Disclaimer: I am not Jhonen Vasquez, so Zim is not mine.
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The idea had been Red's. Why waste time waiting for standard Invaders to complete their missions, when the field of cybernetic enhancement was reaching its peak?
"It'll be simple," Red had said to his co-ruler Purple. "Just pick an Invader-in-training, and stick 'em with every enhancement we can think of."
Purple, who was slightly more dense and slightly more stubborn than Red, hadn't understood why Red was so eager to put so much power into everything. He wondered what was wrong with the Invaders they had.
"Nothing," Red had explained. "But why settle for the ultimate when we can have the perfect? Think about it Purple, we could have the entire galaxy conquered in virtually no time at all!"
That was what had convinced Purple of the benefits of such a plan. And so, under orders from the Tallest, the top Irken scientists were now working on installing all kinds of cybernetic enhancements on a randomly-selected Irken youngster - name: Zak.
Oh sure, they were confused. They didn't understand why their Tallest Red was so excited and so insistent about this. And they didn't understand why their Tallest Purple wanted them to keep it under wraps so badly. It probably had something to do with the fact that such actions were unprecedented. Never before had a potential Invader received cybernetic enhancement. In fact, no Irken had ever received such enhancements outside of experimental work. It was just too risky to be reliable (the subjects in the experimentation procedures rarely survived the process), and the costs were astronomical. But they knew better than to ask questions, especially after Scientist Pik had requested for clarification and ended up getting thrown out the airlock on the Massive. The Tallest were the Tallest, and they were just the scientists, following orders.
A grappling hook was installed in the right wrist, and a powerful laser in the left. The Invader standard-issue ocular implants were substituted with a series of interchangeable lenses, including telescopic vision, night-vision, infrared, UV detector, and more. The marrow was removed from the bones and replaced with Urakium metal - the strongest metal known to Irken-kind. The muscles were given cybernetic enhancements as well, to boost his strength, stamina, and endurance. Even his skin was toughened. The scientists added a fold-in jetpack to his Pak, and even put in a brain implant to increase his intelligence and cunning and quicken his reaction time. A holographic image inducer and a shield generator were installed as well. His antennae were enhanced with advanced sensory equipment, interestingly causing the formerly bent appendages to become perfectly straight. And so on in this manner was Zak enhanced. As a finishing touch, neural uplinks were added to his toughened skin to provide an uplink to the cyber-suit exoskeleton he would wear in lieu of the standard uniform.
The young Irken was placed in the most rigorous training available. On Devastis, the Irken military training planet, he went through the toughest training program, learning to utilize his enhancements quickly and passing with ease. Once completed, he was transferred to Hobo 13, the finest military training planet ever. Once there, he trained harshly under Sgt. Hobo 678, the finest military trainer on Hobo 13. For 30 (Earth) years he trained there, until the planet had nothing left to throw at him. He demolished his way through the tests and trials on Devastis and Hobo 13 with his eyes closed, barely moving and never wasting a movement. Eventually the time came for his final test. He was to meet up with the infamous ex-Invader Zim, exiled from the empire for destroying everything he touched, and put him through training to make him an asset to the Irken Empire. Zak smirked. This was going to be most interesting...