This is a gift fic for ectoqueen on tumblr to fufil two prompts. I'm not gonna post 'em here, but they are in the chapter notes on the version I posted on AO3. This was supposed to be a 2k word one shot. whoops.
The senior class trip was supposed to be the highlight of Dib's senior year. Keyword: supposed.
They were going to a ski resort, and Dib was excited because ski resort meant snow, and snow meant filthy frozen rainwater. And rainwater, in any form, meant no. Zim.
Dib couldn't be more wrong. He hadn't even realized Zim was going until everyone was lined up at the charter busses the morning they were supposed to leave.
"Hello, Dib."
That voice. Dib felt himself tense up in anger. There was only one person who could put such malice into his name, and of course it had to be the one person Dib thought he'd be free of for a whole four days. "Zim," he hissed, spinning on his heel and looking down.
To the surprise of no one, there stood his nemesis in all his four foot nine glory. Back straight, looking prouder than ever. He was feigning examining his nails, but the effect was ruined by the snug purple mittens worn over the gloves of his uniform. "Stunned into silence by my greatness as usual, I see," he said, in his usual casual and arrogant manner.
"What are you doing here?" Dib snapped. He wasn't sure if he was truly angry or just irritated. His hopes of a Zim free weekend were completely obliterated.
Zim glanced up at him, glass like fake eyes making him the picture of innocence. "Why whatever do you mean, Dib-worm?" The little runt batted his eyes a few times for effect. "Zim is here to have a normal vacation with all his normal skool chums."
Dib groaned. Of course Zim would choose keeping up his poorly constructed facade of normalcy over his own personal safety. Sometimes Dib wondered if the alien had a death wish. Actually, now that Dib really thought about it, Zim probably wasn't here just to keep up appearances. "Look," he started, "Whatever you're planning for this weekend, can you please just not?"
"Plans?" Zim's voice rose in a way that Dib knew meant he was lying. "Zim has no plans. I know not what you mean of such things!" Sometimes, Dib was irritated that he could read Zim so well. Zim's posture had stiffened like a soldier at attention, his hands squared themselves on his non-existent hips and he threw his head back in mock laughter. Yep, Zim definitely had plans.
Dib opened his mouth to tell the alien off when the class president's grating voice interrupted his thoughts.
"Alright~!" said the cheery teen, "Now that everyone's paired up with their buddies, we can all get on the bus!"
Buddies? Dib looked around and sure enough, everyone was paired off. Leaving himself and Dib standing awkwardly together. Great, just great.
"Remember," added the president, "You must stay with your buddy the entire trip."
Zim groaned loudly, apparently having just realized this meant he would be stuck with Dib. Dib rolled his eyes at the shorter boy's theatrics- it's not like he was exactly thrilled about the whole arrangement either.
"But you all knew that, didn't you~!" God Dib could hear the saccharine leaking from that kid's throat. "That's right, all normal students will staaaay with their buddies!"
Oh no. The president had to use the "N" word, didn't they. Dib looked over at Zim, who was still focused on the cheery redhead who had moved on to announcing bus rules. He saw Zim's eyes widen, and his fuzzy purple hat move in a way that meant his antennae were twitching under his wig.
Much to Dib's horror, Zim turned to face him, sporting the predatory grin of his childhood nightmares. "Well, Dib-creature," he started. "It looks like we will be spending quite a bit of time together."
Dib could only respond with stunned silence. Great, just great. Now Zim would be dragging Dib into whatever he had planned. Of course, Dib knew that Zim would probably drag Dib into whatever it was even if they weren't trip buddies, but now Dib had no excuse to escape.
All delusions of a normal trip were shattered as Zim grabbed his arm and loudly announced, "Come, Dib worm, we must board THE BUS."
Zim dragged Dib to the back of the bus, and pushed him into the seat just in front of the bathroom. "HERE!" he announced, "We sit HERE!"
Zim climbed into the seat next to Dib, the aisle seat. His toes barely touched the floor.
"Nice coat, Zim," said Torque Smacky from across the aisle. Could this day get any worse? Dib wondered. Probably not.
"Yes, it is a most superior garment," replied Zim by way of acknowledgement. He was very proud of it- it matched his hat and gloves, and was tailored to Zim's small frame. It even had fluffy white trimming that Zim was quite fond of- it reminded him of some of his more benign experiments back on Vort Research Station 9. He seemed oblivious to Torque's snickering.
"You do know that's a woman's coat, right?" Torque said. God, Dib could just hear the condensention dripping from his mouth. He knew it would probably go right over Zim's head.
"Preposterous!" There it went, thought Dib, Right over it. "This is Zim's coat! It was made for me."
Torque laughed and highfived his friends, naively believing he succeeded in getting under Zim's skin. Dib, on the other hand, realized that Zim wasn't annoyed, merely stating fact.
That was one thing he liked about Zim, at least. He was very straight forward. He tended to announce his intentions from the start, even if he wasn't trying to. He was also a very bad liar, at least as far as Dib was concerned. He knew all of the little Irken's tells, but he didn't doubt that Zim knew his in return. That was just how being enemies worked.
The bus ride was eight hours long, and Dib slept through most of it. If he was going to be dealing with Zim all night (it was just his luck, buddies roomed together) he wanted to get all the sleep he could.
Dib supposed it wasn't all bad. At least this way, he could keep a close eye on whatever Zim was planning.
The first two days passed uneventfully. Zim stayed holed up inside the resort, which Dib was perfectly ok with- he had planned on doing the same thing anyway. Dib wasn't much for skiing (or winter weather) so he had only come on this trip in hopes of escaping Zim and his overly complicated schemes.
It was the third day, and final night, that everything went horribly, horribly wrong.
Zim had been acting weird all day. Not that Dib actually cared- it was nice to be able to update his paranormal research files in peace without the little space bug attached to his hip.
He kept slipping off with various excuses- usually involving the bathroom or retrieving more 'liquid coco of dubious warmth.' It took all of Dib's willpower to resist the urge to investigate. The only reason he even signed up for this trip was to prove to himself that he could go more than three days without getting into some kind of fight with Zim. The alien's presence was making that very difficult.
Whatever he has planned, he told himself, there's probably some fatal flaw and it'll take care of itself.
That little mantra worked quite well until dusk.
"Zim will be using the sleep early!" He announced to the empty ski lodge. Dib rolled his eyes. It was only him and one chaperone- there was no point to Zim's theatrics. Dib was going to ignore him like he had been. He had been so good about not letting himself get caught up in Zim's little game, he wasn't going to ruin that now. The temptation was too great when he noticed Zim going in the opposite direction of their room.
"What is he up to?" Dib muttered to his enemy's retreating back. He was still wearing that stupid coat of his. Dib sighed, no longer able to resist the siren call of foiling one of Zim's plans. "He'll feel bad if it fails on its own," he reasoned. But wait, how was that my problem? "Right, he'll just find some way to blame me anyway. May as well investigate..." He was just making excuses at this point.
Zim hadn't gone far by the time Dib caught up with him. He was going over to the ski lift where all the other students were hanging out, laughing and talking amongst themselves. Zim easily slipped by them and onto the lift- Dib wasn't far behind him. Years of breaking into Zim's base with its increasingly tight security made sneaking around teenagers child's play.
The chaperone in the lodge simply assumed Dib had gone to bed after Zim; no one would even notice the boys were gone. At the top of the mountain, Zim hopped off the lift, landing in a three-point-crouch in the soft snow. He began walking towards the woods, off the beaten path, just as Dib hopped off his own lift. His height allowed him to easily slid off without making too much noise.
The sky was rapidly darkening around them, and for a brief moment, Dib feared he would lose track of Zim before he found out whatever his grand plan was, but the moonlight reflecting off the snow proved to provide adequate illumination. Snow fell down in gentle drifts as Dib followed stealthily behind Zim. The path Zim took, if you could call it that, was increasingly windy and narrow. Where is he even going?
Zim turned a corner, Dib not far behind, and stopped. "Yes," he said. "Perfect."
Dib didn't like the sound of that. He ducked behind the corner again and carefully peered out to spy on the Irken. He was standing on an outcropping that overlooked the entire mountain. Dib could see the twinkling lights of the ski resort far below. Behind him was a cliff face with precariously packed snow.
Zim snickered to himself, and Dib narrowed his eyes at his enemy in suspicion. Dib watched as Zim pulled out what looked like two metal cylinders from the confines of his jacket and placed them at the base of the cliff. It took Dib a moment, but he recognized those from one of their various fights. Explosives!
"WHAT!?" Shouted Zim, looking frantically around. "WHO SAID THAT!?"
Shit, Dib realized, I said that outloud!
Zim turned in his direction, "Dib, I know it's you!" He said.
Dib tried to meld with the cliff face behind him. Ok, you know he hasn't seen you yet, Dib. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying to calm himself down. He's probably just bluffing.
"Dib, you're talking to yourself again," Zim deadpanned.
Dib opened his eyes and sure enough, right next to him was Zim, false eyes glinting eerily in the moon light.
"Ok, you got me," he groaned.
"You were going to foil Zim's plans, weren't you!" Zim sounded indignant. Dib wasn't sure why that would be surprising.
Dib rolled his eyes, "That depends. What's the grand scheme this time? Blow up a mountain?"
Zim crossed his arms. "That's for Zim to know and you to find out." He paced back over to the middle of the out cropping. "Preferably when you meet your doooom."
Dib's heart started pounding against his chest in a mix of fear and excitement. As reluctant as he was to admit it, these were the moments he lived for. The script was simple, with room for variation every time. But straightforward.
Zim plots, Dib stalks. Dib is caught. Then the real confrontation begins. As stressful as they were, when Dib was in the middle of it he found it hard to care. It was exciting. Addicting. This whole class trip endeavor was pointless, Dib realized. If Zim hadn't shown up, Dib knew he would be halfway back home before the first day was up, ready to stop some imagined disaster he was sure the alien would be planning.
He grinned. He was ready. "You do realize you can't blow up an entire mountain with only two charges, right?"
"Of course I do!" Dib joined Zim on the outcropping. They began to circle each other in a practiced dance. "Zim's plan is much more ingenious."
"Care to share with the rest of the class, space boy?" Dib taunted. All Zim needed was a little push, and he would easily spill every detail of his latest 'diabolical plot.'
"If you must know, dirt-child," There he goes, "Zim plans to destroy the human recreational facility by BURYING IT IN ICY DEATH!"
Dib quirked an eyebrow. "Like, an avalanche?" That was actually pretty clever. Not exactly on the right scale for world domination, but clever all the same.
"YES!" Shouted Zim, "EXACTLY LIKE AN AVALANCHE!" Zim threw his head back in a fit of maniacal laughter, and Dib suddenly paled.
At that very moment he realized two things:
One: The universe hated him. (But he already sort of suspected that).
and Two: Zim was a really poor planner. (He wasn't sure how he could have ever forgotten that).
Dib heard the rapid beeping of the charges Zim dropped at the base of the mountain; he knew from experience that meant they would explode in only a few seconds. Zim's rancorous laughter wasn't helping the stability of the mountain either.
He didn't think, he just acted. "Get DOWN," he shouted as he body tackled shorter boy. Zim barely had time to protest before his explosives went off with a deafening BOOM! Dib wrapped his body around the alien as best he could.
He didn't know why he didn't just run, why he decided to try and protect Zim instead. He had enough warning to at least get a head start away from ground zero of the blast. Sure, chances were high that he'd end up buried in snow and ice anyway, but at least he could have comfortably said he'd tried to save himself. This was just… Suicide, basically. Maybe he was as crazy as everyone thought he was.