, finally, a spark.

GIR's eyes flickered red for an instant. Zim yelped in surprise, dropping his robot into his lap, feeling the metal beginning to warm as GIR woke up. He spasmed, shook, passed through a few more eye colors. His legs kicked wildly. Zim growled in annoyance and held GIR tightly against his chest to keep him still.

"Aw, hugs!" GIR squeaked, returning the embrace.

"No, GIR! No hugs. That wasn't a hug."

Dumping GIR onto the floor, Zim got to his feet. He brushed himself off fussily, avoiding GIR's dippy gaze, wondering if GIR had any memory of –

Of course not. He couldn't. And what would it matter if he did?

"Come on, GIR. I've done all I need to do down here," he said, turning away, content that GIR was functionally normal. As normal as he could possibly be, of course. As normal as Zim wanted him.

"Can we watch T.V. now?"

"Ugh, that human drivel…" Zim began, then stopped, cringing as GIR bopped up to his side as he waited for the lift. The cyan eyes looked hopefully up. No one ever looked up at him other than GIR.

The lift dinged as it arrived at their floor, but GIR continued to stare at him.

"Sure. We'll watch whatever you want," Zim said.