A/N: It's been FOREVER since I've put an Author's Note in a fic. I usually write Final Fantasy 9 fic, but I've had this one bouncing about on my harddrive for a while - ever since I saw Magnolia - and figured I should put up what I've got to see how people react. It will have slash, as well as femmeslash, and I do kind of butcher some characters. Not really OOC butcher... more like... well, you'll see. (If you've read End of Times, you'll get what I mean by butcher.)
The bar is, in all appearances, the same as every other dingy bar the city could possibly offer – the same as every bar in those old film noir movies that he used to watch all the time.
He clinks the ice in his glass and says, when the bartender arrives to refill his drink, "I used to be smart." The bartender smiles, an uneasy grin full of braces, and replaces the drink. He laughs dryly in response to that grin. "Now, I'm just..." He drops his head into his hands, "Stupid."
With a groan, he knocks back the glass of bourbon, fully draining it before throwing a few tens on the counter. Who cares if it's too much – it's not as if he needs it. He laughs at his own humor and nearly falls into the door.
"You want me to call a cab?" the bartender asks.
"Hah. Like I would want to do that. I need to walk. I'm getting fat."
The bartender casts a frown at the patron's unhealthily thin form and then says, "If you say so..."
"I say so," he snaps, "Why does no one ever believe me?"
The night is cold but he's found that it's refreshing after a few drinks, so he walks along the sidewalk in the dimly lit city, arms widespread and shaggy black hair framing his face, grease preventing it from getting into his eyes. Cold, cold, cold, and his face feels warm, warm, warm – what a perfect night.
"It's so pretty," he says to the empty streets, staring at the sky above, "When you're looking up at it."
His foot lands on something hard and a metallic crunch reaches his ears. When he goes to kick the debris away, it responds with a dim, crackling noise, like a broken radio. He looks down, and suddenly three glasses of bourbon isn't enough.
He hasn't seen anything like this in – in years. Years, years of knowing and not stopping and then stopping and not knowing why –
He kneels down and picks the little metal body up, cradling it as he would a child. "Gir?" he asks, staring in confusion. The little robot's eyes – usually bright cyan and empty of all reason but full of crazy happiness – are blackened, dimmed and shut off, with cracks in them and dents all over his body. A closer examination warrants the discovery of dried purple blood on his hands.
"Gir!" he exclaims, looking over the robot in a newfound panic. He's now knowing and stopping and trying to go with rusted wheels – "Gir, come on!"
Shaking gets no response and so he sits, cross-legged under a streetlight, and opens the front panel of the little body. The inside is a mish-mash of torn wires and sparking circuits, but after so long he still understands how computers work and he goes about tying the copper-ish strands inside coated wires together, trying to get more than a few sparks.
Eyes glow cyan and Gir's voice yelps, "Master!" before they go out again. He frowns and quickly goes about setting random switches to what looks like on, before finishing the last, red wire.
The eyes glow again and stay lit, flickering slightly but operational. The SIR unit cries out, "Master, where are you?" before noticing the man above him. A grin grows out of his frown and he shouts, "Dibby!" He looks shocked, "Your head! It's not big no more!"
"Gee, thanks," Dib mutters to himself, scratching at his stubble. "Gir, what are you doing here? I thought you were..."
"Master told me to leave!" The cyan eyes water – how Gir does that, Dib still doesn't know – and the robot cries, "Someone came to see him and he told me to leave! I was gonna make a cake for him!"
"Wait – Zim's... Zim's here?" He looks about, as if he could spot the alien, "Zim left! He's on Earth?"
Gir nods, "Uh huh!" He grins widely and continues, "He had to go for a while so I got to stay home alone! Piggy and I had lots of fun, and the Scary Monkey Show, and then there was that time with the laser rainbow...! But then he came back and said... and said..." The robot frowns, then grins and shrugs, "I dunno!"
"Someone... Someone came to see Zim?" Dib frowns, and then looks at the sky. "What did this person look like, Gir?"
The robot umm's for a while and then shrugs again, "I dunno!"
"Gir," Dib grits his teeth – this would be a lot easier if he were just a little drunker, "This is very important, okay? Did Zim – Did your master tell you to do anything, before he kicked you out?"
More umm'ing and then the robot shakes his head, "He just said 'don't come back!' But I know he didn't mean it, Master loves me!"
"I'm sure he does," the human frowns, cradling the robot as he stands, "It's not good for you to be out without your disguise, though, Gir!" he scolds, feeling guilty for abusing the robot like he is, "We should go back and get it. Zim would be mad if he saw you out here like this, wouldn't he?"
"Master don't care 'bout none of that stuff no more!" Gir chirrups, "But I wanna make a cake! Can we make a cake at your house, Dibby?"
The human sighs and looks around. This worries him – Zim is back, has visitors, and kicked Gir out? And there's Irken blood on the little robot's hands...
Still. If he has to worry about Gir ruining anything he might plan...
"Alright, Gir, you can bake a cake at my house."
"Can we see Gazzy?"
A frown graces Dib's pale face. "Probably not... we don't live together, you know, Gir. People don't always stay together."
"That's not true," the robot says in an oddly clear way, "Master and me and you will always stay together! We're... We're family!"
Dib looks at the robot in his arms and then shakes his head, picking up his pace. "I don't know about that, Gir. Family bonds aren't all that strong around here."
Dib hates coming back to this place, but it's his home, now, with Dad...
Well, it's his home, and as long as he locks the door to the labs, Gir should be fine here by himself. The idea makes the human shudder, but still...
The old house is no longer made of pristine white walls and well trimmed lawns – years of abuse have left the paint peeling and the lawns overgrown with weeds. The only thing the same about the house is all of the furniture – but it's all aged and stained from long nights in and take out food. He would get new furniture – God knows he can afford it – but sentimentality has always been one of his weaker points.
Once he finishes fiddling with the front door, he enters and deposits the robot on the threadbare couch, going to the basement door and locking it. "Okay, Gir, why don't you just stay here and watch TV, or something?"
"Where are you goin', Dibby?" the robot asks in curiosity.
"Well... I'm gonna go get cake mix for you to bake a cake, okay?"
"Yay cake!"
Dib puts the remote next to Gir and hopes that, when he returns, the place won't be utterly destroyed. He locks the front door, just in case, before taking off down the street at the fastest pace his alcohol-addled mind can take him.
The base is... well, it sure is a sight to behold. His last time here had been five years ago, just before his twenty-second birthday. It has been a long time since then, and its obvious Gir had no idea that the outside world had even existed. The peeling paint, rusted metal, decapitated gnomes and weeds all denote the emptiness of the house – but there's something strange about the layout of the heads of the animated gnomes. They're lying about, anywhere from five to ten feet from the bodies – not just a mere roll down the angled bodies, that's for sure.
He feels something inside him swell up and he moves quickly to the door, noticing that the men's room sign is missing, and that the rudimentary lock has been blown out. An icy feeling wrenches his gut and he pushes the door open, moving silently through the cold, dusty, and dark upper level.
Everything here looks as bad as my place, Dib thinks, wondering what that says about him. He reaches the kitchen and sees that, among other things, the trashcan elevator has been blown away, leaving a gaping hole in the floor.
More importantly – there's a bottle of something lying nearby. He picks it up and looks at the label. "Rum, huh? Can Zim even drink?" With a shrug, he knocks some of the bottle back, before putting it on the counter and looking into the black hole. "Well... what is there for me to lose?"
Nothing, his mind responds, and so he crawls down.
The metal that was once smooth and polished is now rusted and chipped, giving Dib some grip against gravity. He struggles his way down the long elevator shaft, wondering where the hell the elevator itself is. If this were another time – another, long time ago – he would have been excited to be doing this daredevil stuff; but he's twenty-seven now and it just doesn't do it for him anymore.
He reaches the inner sanctum of the labs after what feels like hours, and takes his time to look at the equipment. He's sure that, if the lights were on instead of this purple-red glow, he would see dust caking everything. If this were another time... He almost feels the phantom weight of the video camera in his hands, and takes his time looking over alien technology. He gave this stuff up when he found out Zim was gone... Maybe it's time to get back into it.
He slips a little and looks down through the nightlight to find dark purple on the dusty, matte silver floor. His stomach leaps and he follows the path of Irken blood through the dark and suddenly foreboding machinery.
In the red-purple glow of the auxiliary lighting, he sees the five-foot-one figure of the most influential being in his life.
Wet, hoarse choking noises escape the small alien's throat as he lies there, splayed out on his side, against the cold metal flooring. The puddle of blood is thick around him, and there are sparks flying from behind him – no doubt his pak has been damaged.
"Zim...!"
Almost flat-colored scarlet eyes look up, half lidded and almost lifeless. In between coughs, the Irken manages a weak grin – too elated to see Dib for the other's comfort.
"I... D-Dib... Filthy... fi..." Cough, choke, wheeze, "H-Help Zim?"
"Help you?" Dib asks, crossing his arms across his chest, "You're trying to destroy the Earth, remember?"
"Dib-beast! This is not the time for idle chitchat – I am..." A wince, a groan, "I am in need of your assistance, human. Do you realize what this means?"
"It means you're crazy. Let them take you away – I won't have to worry about saving the Earth anymore! Go away, Zim, leave me alone! I have my own problems, okay?" He slams the door, makes it to the stairs, and then thinks that maybe he should try. Is he morally justified in not helping the other – alien or not?
When he returns to the door and opens it, Zim is already gone.
"Help you?" Dib asks, shaking from head to toe and hating that swig of rum that didn't help his nerves, "Who do you think I am?"
"P-Please."
Zim never begs and this makes Dib's terror all the more real.
"I- pa...oh, Tallest..."
The human comes forward, "Your Tallest did this to you?"
"...N-No... p... please, Dib...?"
"...What..." He looks around at shut off machinery, "What do you need me to do?"
Zim reaches out a shaking, bloody hand and Dib takes it. "H-Help... up, but... hold pak, hold it – pl-please." Dib doesn't understand quite but starts to pull the other up anyways; the alien cries out and reaches a hand behind him. Dib stops, looks over, and nearly retches.
The pak is hanging by cords of muscle and tubing, half dislodged from the other's body and letting the blood escape in thick globs. He can see bone – oh, God, he can see bone! Zim bites the human's shoulder with zipper teeth but Dib can't find a reason to stop him, feeling the scream vibrate and choke and die on his shirt, in his skin.
"Zim!" he cries, suddenly seeing what "hold the pak" meant, and he cautiously pushes the pak towards the other's back, back to its original place.
"Yes," Zim hisses, "T-That – just l-like that. Up, now, up!"
Shaking hands keep the pak against peeling skin – like paint – and pull the alien to his feet. Zim wraps one arm around the other's waist, leaning fully and biting his tongue, shrieking muffled slightly.
"O-Over, th-t-there, bed, medical. Need..."
"Alright, o-okay. Slowly, don't-"
There's no fire in Zim's eyes but it's in his voice, "I know w-what to do!"
The human is silent and carefully leads the alien in the direction that he has been pointed, arriving at a single metal table surrounded by hanging wires and computers.
"O-On the... the..."
The pak sparks.
"Who... who am... on the b-bed, Dib," Zim rasps, holding one hand over his face, "Pl... oh..."
"Okay, okay Zim, its okay." Dib helps the alien up, holding the pak tightly and trying not to throw up as hot blood gushes over his hand, already congealing against the cool air, though it isn't helping the situation at all.
Zim lies on his stomach and looks blindly to his left. "D-Dib, th-there's... the cord, the core of th-the pak – pick- take it... t-take plug it..."
Take it?
Dib looks to the pack and sees something covered in blood sticking out just a little between flesh and metal. He steels his nerves, thinks this is what you need to do, and then grabs it, carefully unwinding it. Zim howls but tells him to keep going, screaming and sobbing without tears. The human looks at all of the powered-off equipment and sees a plug similar to the one on this long tube he's holding, so he forces it in the slot.
"G-Good... Good, D-Dib, now... now..."
Zim doesn't speak for a moment, and Dib supplies, "Turn it on?"
"Yes!" Zim shrieks suddenly, as if he's found gold, "Th-that's it."
If the Irken can't even remember such a simple instruction... Dib hurries to find the power button.
It's big and red and man, he's glad Zim has such easy computers – he presses the button and lights turn on in all directions.
Zim shrieks and whines, "It hurts!"
"I know, Zim," Dib mumbles, "Is there anything else I have to do?"
"N-No... takes care... self... who...?"
The human comes to the bed and kneels down to be face-to-face with Zim. He hasn't grown at all – not that Dib expected it, ever since he reached five-foot-four and Zim was still five-one like when he was twelve.
"It hurts," the alien whispers.
"I know it does, Zim, its okay." He reaches out and touches an antenna – Zim winces. "Is it broken?"
"H...Hurts, very... v-very badly."
"Okay. Will this machine fix you?"
A coughing, wet laugh, "Can Zim be fixed?"
The question, especially coming from Zim, is so left-field that Dib can't respond. The computer is running diagnostics already, and sparks are flying from the pak, but Zim is no longer screaming. Is that good or bad?
"Who did this, Zim?"
No response, and red eyes close.
"Zim? Who – who did this to you?"
"Diagnostics complete. Repairs at zero percent – estimated time to completion: two hours."
Dib looks at the computer and sighs.
"Antibiotics given," the computer continues in its monotone voice, "Anesthetic applied. Estimated time to completion: two hours, fifteen minutes. Power at twelve percent – standby mode activated."
The human looks at Zim, and then asks nobody in particular, "You're being put in standby for a virus scan?"
"Negative," the computer responds to the question, "Virus scan completed – no virus detected. Blood pressure low – infusion started."
"Great," the human sighs, "Tell me when you're getting close to finished."
"Affirmative."
He walks away and collapses into the swivel chair in front of the main computer. Taking off his glasses, Dib rubs his face and tries to steady shaking hands, before realizing that he's just gotten blood all over him.
"Great," he rasps, not as sure as before, "Great."
Zim tries. He always tries, and always fights, but bigger and better things tend to sideswipe him – as is the case now. His head is held by one massive, scaly gray claw, squeezing and twisting his antenna painfully. If this had been any other Irken, they would have tried to self destruct by now – but not Zim. Zim has long since grown past that phase.
"Where is the other, Zim?" the assailant snarls, but Zim is not one to tell.
Zim whines as sparks fly from his pak, the iron weapon bending in between skin and metal.
"I will destroy you, Zim! You ran away from us and with the Tallest..." A laugh, cold and hollow, "...out of order... I decide what happens!" Now the voice turns buttery and arsenic flows, "Tell me where the other is, and I will let you come back in one piece."
Oh, Zim wishes he could – could - ... but it hurts! It feels like his pak is being ripped from his body and how can an Irken remember anything with that going on?
"S-Stop!" he wails.
"Where is the other one, Zim? Where is it?"
Metal digs deeper. Other – other? There's another? Who brought him here... he had been in no condition to fly but now – now he can't remember –
"D-Don't know!"
The metal drives deep in between the pak and his flesh, and Zim can't remember his own name. He shrieks and then falls limp – no one would do this to an Irken! No one – no race is this cruel, not even his own –
"Where, Zim? End your suffering now."
He whines and twitches but can't speak. He doesn't know the language anymore.
"You're pathetic, Zim," the assailant growls.
Jerk, stab, crack – Zim screams at the top of his chords and sobs dryly. He's thrown to the ground on his face, and the assailant sighs. "Useless! That damned robot will do better."
"H-He...!" Zim tries, he tries because Gir doesn't even know anything, "D-Don't..."
He can't breathe – it's all wet and rasping.
"Night-night, Zim."
The club is the same as every other club in the city – the same as every club in all those old movies she watched her last time here. Pumping bass and colored hair, with fruity mixed drinks and not a shot glass in sight.
She tosses her hair over her shoulder and looks around – it's exactly as she remembers it. This whole place, it's the same. Nothing seems to ever change here...
With just a few dollars thrown down for the less-than-numbing conversation she just finished with the bartender, she takes her leave, exiting the throbbing bass and the lights for the dim outside world, covered in brick.
She takes to walking, mind uneasily clear, and when she turns the alleyway to start back where she needs to go –
"There you are."
She stops, dead in her tracks. That voice! She thought she'd never hear it again – she thought they'd gotten out –
"You know, Irkens are really a horribly fastidious race. Just can't settle for slavery like the rest of the galaxy, can you?"
A hand grabs her and she tries not to scream because she's not scared, damn it, she's not! They were supposed to be safe here – such a backwater planet, how could anyone follow an unregistered –
"And you and I had such a good deal."
"Get your hands off me," she snarls, clenching a fist to keep from shaking.
"Tak," the cold voice growls, massive hands clenching at her shoulder and pak, "You know very well that you're going to be in a lot of trouble if you keep this up. Now, then, you and I are going home."
She tears away from his grasp and slides into a fighting position. "I said; get your damned hands off of me!"
The massive shadow looms above her and she doesn't want to go back, not one bit.
"She said to leave her alone."
The dull voice is completely uninterested but at the same time holds malicious intent. The shadow turns and she can see a young woman standing there, with dark, curled purple hair, and narrowed amber eyes.
"Oh, look at you," the shadow says in a voice she knows well.
"Run, you stupid human!"
The eyes narrow into real slits now and a gloved hand raises, pointing at the shadow. "I think you should go now," the human hisses.
"Oh really?"
"Now."
Fire swells up inside Tak and she moves backwards, eyes wide. What kind of human was this?
The shadow staggers slightly and then snarls, "What kind of woman are you?" before turning to look at Tak with burning yellow eyes. "I will find you, and I will take you home."
"I have no home with you," she spits.
The shadow moves and is gone, leaving the two women to stare at each other.
The human shrugs and turns to keep walking.
"What are you?" Tak asks – she has to, there's no choice.
"A girl," the other responds, looking at the clouds above. "It's going to rain. You don't have an umbrella, do you."
It's not a question so Tak shakes her head in agreement, also looking at the sky in apprehension.
"Come on, then. I know someone who will want to see you. We can take my car."
A drop of rain lands on her head and it burns, so she takes off after the taller woman.
"Who are you?" she asks, as they approach a black Jaguar convertible. Even without being on the planet often, Tak can see that the car is expensive. It looks almost futuristic – for Earth, at least. It's vintage in the rest of the universe.
"Someone who couldn't give less of a shit about aliens," the human replies, and the car beeps once as the lights come on. She goes to the driver's side and motions to the passenger seat. "Get in."
"You still haven't answered my question!" Tak exclaims, doing what the other says nonetheless, feeling another drop of rain.
"Be that as it may, it won't matter soon. I'd rather get you out of my hair and into someone else's." Once seated and strapped in, the driver turns on the car. "After all, maybe you can get him out of this crappy mood he's in."
She pulls out of the parallel parking spot and takes off down the street. Tak looks at her for a long time, and then says, "You look so familiar."
The woman simply adjusts mirrors and ignores Tak without reservation.