Sick's Disclaimer: Invader Zim does not belong to me. I still think this is a good thing- the sheer amount of IZ fanfiction love would probably go to my head. I do own a disturbing sense of humor and the characters Kira and Mara.

Dib's Prospective

In my dreams I was always flying. Able to survey everything below me, see what was coming.

I always hated surprises. "Wake up, kid." A gentle shove against my shoulder. "Di-ib." Cheh, have to try harder than that, thanks. "He's kinda cute-"

SLAM!

"Holy shit!," I yelped, eyes flying open as I proceeded to bash my forehead on the wood panel not four unsettling inches over my head. "Ow…" Seeing stars, I slumped back, muttering a muffled 'son of a-'. Where the hell was-

…I? Pushing on the dropped panel with both palms, ridiculously intense white light peaking in, stabbing my retinas.

"And the kid more or less lives!," an annoyingly cheery female voice exclaimed, grabbing the edge and helping to pull it all the way back. I warily pushed myself up into a sitting position, a difficult thing to do when half your limbs still thought they were asleep.

I squinted in the direction of the voice, realizing what I was missing and instantly defensive for it. "Who are you?," I demanded, trying to sound badass and intimidating. Jeez, where are you…Unfortunately, my voice died in my throat about halfway through and no amount of coughing was going to salvage what I imagined to be dignity.

"Relax, kiddo," the female I vaguely recognized from before laughed. "You're a sound sleeper, must've taken more blood than I meant." She came up close enough where I could see her better even with my bad eyesight, taking my bare wrist in her cold hand; what breath I still had caught in my throat.

The person was most definitely female, even without my glasses I could tell that. A blur of green and brown, I blinked, shying away from her instinctively though I knew I had literally nowhere to go-

"Relax, Dib," she murmured gently, supporting me before I even realized I was falling back, a wave of dizziness threatening to put me under again. "Are you in any pain?"

Her touch was a lot colder than I anticipated, her arm loosely around my bare back. Something was really wrong here, and it bothered me I couldn't see it…

I blinked a couple of times and gently shook my head in a vain attempt to try to clear the black spots out of my eyes. Should I be? No, I wasn't in any pain, even where I'd introduced my forehead to the edge of the-

Oh.

Dammit.

"This is either a bad joke, or I'm…" A sinking feeling somewhere in the vicinity of my heels prevented me from actually saying it.

"Dead?," she provided gently. "Well, kind of, but that's usually what happens when humans get stabbed like you managed to." I could feel the concern in her stare as she placed a piece of cold metal in my hand, and what feeling remained in my heels slowly completely disintegrated. "Dib?"

It was a couple of seconds before I realized she'd said my name, but I snapped to attention as soon as it occurred to me I should reply. "Kira."

"Yes." She seemed to take it as a good sign I both hadn't passed out and remembered her name. Yay. Keep in mind I was just thankful I hadn't started screaming and been unable to stop.

Yet.

I slipped on my glasses with one remarkably steady, practiced motion, regarding her the whole time with a deadpan expression. "So I'm…dead," I said with the tone of someone who wanted to make absolutely sure he knew what was going on and felt ridiculously stupid as he did. Which actually wasn't far from the truth…

"More or less." Kira shrugged, a smile always on her face. Did she never take anything seriously? "Technically a vampire, actually." A look of almost motherly concern narrowed her eyebrows. "You look like shit. You've been out for almost three days, I was worried you might not take…"

I was still hung up on 'vampire'. "What do you mean-"

"Here, let's get you out of this, first…" Pressing on a panel, the side fell forward, making it easy to slip out. Careful not to twist my bandaged side, and from somewhere relieved I was still wearing my black pants, she helped me out, letting me lean on her for a second so as to find my balance.

Sitting me down the first row of fold out chairs, she pulled a plastic bag full of a dark red fluid from a backpack at her feet. "You need to eat, kiddo," she warned, pressing the packet into my hands. I hadn't felt hungry, and still didn't- at least not in the usual sense. Just kind of…numb. "Human food you can still consume in moderation, but your body has reprogrammed itself to use blood, plasma actually."

The idea of consuming blood didn't bother me as much as I guess it should have, but I didn't just immediately take to it, either. I gave her a skeptical look that I felt no shame about, but she just nodded, helping me open it with a switch knife.

As soon as the blood touched my tongue, I knew I was hooked. As disgusting as it sounds, it took immense control not to just rip the plastic apart; it was all I could do to drink as slowly as I did. Kira watched me intently, something I was painfully aware of the whole time; finally, simultaneously forever and too soon, it was empty. Feeling like I was shaking worse now than before, I avoided meeting her eyes and forced myself to set it aside, wiping my mouth absently with the back of my hand.

"Like a tomato-y Capri Sun," I muttered, attempting a lame joke. Kira smiled indulgently.

Letting my stomach settle for a minute, I leaned forward in the chair far enough to rest my elbows on my knees. Amazingly, I noticed my head had stopped pounding so badly, permitting almost coherent thought.

Three days asleep…in a coffin, no less…I shuddered inwardly. No wonder I didn't remember much of anything, I thought with a dark snort, closing my eyes. I understood Kira's reasoning (it was dark, inconspicuous, she liked to mess with me) but it didn't make it much easier to take. I did remember Kira, she had been the director at dad's funeral-she had been wearing the same type of suit. Kinda hard to forget something that precise shade of green.

Insofar as being a vampire… The paranormal had been an interest of mine since I was little, but I had somehow never really contemplated actually becoming one of what I had studied so passionately. I decided it wasn't something I particularly regretted, which was kind of a surprise in itself; just a thought I figured I'd have to get accustomed to.

That being said, there was something that bothered me about the whole thing…

I rubbed the back of my neck absently, a nervous habit I thought I'd gotten rid of years before. I had always thought too much, gotten hung up on the details; on more than one occasion it had nearly gotten me killed…

Kira touched my cheek, taking the empty bag out of my hand. I had never sought out physical human contact, a violently bipolar sister and practically nonexistent father had killed any real even subconscious interest in that a long time ago. Still, I didn't flinch at the contact.

Just this once, for a little while, let it go.

"Feel better?"

I nodded, relieved to find it was true.

Little experiment, I wanted to see what Dib's reaction would be to actually becoming what he used to study. I kind of cheated, this story occurs when Dib is about fifteen and Zim has left the planet for six months, so circumstances have dictated a different response than if he were still a kid... I have plans for this if people would like me to continue; yes, Zim will eventually appear, though at this point in flashback capacity only.

I had to rewrite this thing four different times- and it still didn't come out the way I planned…Oh well.

Sick