Author's Notes: This idea came to me after observing a pattern in the Invader Zim series where Red seems to take a more proactive approach to dealing with Zim's craziness than Purple. After reading about the unaired episode "The Trial" I got to wondering why the Tallests didn't start with that plan instead of waiting forever and a day, and then this fic was born. The style is similar to a Transformers fic I wrote called "The One I Spared", but I think the general concept works well here too. I hope you enjoy this little oneshot and please review :)
Also: This fic takes place directly after the episode "Battle of The Planets".
Why Didn't We Just Shoot Him?
Everything Zim touched seemed to either explode or crumble to dust. He had done it again. He had piloted an actual terrestrial planet out of its orbit and lost control; sending the stupid thing careening with several Irken ships heading for planet Blorch. Oh, his transmission had been funny when it was so far away, but now that it was affecting the missions of actual soldiers and invaders, well, let's just say the Tallests were no longer laughing.
"This is your fault, you know?" Purple said accusingly to Red.
"My fault?" Red snapped, and several smaller Irkens backed away from what was sure to be a fight between their two leaders, "How is Zim sending a freaking PLANET to crush us my fault!?"
"Because he's still alive," Purple replied as if it should be obvious, "He's already screwed up Operation Impending Doom I, and before that he ruined so many other plans for conquest. Not to mention all the power outages he caused over the years. Bloop, he even ruined plans for regular old peaceful exploration! Yeah, remember when that was a thing? One time during one of those trips I saw a turquoise bird creature with four wings. Strange times..."
"You're getting off track again," Red reminded Purple longsufferingly, "And come on! Nobody expected a planet to be there! It's not my fault Zim didn't die of starvation in his stupid outdated little voot runner."
"Well why send him to a planet at all?" Purple asked caustically, "I mean, he killed two former Tallests, and when we became Tallest instead of killing him like we were supposed to, you banished him to Foodcourtia! Why!? A food service job? That's not painful enough for all the trouble he's caused!"
"Other invaders have killed Irkens before," Red pointed out, "Zim's not exactly special."
"He's worse than special," Purple replied, venom clear in his tone, "He's a defect. When Miyuki was in charge defects were killed swiftly and without mercy. Yet we find out Zim is defective and you send him to an unknown planet to pretend to conquer it? What if that earth place had actually been good for something? Huh? What would we do then? Huh? Huh?"
"Well it's too late to worry about that now!" Red snapped, tired of having his conversation.
"Why didn't we just shoot him?" Purple asked, now more confused than angry, "We have soldiers, weapons, and the facilities to deal with him. He's just a short little defect that does more harm than good and is really annoying. Why did we spare him? Why?"
"Oh come on, talking about the past won't change anything," Red replied with a forced smile as he tried to dismiss all the Zim talk, "Right now we've got nachos and pink fizz to eat. You wanna grab a bite?"
"Pink fizz? Why didn't you say so?" Purple replied excitedly, "Come on, hurry up! I'm hungry!"
Red chuckled affectionately as he watched his best friend get excited about the treats in the lobby. The entire day with Blorch, Skoodge, Zim, and that stupid Mars planet had worn Tallest Red out, and the only reward they got at the end of the day was a stupid parking structure planet. Red supposed they should've thought through the use of Blorch better, but truth be told they never expected anyone to conquer it, let alone a short ugly fat guy like Skoodge.
Why didn't we just shoot him? Purple's words came back into Red's mind suddenly, and Red sighed and shook his head to try to dispel the thoughts.
Other thoughts came rushing back as well. Like Zim's banishment to Foodcourtia, and Zim returning for Operation Impending Doom II. Everyone had been shocked to see Zim return, most of all Red and Purple.
"Weren't you banished to Foodcourtia?" Purple had asked, "Shouldn't you be...frying something?"
"Oh I quit when I found out about this," Zim explained quickly.
"You quit being banished?" Purple asked in amazement, as if the thought had never occurred to him in his life.
Red worried Zim would ruin the mission just as much as Purple did, but Red was just a little quicker to recover from the shock. He had tried offering Zim a sandwich to make him forget all about Operation Impending Doom II. Using food as a distraction always worked with Purple, but unfortunately Zim was more single-minded than that. He demanded a mission, so Red found a sticky note that suggested a planet might be somewhere in the outer reaches of unknown space. They gave it to Zim, and had thought they would never see him again.
Of course they did see Zim again, and again, and again, and again. Zim called them so often Red was almost used to it, which was a scary thought in itself. Zim would wear ridiculous costumes, obsess over a single native inhabitant trying to destroy him, and allow his broken SIR unit free range of the base despite the damage it caused. Zim seemed to become more deranged as time passed, and on some level it was fascinating yet disturbing to watch.
Why didn't we just shoot him? The thought wouldn't go away. Red knew the answer to that question, but he could never speak it aloud, especially not to Purple.
The answer to Purple's questions could be traced back to 750 stellar cycles ago, when Red and Purple were both first hatched from the smeet nursery. Red could still remember it like it was yesterday...
Red was born among a large group of other Irken smeets. His PAK was activated, and he gazed up at the large robotic arm that broke his jar as a mechanized voice intoned "Welcome to life, Irken child. Report for duty."
Red did the acceptable thing and saluted before heading off to join the other smeets standing at attention awaiting their orders (and their clothes). Red watched as more smeets were born. The same process was repeated. A smeet was born, the voice ordered it to report for duty, and the Irken infant saluted before joining the growing line of smeets. But then something went wrong...
Another tube was broken, another PAK was activated, and a pair of purple eyes opened to the world.
"Welcome to life, Irken child. Report for duty," The computer repeated once again.
"AAAHHH!" The new smeet ran away crying into the crowd of other infants.
The other smeets, sensing something was wrong with this new one, scooted away from him immediately. No sense catching whatever coward virus had infected this thing. The new smeet, seeing that it had been rejected, sat roughly on the ground and started to bawl its eyes out.
Red wanted the crying to stop. He felt weird, and didn't know what that feeling was. His PAK didn't have a word for it, but it felt bad and he knew making the new smeet stop crying would make the bad feeling go away.
Red approached the new smeet and forced him to his feet. He then dragged him to the line next to him and forced him to stand straight.
"You can't do that anymore!" Red admonished the new smeet, "If you cry you're gonna get deactivated. Only defects cry. Are you a defect?"
"N-No," The purple eyed smeet sniffed, "I'm not a defect. I'm Purple."
"Okay Purple, then stand up straight and await further orders like the rest of us," Red ordered.
Purple nodded and wiped away the tears. By the time an attendant came in to assign the smeets their coding and direct them to training every one of them was standing straight with no signs that anything had been wrong. Red felt good. The new smeet learned and survived, and it was all because of him. Little did Red know he'd be looking out for Purple for the rest of their lives.
Both smeets were assigned to be soldiers and eventually elite class conquerors. They were never apart, and their battle strategies were so synchronized that they were as a single warrior with two bodies. They had no issues with their job as elite soldiers. Most of their problems typically occurred when they weren't working.
Purple had started making this weird noise aliens called 'humming'. He did it all the time, and sometimes he even sang. Irkens had no need for artistic endeavors, so all such nonsense had been deleted from their coding eons ago. Purple, however, seemed to maintain a fragment of musical coding as well as a love of dance. It was dangerous for him to hum so much, and Red often worried that Purple's PAK would be checked for defects someday.
Deep down Red knew that Purple was a defect, but it was a hard thing for him to admit to himself. Purple was a fun Irken to be around, and he was a connoisseur of sweets and snack foods. Red at one point wondered if Purple would've been happier as a food service drone than a soldier. Sure, Purple could fight, but he didn't like to fight. Food preparation was the closest thing to art Irk had left, and maybe if Purple had been a chef or a baker he could have expressed his creativity without fear of deactivation.
Everyone else around them seemed oblivious to any faults Purple might've had though. For one thing the two Irken soldiers were always together, so their actions tended to mesh together for a combined reputation. Purple was rarely judged alone, and Red was rarely judged alone. It allowed them both to get away with a little more than other elites normally would. It also helped that they were both much taller than others with their same job title.
Sadly hanging out with shorter Irkens put them in the path of an annoying little military researcher and warrior named Zim. Zim was a real hanger-on, only wanting to be around Red and Purple because they were tall. Of course Zim was oblivious to his own literal shortcomings, and believed he himself would be Tallest someday. Both taller Irkens laughed at the little pipsqueak's stupidity.
That laughter continued for many years, until they became the Tallests. Red had always wanted to be Tallest, and co-ruling with Purple seemed like a cool idea. They would be fun yet ruthless leaders that would make their mark on the Irken Empire by expanding it more than any other Tallest ever had.
Of course the ceremonies involved made Red nervous once he realized everything that was involved. He feared that the Control Brains would check their PAKs and find something wrong with Purple. Of course Purple had led a life in line with Irken ideals and had won glory for himself and the Empire over the years. That still didn't make Red any less nervous, fearing the Control Brains would find something they didn't like and either recode or destroy Purple.
That didn't happen though. Neither Tallest had given the Control Brains any reason to suspect there was anything wrong. The ceremony would not involve PAK probing, and once they had their thumbs cut off and their hover robes bestowed upon them they could begin their glorious reign. Everything was going great...until Purple disappeared.
Everyone in the palace searched for Purple on the day of the coronation ceremony, but no one seemed able to locate him. The early morning gave way to the late afternoon and then the evening. Red was getting angry, and he was getting worried. What if some rebellious defect had kidnapped the new Tallest? What if an alien race had declared war on Irk and were using Purple as leverage? What if Red never saw him alive again and had to rule by himself?
It was almost night time when Red heard soft whimpering near a used ship sales lot. He thought that was strange, since the only Irkens that cried were useless drones and defects. He scoffed, thinking that some wage slave was complaining about their life. What kind of soft-spooched weakling just sat there and cried like a smeet when-?
"Wait a minute," Red muttered to himself, "Purple, are you back there?"
"No," Replied Purple's voice in an obvious attempt at lying.
"Oh for crying out- Get out here!" Red snapped; tired after all day searching for this vastly overgrown smeet.
"No! I'm not going!" Purple whined, "I don't wanna be a Tallest!"
"Yes you do," Red argued, "You said so yourself. You said you were looking forward to ruling Irk and riding in the Massive. It still has that comfy couch in the lounge..."
"I don't care!" Purple refused to take the bait, "I don't wanna lose my thumbs!"
"The surgery is painless Purple, and you won't need them anymore," Red reasoned, "You'll have servants to cater to your every need, and you only need two fingers to hold stuff and throw garbage at our thankless servants. Come on, it'll be fun! Come out from behind that spittle runner and let's get coronated already."
"No!" Purple shouted stubbornly, "If I lose my thumbs I won't be able to hold a stylus correctly ever again!"
"So?" Red scoffed, "Penmanship isn't everything. You'll learn to use a stylus again."
"Not like before!" Purple wailed miserably, "Red...there's something I need to tell you. I've never told anybody because I know it's wrong, but...I like to draw. And I like to paint. I'm pretty good at it actually, but if I lose my thumbs I'll never draw again. Red, I don't wanna lose that part of me."
"You mean the defective part?" Red asked flatly.
"Why is being different so wrong!?" Purple shouted as he stood up and walked right into Red's face; lavender eyes locked on crimson demanding an answer.
"This isn't about being different, it's about being useless," Red replied bitingly; not willing to let his best friend throw away his life, "Time is the one thing that cannot be conquered, bought or saved. Time is a resource that the Control Brains have bred us to use in the most efficient way possible. Art is a waste of time. Singing is a way to give away your position in battle. Dancing is movement without purpose. Things without purpose don't belong in the Irken Machine. Things without purpose are deleted. Irkens without purpose are deleted. Do you want that, Purple? Do you want to reject the ultimate goal of every Irken alive? Because if you do that, then the Control Brains will begin to wonder if you're defective."
"I'm not defective!" Purple screamed defensively.
"I know you're not," Red replied patiently, "Now, what do you love more, the Empire or your useless art?"
"The Empire," Purple replied in a hollow defeated tone of voice.
"Good. Then delete that which holds you back and take your rightful place of glory," Red replied with a warm smile as he held a hand to Purple's shoulder.
As he placed his hand there, Red got a look at his own thumb, soon to be lost as payment for his new position. He was ready, and he was sure that now Purple was too.
Purple never drew or painted again. He never talked about it again either. He was a good Tallest that punished the weak, ate his snacks, and helped Red plan the ultimate invasion of every inferior planet in their galaxy. Purple also wasn't very self-aware. He didn't understand concepts like empathy and irony. Then again, those were useless to the Empire, so no one questioned it.
Red never asked to see any of Purple's artwork, and Purple never offered. Red just hoped Purple was smart enough to remove any traces of the offending evidence. No one needed to know Purple's dirty little secret.
Red sighed at the memories before grabbing another cup of cottony fluffed pink fizz. He looked out at the crowd, and whenever a shorter Irken caught him staring they would either salute respectfully or smile and feel honored at being noticed by one of their Tallest. They all looked at him and Purple like they had all the answers. Perfect little Irkens.
That brought his thoughts back to Zim, the defective little sycophant. He gave the Tallest those same looks of awe and admiration. He would sacrifice his life for them if they asked him to but by the same token he would also kill them if given the chance (accidentally of course). It was as if Zim had never known them before they became Tallest, which was weird in itself, given they had worked together for so long.
Why didn't we just shoot him?
Ugh! That question again, the question Red didn't feel like answering. It was the same sort of question that he got when he allowed the continued existence of other defects like table-headed Irkens or Irkens incapable of growing after smeethood. It was the same question he asked himself when he saw looks of admiration from those shorter than him. It was the same question he asked himself when he gave an audience to Zim's insane ramblings or allowed those that by Irken law should be killed to serve as drones and slaves instead.
Why don't I just get rid of my problems? Red asked himself as he stared at Purple telling an anecdote to some mid-sized Irkens. I could've ruled alone. One call to the Control Brains and I would be the only Tallest. I could've had full credit for everything this reign will accomplish. One command and Zim would've been catapulted into the nearest meat grinder. Why is it sometimes I can exterminate my problems, and other times I can't?
Red had answers, but they never felt good enough. He never ratted out Purple's condition because Purple was his friend. He banished Zim instead of killing him because the little defective was loyal (if crazy). He knew the name of every service drone in the quadrant because as leader he was supposed to know. He often told himself these answers, but they weren't good enough for a real Irken elite.
All of his answers came down to a single word. It wasn't a word native to the Irken language, but he had heard it enough from other races to understand its meaning. Compassion.
So, I feel compassion... Red thought with grim realization. Purple wasted his time with art, and I waste our resources on acts of compassion. Maybe...Maybe I'm defective too.
The End