Last Request
Plot: Zim And Gaz Are Trapped In A Dark Cold Cave, It Looks Like Only One Of Them Will Survive, So Zim Asks For Gaz To Do Something For Him, That Dib Never Reveals His Corpse To The Human Race, What is Gaz To Do?
Author Notes: For those of you who have an idea of what "Soylent Green" is then you won't be at all surprised where the plot of this twisted story came from.
Also HAPPY Halloween, this fic is dedicated to my good friend Cheddarbiscuit who turns a year older today so Happy Birthday my friend.
Disclaimer: As always I don't known Invader Zim, Jhonen Vasquez does and sadly Nick also owns the series.
Anyways, enjoy this story even though technically it has nothing to do with the holiday, but it's still freaking creepy.
"I really do hate your winter season" Zim shivered.
"Blame the Earth, not me" Gaz sneered.
"I blame you!"
"Why?!"
"I just do!"
"Well whose bright idea was it to come all the way to the damn forest to get a fucking moose?!" Gaz snarled sarcastically.
"Well excuse me for wanting to give you a good hunting experience!" Zim bellowed "You always like killing vampire mooses on your stupid video game; I thought you would like killing the real thing!"
"One, it´s vampire piggies!" Gaz corrected "And two you could have simply brought the damn animal to your base for me to destroy!"
The Irken opened his mouth to say an angry retort but nothing came out, simply because he hadn´t thought of the alternative idea the girl just gave.
Instead he simply looked at some random direction and uttered "What the hell is taking Gir so long?!"
Gaz snorted "You actually think that scrap of metal is coming for us?"
"Believe it or not human" He said venomously "Gir has assisted me on far worse situations, the only reason I can think of is that he hasn´t gotten my transmission because of some interference"
"Whatever"
"You really don't give a slaughtering rat's ass whether you live or die, do you?"
"It really makes no real difference to me Zim" Gaz admitted "If I live I continue to help you plan out the invasion, if I die I at least escape from my brother's annoying presence or better yet haunt him all the way from hell."
Zim sniggered.
He girl narrowed her eyes dangerously "What?"
"I just think this is amusing"
"What is?" She hissed.
"Your brother is the reason why we unite forces"
"Yeah, and?"
"So in a twisted way he is also the reason why we're stuck here"
"I fail to see what's so amusing"
The Irken's smile widened "This is his fault and I know you aren´t exactly known for your forgiving nature"
Gaz finally caught on.
"He is so doomed" She said with an evil glint in her eyes.
"He is" Zim agreed "So what say we kill some time by toying around with ideas as to how to make him suffer"
The human sat down "I want to re-arrange his orgasm and then remove them"
"That would be fairly easy to do"
"Then I want to stuff them into his big giant paranormal head"
"I wouldn't be surprised if they fit on, his head is the size of a hippo!"
"And finally I want make it explode".
"I think we can get a little more creative than that little Gaz!" He said in mild disappointment.
Gaz scowled, irritated with the demeaning tone of voice he used, she hated when he talked to her with that tone, as if he wasn´t impressed with her methods of cruelty, as if he was better than her.
"The hell he is!"
Nevertheless, Gaz acknowledged (at least to herself) that her moronic companion knew methods of torture that no human has ever experienced, but in her mind that still didn't give him the right to look down at her and maybe he didn´t, Zim after all could be subtle when he actually tried, so maybe by mocking her dark nature Zim was actually encouraging her to try harder at torturing others, the Irken has pointed out that yes while her methods of physical assault were rather effective, there were other ways to causing despair.
Here the girl smirked wickedly, if she was to name one thing that she enjoyed about her time with the invader then it would be his tales of Irken invasions, of how his people captured other aliens and used them for their sick and twisted experiments and purposes, she marveled at just what his xenophobic race was capable of doing to other alien species not just physically but emotionally.
Surprisingly for the pale human it was during those tales that Gaz actually had brief moments of longing and envy, she didn't give a flying fuck about the Irkens technology unlike her brother who wanted to use it for the betterment of mankind.
"Dumbass".
What she actually craved was the Irkens lifestyle, causing destruction and grief on an everyday basis was very appealing to the young Goth.
It was truly a very rewarding feeling and Gaz thoroughly enjoyed it, she would be lying if he didn't liked having another person to share those dark moments with.
So after a few seconds of cold silence she had to ask her companion "Well what would you do to my idiot brother then?
Zim's smirk widened "Why stop with the head exploding when we can cover it with that FILTHY earth meat and make dogs eat it before it explodes?"
The girl was not impressed "Think bigger"
The Irken clapped approvingly "Now you're catching on little Gaz"
Several days later:
Zim shivered and moved a little closer to the unconscious body of his best friend… and kind of girlfriend, kind of not, the feeble warmth of the small fire was doing almost nothing to hold away the freezing temperature of the winter evening.
Even Gaz's body gave off more warmth than the slowly crackling flames.
It had been three weeks since the excursion that had left them here and although in reality the alien wasn´t too sure since didn't require sleep, so to him this nightmarish time seemed like one long day that didn´t want to end.
They were in the woods, all alone.
Zim cursed softly in his native tongue, staring forlornly out of their dark cave and into the snowstorm.
His Voot Cruiser had been hit hard by the storm and wasn't operational for the time being.
Sure, it was repairing itself but it was taking longer than expected to being airborne again.
Gaz hadn't eaten anything but a handful of old peanuts and sodas Gir has stored in the ship for unknown reasons, but it wasn´t enough. Zim had been on this planet long enough to know that humans couldn't survive simply on snacks like his race could.
Glancing quickly down at the scary girl, he sighed. He had eaten even less than her, but he wasn´t complaining, he was a soldier and he was trained to last hours, days even weeks without food, but it would only be a matter of time until his Squeedly Spooch demanded the nutrients he required and in these harsh conditions who knows when his (and Gaz's) next meal would be.
Zim may have been on Earth far longer than he wanted to admit but that still didn't mean he was an expert on the freaking planet, his lack of knowledge of the weather often made him think that things such as this storm the storm could last for years, ok that was a bit of an exaggeration but until it died down the cruiser couldn't fly and so they were pretty much trapped in this hellish cold climate.
At first his companion had not cared if he ate or not but eventually Zim began to feel weary from the dropping temperatures and Gaz eventually forced him to eat whatever was in the ship and she meant it quite literally since the scary girl had shoved several of his snacks into his mouth when he refused to eat, saying the Irken provisions were meant for an emergency.
Gaz was appalled to say the least.
"Since when a snowstorm is NOT an emergency?!" He remembered her screeching.
He was amazed actually; who knew the ice queen of doom was capable of empathy?
She had been adamant that the alien should be the one to eat, hoping against hope that it would help him get some of his strength back so he could do something.
Gaz actually knew that Zim's destructive nature was his biggest flaw but in a way it was also his biggest strength, she actually wanted him to do something stupid because that usually brought as the Irken called it "unwanted attention".
The mere thought of his stupidity saving their lives was rather ironic, but Gaz could care less about irony, she cared to kick her brother's ass once she got once.
Time passed and of course that meant that eventually their food supply was beginning to run out and to make matters a million times worse, his PAK's system began to fail, countless times Zim was forced to take several deep breaths, Irkens weren't used to cold weather and since snow was basically frozen water it was slowly but surely destroying his body.
It was just a matter of time till they were both began to starve.
"WHERE THE HELL IS GIR?!" Zim asked for the eight-hundred and fifty-seventh time. "He was supposed to be here already." He hefted the small transmitter and glared down at the cheerily blinking light. Even this small bit of exercise made his whole arm tremble. Walking out of here and finding help wasn't an option.
To be completely honest, getting out on their own hadn't ever been an option.
Gaz had suffered a lot on this trip and Zim was not happy about that… she'd been so hurt and she'd gotten really sick.
He knew she was getting frostbite.
Zim hadn't escaped the ship's crash scot-free either. His PAK was the main reason for their survival but when it started to malfunction, everything started to look grim.
He recalled that it had taken almost an entire day of shivering and freezing to accumulate enough energy to get even their feeble fire started.
Every day for the past few weeks, Zim had been telling himself that his faithful SIR Unit was coming for them, that he had gotten lost on the way to rescue them, so many excuses came to his tired mind, but the fact of the matter was that Zim knew there was a pretty good chance that Gir was unaware of his and Gaz's predicament, the little android probably never even knew he was gone.
It was quite possibly a scary fact.
Even as he stared down at the transmitter, the alien could feel Gaz's eyes itching to look up and make sure, just one more time that there was nobody coming over the crest of the nearby hill.
She had always been quite the pessimist.
But Zim had gone as far as to reassure her that they would make it out alive even by pointing out that if Gir was not coming, surely Dib would be looking for her and by extension himself.
"Damn it, Gaz-beast," He breathed, brushing a dirty lock of hair out of her face, "this is horrible so very horrible." Zim wasn't entire sure why he was still talking to her like she could hear him and would reply with some snide comment.
Maybe it was because He just needed to hear his own screaming voice so the silence wouldn't drive him insane. Maybe it was because he didn't want to accept the fact that his companion, his associate, his partner, his friend and possibly mate was so close to an agonizing freezing doom or maybe he was just an antennae closer to 'crazy' than he thought possible. She'd been in what he figured was a coma for almost a week. Her skin was pale and sallow, looking like fragile pieces of paper against her cheekbones.
"This stupid thing doesn't work." This wasn't a huge leap of logic.
Gaz had still been awake and able to respond with sarcastic comments when Zim managed to figure that out. Despite his pronouncement, he carefully set the emergency transmitter down in a snow-free section of their cave.
Zim couldn't quite get himself to throw it away… even after all this time.
He still saw it as a piece of hope after all.
"I haven't said anything amazing in days, Gaz-Human." He shot her an annoyed glare, almost as if he was blaming her, he shaking my head afterwards. "Neither have you, just so you know."
He swore he could hear her in his mind, he swore by the Tallest that she said to "fuck off."
"I think we've had this one-sided conversation before." Chocking back on a small sarcastic laugh that would have really hurt his starving body, Zim huddled deeper into his purple space suit and while far from confortable, it kept him warm. "I've even said that before."
After a long, morose silence, The Irken groaned. "We are going to die out here." And while Zim wasn´t afraid of dying he was afraid of going down as a failure.
"What kind of soldier can´t save his own companion's life?" He thought bitterly.
The only things that answered his mental question were the labored breathing of the Goth girl who quite literally was his ticket for world conquest as well as the soft crackling sounds of the fire.
That in his already deranged mind he believed he hear his Tallest voicing with contempt one single yet hurtful word.
"Fracdor"
That meant failure in Irken.
He looked down at his battle-mate, watching her breath fog gently in the cold air. "This would be a nice time for you to speak to me and call me a moron Gaz-Human and then I would call you an evil witch, my evil witch"
Waiting a moment, Zim sighed and shook his head. "I'll just pretend you said it."
He grabbed one of the last pieces of wood from our meager wood pile and tossed it to the fire to get some more heat. They wouldn't get any more wood when this was gone; Zim didn't have the strength to go wood-searching anymore. This idea didn't cause the panic in his chest that it normally would have… after all, the invader was completely dead to the idea of rotting.
"When I perish I will haunt you Dib-prick!"
This was Zim to the very end, if he was going to die a failure then he sure as hell was going to blame the person who was responsible.
In other words he wasn´t about to blame himself, oh no after all in his narcissistic mind, Zim is flawless, amazing, pure evil and above all, the perfect invader.
But going back to the subject at hand, the measly supplies both of them managed to scavenge from the burning wreckage were splayed out before him, illuminated by the warmth and light of the tiny fire.
He was trying, one last time, to figure out a plan to get them out of here, one that had to be better than the one involving a flying squirrel holding a miniature home-made bomb meant to threaten humans into rescuing their frozen asses.
There was the joke of an emergency transmitter, a couple empty tins Gaz used to melt snow for water, Gaz's beloved Game Slave, and a small laser gun with enough energy to shoot once and only once.
"There just isn't a better plan, Gaz-Beast." Zim reached over and traced a finger over her cheek. "It's a long-shot, but it's the only hope of either of us surviving through this." Fingering the cold metal of the gun's barrel, I sighed. "You were going to kill me when you woke up anyways."
It was a horrible plan that the Irken had come up with nearly a week and a half ago. He did mentioned it to her at some point and she'd simply shrugged and coldly replied with a "Do what you want"
Deep down Zim knew what she really meant.
If he did go through with it, there would be no invasion, no conquest of the planet Earth, no extermination of the human race.
And worst of all, he wouldn't get the respect of his leaders.
It was his dream and if he grabbed the gun, it was all over, it was not a pleasant thought.
Gaz also gave him the finger, a silent signal that referred to a specific person in their lives.
Dib.
He knew what she meant, if he didn't achieve his goals, it meant that his most annoying enemy would win their war.
The Irken could just imagine the smug victory of his most hated enemy once he presented his corpse to all of human kind.
Suddenly to his immense surprise he heard coughing.
"Gaz-human?"
"What have I told you about calling me that?" She hissed.
"That the next time I did it you would rip my head off, play with it like a soccer ball and would end up shoved up my ass?"
"Exactly" She said "So why the fuck do you still call me that?"
"Because I wasn't sure you were really conscious"
Gaz rolled her eyes "Fine, I'll let it slide this time, only because I feel like crap"
The scary human was about to rest her head again, only to be stopped by the alien.
"Do not fall asleep again Gaz-Beast" The Irken ordered harshly "Zim requires your assistance!"
"To do what?!"
"To feed you"
Gaz managed to look at him dead in the eye "You got food?"
"Not yet"
"Then how…?"
All the alien did was to shove his gun into her cold hands.
The girl's eyes narrowed suspiciously "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?"
"Think, Gaz-Human, what is a weapon used for?!"
She caught on "You disappoint me Zim"
"The situation is grim Gaz-Beast" He told her coolly "Even you must have enough brain-meat to realize that unless something is done we will both die"
"Like I told you before Zim" She sneered "I'm not scared of death"
"And neither am I but I will NOT let your brother win"
"He wins if you go ahead with this"
The alien shakes his head "No Gaz-Human, he will not win as long as you do as I say"
"Because that worked so well is the past!" She yelled sarcastically.
Zim scowled "Just shut up and listen"
Gaz wanted to punch him just for that, but of course she was too weak to do so but the moment she got her strength back she was going to kick his ass.
Unaware of the murderous thought his companion was having, Zim began to speak again "You are weak Gaz-girl and don't try to deny it, you may be quite a deadly person but you are still human and a child"
"Your point?"
"My point is that you are not going to last much longer if you are unfed"
"SCREW THAT!" Gaz bellowed "I told you before that I don't care if I live or die Zim, so tell me what this is really about before I rip your balls and make you eat them!"
"I'm trying to save you, you ungrateful worm!"
"Why?"
He blinked, the question throwing him off guard "Why?"
"Zim, I been around you long enough to know when you are keeping things from me, I agreed to help you with the invasion because I don't care for the human race, and you accepted my help because you want to defeat my brother in more ways than one… but that's not the only reason why you let me be at your side… is it?"
The invader of course denied any reason other than being a mutual partnership.
"Invaders need no one Gaz-human" He coldly replied "You are simply a means to accomplish my job more quickly, nothing more, nothing less"
"Bullshit"
"Little Gaz what I tell you is nothing but the truth, should you believe otherwise is entirely your problem."
"Oh really?"
The pushed the pistol's safety button, fully aware that it only had one shot, but she wasn´t about to use it on her acquaintance, oh no, not by a long shot.
She put it on her own head.
Zim widened his eyes in terror "GAZ-WITCH!" He bellowed frantically "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?!"
"What needs to be done?" She asked sarcastically.
"Drop the gun" He ordered.
"Fuck you Zim, just fuck you"
"You will not fuck Zim!" The alien snarled "It's disgusting and highly irrelevant to our conversation!"
Gaz had the urge to slap herself but remembered that had both her hands occupied at the moment "Unbelievable, he's been on Earth for how long and still doesn't understand simple slang"
"Zim" listen to me ans listen to me well, you want to save my ass, fine you can try if you want to play the hero" the last world was said with disgust, something that surprisingly the alien didn´t miss "But let me tell you something if I want to die Its my choice and if you even dare to prevent me dying I swear that the moment we get out of here I'll put you in a nightmare world in which there is no escape!"
"You can´t be serious!"
"As serious as a heart attack"
"You actually want to die?!"
"It's my choice to do so!"
"It's a stupid choice!"
"No, it was stupid giving me the gun!"
"You insufferable human!" Zim hollowed anfrily "You are the single most stubborn creature I have ever met!"
"Well it takes one to know one!" Gaz sneered.
"Give me the gun" Zim demanded "If you can´t carry out such a simple order then you aren't worthy of being part of the invasion"
"There won't be an invasion if I do what you are asking for!" She countered "There won't be any genocide of humanity and more importantly you take the cowards way out!"
"There is nothing cowardly about this!" Zim snapped "saving another's life is a good thing!"
Gaz began to laugh hysterically at this "Your kidding right?"
"Why would you think that?!"
"Zim your people are a bunch of xenophobes you pretty much kill everyone and everything on a daily basis" Gaz pointed out "If anything I'm sure that saving a life is a disgrace to your race!"
"Nt if you save a Tallest!"
"So you just want to save me because I'm tall?" Gaz counted.
"Yes… NO!"
She narrowed her eyes "My patience is running thin Zim"
He had enough "You know what, you wanna kill yourself FINE! Do so I don´t care anymore, I was just trying to make you eat something!"
"Oh bite me Zim"
"You want me to eat you?"
"NO YOU DUMBASS!" Gaz snarled "I'm saying that you are full of crap!"
"Why are you so against Zim saving you!" The Irken asked exasperatedly.
"And WHY do you WANT to save me?!"
"I asked you first!"
"Well if you haven´t heard the expression ladies first then you have to answer MY question first!"
"Oh that's rich!" He laughed cruelly "You a lady? Don't make Zim laugh!"
Somehow Gaz found the strength to punch him in the face.
"YAHH MY GLOROUS FACE!"
"Whiner"
The Irken began to massage where his nose would be all while giving the purple headed human a feeble glare "What is your problem?!" He asked angrily "I said it as a compliment!"
"If that's a compliment then I would LOVE to hear an insult and coming from you, that isn´t much"
"Well considering your dark nature I would think you would hate being called a lady!"
"True but I still don't like it when you mock me, no one does that and gets off scotch free" Gaz said darkly "You are lucky I just punched you"
"Gaz"
The girl opened one eye suspiciously; this would be the first time since Zim asked for her to be his "battle- Mate" to call her by her name without anything following afterwards.
"If I tell you why I asking you to do this then would you carry it out?"
"No"
"What if I tell you that you can still see me afterwards?"
Finally she dropped the gun away from her head "Keep talking"
"Gaz-human, there are more than one ways to die and you obviously know this seeing as you witnessed and are responsible for a few murders" Zim began to speak in a chillingly calm tone "However I'm certain that you don't know that Irkens cannot die by your species definition"
"What you mean?" She asked "If you die then you die!"
"Yes but in my case, if you shoot me only my body dies"
"And?"
"My body" Zim pressed "Not my PAK"
Gaz was didn´t know what he was getting at.
"If you starve, you will die" Zim muttered darkly "And I'm not going to let that happen"
"I ask again why you care?"
"Because… I think I like you"
"You like me?" Gaz asked incredulously "That's your reason?"
"Irkens don't like anything other than destruction" He said professionally "For me to consider you a human an equal would pretty much have me executed on the spot"
"That… that doesn´t seem fair"
"Irken rules are rules and if anyone ever found out then it would be my end… So"
".. So?"
After several minutes Zim looked up and gave her the most penetrating glare she has ever received from the invader.
"So I much rather get shot by a friend than getting executed by strangers as a prisoner and not a soldier"
"Zim… what you're asking for is… is too much… I don't think I can"
"YOU MUST!"
"It's monstrous!" She countered "It's wrong and I don't want to be a part of such a request!"
"It's a soldier last wish!"
"But hat if someone finds us?!"
"That's bullshit Gaz-Human!" He hollowed in disbelieve and anger "We been here for three wekks, a month, maybe a year I no longer KNOW how much time we wasted waiting for rescue that may very well never come so one us HAS to survive!"
"I rather that we BOTH survived!"
"That wont happen if you don´t shoot me!"
"YOUR NOT MAKING ANY SENSE!" Gaz raged "YOU ARE BEING AN ASSHOLE!"
"I'M BEING AN ASSHOLE?!" He yelled "YOU'RE THE ONE WHO IS NOT KILLING ME!"
"I WILL NOT MURDER YOU!"
"WHY NOT?!"
She slapped him right on the kisser.
Zim was speechless but what Gaz said afterwards surprised him even more.
"Because.. I don't think I could shoot a friend"
He puts both gloved hands on her shoulders, his claw like finders rooting into her skin "Like I told you before, do as I say and things will work out fine"
"I don't know" She began to say uncertanly.
The Irken started to play with her haid, a move that was atypical for the usual moronic alien.
"Do you trust me?" He whispered in her ear.
She shook her head "Trust is for idiots"
Zim smirked evilly "Very true" his facial expression changed into a frown when he asked his next question "You do know I have your safety in high priority right?"
"I'd be lying if I said I havent noticed"
"So be a good battle-mate, kill me and eat me" He told her as if doing such acts weren´t beyond sick and twisted "I promise that you WILL see me again"
"How?"
Once again the alien smirked evilly, "Once my Voot Cruiser fixes itself simply get my PAK to my base and get it to my base's main system core"
"And then?"
"I already written all my instructions and left them in the cruiser all you gotta do is follow them"
"All right"
"And one more thing"
"What?"
"Listen t me carefully Gaz-Demon, whatever you do don't let your Dib-sibling have my corpse, eat everything, burn my bones if you have to, make sure there is NOTHING left, I don't want to give your large headed brother to have any proof I was ever around"
"What if he finds me before the Cruiser gets fix?"
"Then destroy my PAK" He ordered coldly "And my base too,"
"And Gir?"
"Tell him to go back to Irk"
"And if he doesn't want to?" She had to ask since it was a good possibility.
"Tell him I went there and I'll be waiting for him" He said "He'll spend the rest of his life trying to find me"
"That's kind of cruel Zim"
"Sometimes cruelty is needed to keep others safe"
Gaz knew right there that he wasn´t simply refrering to his malfunctioning S.I.R Unit.
"Now, anymore questions?"
The girl kicked him in the shin.
"OWW!" He moaned in pain "WHAT WAS THAT FOR?!"
She shrugged "It could very well be my last change to hurt you whiner"
Zim massed his shin all the while giving the human a final glare, he then slowly walked to the end of their cave and stood proudly as any soldier would.
"Klio Tref Mai Altos"
"What does that mean?" She asked as she too stood up, weakly holding the gun in both her hands.
"It's my native tongue" The extraterrestrial explained "It means long live the tallest"
"Whatever" She shrugged "so Zim… are you ready?"
"End the formalities little Gaz just kill me already!"
"As you wish"
She couldn´t watch, Gaz had to shut her eyes.
The pressed the trigger.
And a body colapsing on the cold hard ground was soon heard.
For the first time since her mother died, Gaz shed a tear.
The deed was done but even thught it was fr her survival it didn´t change what she had just done.
She just murdered her only friend.
But she couldn´t dwell on it or long, after all she hasn´t eaten in days and needed to make dinner.
"You better be tasty Zim"
Well my readers, this is the end of the story, if you read the whole thing then I hope it didn´t scarr you for life and be sure t leave a freaking review!
I also hope that you all understand what Zim had in mind when he asked Gaz to put his PAK in his base's main system core, assuming or favorite evil little girl even survives the outcomes.
And if you read this Cheddar then I hope that you liked what could have been my most deranged piece of work.
Once again, Happy Halloween.
Invader Johnny Signing Off.