Slow Progress, Quick Changes
5 Earth years later, June 16th XXXX
It was a regular day for the Irken empire, more specifically the leaders of the Empire known as Tallest Red and Tallest Purple. The absurdly tall aliens were stuffing their faces (as usual) with doughnuts, varying from glazed to sugared. The pair were in a trance of idle chit chat until an realisation hit the one adorned in high ranking Irken purple attire.
"Hey! You know who we haven't heard from In a while? Zim!" Stated purple. The Irken In red blinked a few times In silence before turning his head to face his partner, thinking about how long It's been since he's heard the annoying voice of Zim.
"Come to think of It, I can't remember the last time he's informed us of his idiotic plans..."
"Computer!" Tallest Purple shouted, "How long has It been since Zim's last transmission?"
A moment of silence was present until a technician on the platform above the tallest spoken. "The last transmission was approximately 24 years ago, my Tallest, 2 ½ Earth years, Sir."
"Has It really been that long, are you sure you have the right files?" Asked Red in disbelief, as there had been many times Zim has called the Massive non stop, even to clarify that the Massive was near Earth!
"Positive, my Tallest," said the Irken technician. Even after the clarification of Zim's last call, they were still in disbelief.
"Let's call Zim, see how much progress he's really done, probably failing and too embarrassed to face us," smirked Red, him and purple snickering at the thought. In mere seconds a call was made to Earth, and a minuet later the call was broadcasting on the big screen, indicating there was life at the end of the signal.
The previous smirk that were adorning both the Tallest face were wiped off instantly as soon as Zim showed up on the transmission, even the technician's seemed phased by what they saw.
Zim... he changed.
The Irken stranger was sitting on his chair, slumped down, playing idly with a jagged knife, both legs crossed over and elevated up onto his control panel. His legs were long and slender, even from his sitting position, he looked incredibly tall, enough for the Tallest to worry about their authority. Zim's boots and matt fitted vinyl leggings haven't changed, however he was wearing no top or gloves.
Tallest purple almost choked at the sight of Zim's torso; It was covered in scars that were darker than his natural pigment, some big and deep and others just mere scratches, however the ones that stuck out were the light pink cuts, indicating that they were fresh and not close to the scar healing stage.
Red, was also, taken back by Zim's wounds, he'd never seen a sight like this before, not once has he witnessed an Irken with so much mutilation.
What seem to struck the Tallest was the lack of excitement that use to be evident In Zim's posture and facial expression, which was replaced with a look of boredom and even irritation. Zim's hot pink eyes seem to have a faint grey hue and dark circles around his ocular implants, however it was uncertain with the darkness of the 'Invader's' lab. The once chirpy alien had now changed into a creature devoid of any positive emotions.
"Yes, my Tallest? To what do I owe this... unexpected call, I was in the midst of tiring research." Zim spoke in a chilling voice, deep and ominous, not his unusual, child like voice.
Both of the Tallest found themselves speechless before Tallest Red snapped from the trance, speaking up first.
"I Zim-uh, I-" The one sheathed in red stuttered, the sudden sight of the 'new zim' taken him off guard, rethinking about the whole call. Calming himself mentally and coughing into his stick like claws-to seem like he was clearing his throat- he finally spoke coherently. "We were checking in on you, to see your progress." Truthfully, Operation Impending Doom II ended before Zim stopped calling, the Invaders had successfully taken over their assigned planets, and since Zim wasn't programmed as an invader into the control brains, the operation ended with no interruptions or delays.
Zim's antennae perked up, his eyes narrowing in scepticism. Eventually he held the knife he was playing with towards the screen directly at his leaders.
"You want to know how I'm doing with my invasion?" Grunted Zim, a scowl forming on his features. The 'stranger' Irken examined the Tallest expressions, suppressing a smile at the fear they were emitting, obviously not used to the dark aura coming from Zim.
"That's right, how's your progress?" Purple piped in, thinking he needed to act his authoritative position in front of a lower ranking Irken.
"Slow... very slow." Zim lowered his arm with the accusing knife, both arms propped on the arm rest of his magenta chair. "More slow than I would like to admit, my Tallest... everything is changing, too fast for my liking; the laws, the absurd trends, the scenery, the people..." Zim paused, looking down temporarily before lifting his head up to face his leaders, a neutral expression taking place on his face. "I'm afraid with the constant changes and the never ending information needed to be obtained, It'll be years before I can even ponder a full blown invasion and slavery. Not only the mandatory needs of this mission, I have personal tasks that can't afford to be left unfinished."
The Almighty Tallest listened, genuinely interested in what Zim had to say. During the early stages of Zim's mission the Tallest were only interested in certain things like the height of the humans and their weaponry.
"Why do you need all that information?" Asked Tallest Red.
"Because the control brains have no information about Earth what so ever, It's more of a personal quest than anything, It would help me with decision making upon the fate of the planet, seeing as It's not charted as Irken property, I'm making it my own work."
"W-wait, sure It's charted as Irken-"Red was going to protest with plastic information until Zim interrupted his leader.
"No, It's not." Zim narrowed his eyes, which made Tallest Purple sink into his chair, hugging his bag of doughnuts for comfort. "It seems you still take me as a fool I used to be, my Tallest you do realise my age, don't you? I may have been the stupid defective idiot when I was 159 years old, but other contributing factors such as 49 Irken years on a completely different planet, where each person is different and not a replica." At this point, Zim swung his feat and calmly stood up straight, placing the knife on the dimly lit control panel. "All I ask is to be treated as an Invader, a proper one, not one to pass the time, It was my mistake to trust you when my mind was naïve. After I've done what Is needed to be done, I'll bring back something that will be in your favour." Zim was holding back a grimaced expression, knowing full well what the offering he had in mind, but the thought being too simple.
Both Red and Purple took Zim's words to heart, listening carefully and thanking what ever entity out there that it didn't end with a death threat, since Zim's intimidating appearance was enough to set them off edge, never mind him stating that he could betray them.
"I see... and what will this offering be?" Questioned Red, relaxing at Zim's sincerity.
"I'd like to keep it a surprise." More like refrain from having to have a long winded discussion about Zim's offering.
The marked and grazed alien say back down, slumping into his seat lazily and propping an elbow upon the arm rest, his head tilted into his palm while his legs were spread apart. In shorter words, the image of sloppiness and his missing top only topped it off-which brought curiosity to Tallest Purple.
"Zim... what happened to you?" Purple asked, his voice high pitched and innocent, naturally It was, however his eyes tinged with sparse traces of fear.
In response, the battered and bruised Irken chuckled quietly and briefly, before answering.
"I was naïve."
As if on cue, an alarm went off on Zim's side of the transmission, a red tinge in the base to empathize the problem. Naturally both parties on the line jumped up from the sudden news, a sub-screen on the right of Zim illuminating video footage of a black panther scratching and bashing the walls of the rusty old cell, chipping the metal effortlessly in an attempt to escape. Unfortunately, the sub-screen was angled away from the Tallest view, so all they could hear was intimidating howls and chilling scratches.
"Underground block C1, subject C-02 is ferociously attacking the holding cell and approximately 6 minuets away from breaking free from the cell," piped the computer, which Zim reacted to the news in disdain.
"That fucking..." Zim swore under his breath while he hit the control panel, in a vain attempt to relieve the boiling rage of the annoying task of sedating the retched animal. However, the act caused the connection between the Tallest and Zim to cut off inadvertently.
A few seconds of silence passed In the Massives main deck, before the technician's above the Tallest started whispering to each other, inaudible for their leaders to hear though.
"What... what did Zim say before the transmission was cut off?" Questioned Purple, confused at the foreign word Zim used In vexation. Red ignored his partners question which all the Irken's who witnessed the call wanted to know the answer to.
"Did you see the way he spoke towards me?! Back when he was a naïve little pest he was something to laugh at but now-!"
"Calm down!" Interrupted Purple, cutting Red off in an attempt to bring his growing anger down. "He's changed a bit... okay, a lot, but you heard what he said, It'll take him years to finish what ever he wants, and It's not like we want the Earth, we didn't know It existed before Zim found It!"
Red found himself registering the facts Purple was feeding him, understanding his point as he goes on.
"Long story short, we have Zim staying on that planet and away from us, and when he's done, we'll get something."
"And what do we do when he comes back? You've seen his height! I could've passed out when he stood up!"
"We've got along time before we even need to worry about Zim's return," smiled Purple, holding up his bag of flattened doughnuts up in the air. Red caught the concept and smiled, his eyes half lidded, as if he was relieved in a way. Purple was a dumb moron at times, but Red wouldn't have it any other way.
30 Earth minuets later...
The disguised house was quiet-which seemed more than not frequent- but the sounds of Zim's shallow panting damaged the silence through out the strange house. Zim was lying on the settee, his body just as long as the settee itself, his arms covering his eyes. He felt a 'migraine' forming, as the humans called It; come to think of it, he never actually experienced these 'migraines' before he came to Earth.
Zim was exhausted from the battle with the black panther, It would've taken too long to hook the liquid sedative injection onto a control arm that was capable of travelling around the house and base, in which, with no choice, Zim had to enter the cell of the violent creature and inject the animal manually. Without Zim's PAK legs to help him gain height above the panthers reach, he would've been in shreds.
The Irken face scrunched up in affliction, turning over and sinking head into the plushness of the Settee. Lucky for Zim, he could feel himself regaining energy from his PAK, In a matter of minuets he would be back to his research.
After a minuet or so, Zim felt physically better, turning over on his back he intertwined his hands and then stretched them as far as he could over his head, arching his back as well to relieve the stiffness. A pained gasp erupted from the alien as some of the irritating and itchy cuts over his body split and opened, restarting the healing clock for those particularly gashes. Zim grunted in realisation, having to put up with the wounds was bad enough, but having the healing time prolonged was just plain annoyance.
Suddenly, the house 'telephone' erupted with an ear piercing ring. Zim couldn't remember how he got such a vintage communication device along with his home, but what he definitely knew was who was on the other line.
Grunting, Zim dragged his stick thin body down the hallway to where the phone resided, lifting the plastic attachment and seizing it's noise. Before Zim had time to talk, he was cut off by the person at the end of the line.
"It mustn't have taken a lot to leave you in a panting mess, what happened to you, space boy?" A sly voice from his arch rival for 5 years emitted from the receiving end of Zim's phone. Dib Membrane. His most hated enemy out of all the filthy humans In the world, but he's closest thing he has to company, even if It's unwanted which is 99 percent of the time.
Zim scoffed at the innuendo-after the conversion from middle school to high school (Hi Skool) Zim learned pretty quickly the pathetic witty remarks revolving around sex, which was unfortunately what he was surrounded by when it came to idiot males in school.
"Listen shit head, either tell me where you hid the camera or I will happily rip off your arse off and hand it to you!" Zim barked down the phone, receiving a chuckle in response. While Zim was out of the house he must've forgotten to shut GIR in the underground base, since then Dib has been able to access a clear view into Zim's living room area, luckily enough, just his living room. It still agitates the alien, knowing that his home, his privacy has someone watching it, he avoids the living room because of the thought of Dib getting the footage that he wants.
"Tut tut, you'll never get anything with that attitude. Or the footage."
The realisation hit Zim, cussing silently as he hastily felt his head to feel nothing but his bare skin and antennae, no wig for at least an attempt to say he has a skin condition as well as pink eye, It always works.
"'The Alley', be there are 6 O'clock sharp, It'll be much more amusing In person." With a light chuckle, Dib hung up, leaving Zim exasperated. 'The Alley' was a rendezvous for Zim and Dib, It was public for certain groups, typically chavs and pot dealers and the occasional person who happens to walk through the alley, other than that, it was theirs. They meet early In the morning to avoid the public, and generally the fights between the pair don't last over an hour, at 7 O'clock or before they go home to prepare for school or carry on with everyday lives.
"That wretched little...!" In frustration, Zim through the phone attachment with full force to the floor, however with it's spiral cable it only lightly hit the floor with minimal damage, bouncing up and down, mocking Zim.
It was 2 O'clock in the morning on a Monday, four hours until he had to meet up with Dib.
Eventually, the Irken went over to his chambers to put on his 'Earth Attire' as he calls it, consisting of fitted black trousers (which he was still uncomfortable with) a white t-shirt and a choice of purple, pink, maroon, royal blue, dark green or black jumpers-today, he picked out black. After putting his Earth attire on he went down to the underground base for further research about the planet's History, laughing at how the League of Nations failed miserably.
AN: I don't even know why I started a new story which will involve chapters, since I have other stories I need to desperately finish. It must be something about staying up all night just to finish it... I'm knackered, I wish I went to bed... :/
As always I have a promising plot inside my head that's very vague and then boom, realisation will hit me that I should have planned It out more, aha~
1: If you're wondering, the school year system is British, which instead of grades, It's years (6th grade will be year 6, ect..) also school hours would be 9 AM-3:30 PM.
2: Earth time, Zim is 21 and Dib is 16, and by Irken time, Zim is 208 years old, don't ask my way of converting the ages and times, It's stupid ¬.¬"
3: And the ever dying question Is content, It's ZaDR (of course) and It's mostly rivalry, angst and hurt/comfort however I do have plans for a canon fluff moment, yell at me via FF to write to that point~
4: One thing I was iffy about was the start when Zim was acting hostile towards my Tallest, I just hope the change In attitude wasn't too hasty. Even if Zim Is a defective, he wouldn't abandon his Tallest.
5: And one thing I've been dying to say in a 1960's Batman series narrator voice (imagine it, please) Is how has Zim cut himself up? What happened to that happy little Irken we once knew and love? What will Dib do with the footage? What will happen with a load of other crap I missed out? Stay tuned!
Invader Zim belongs to Jhonen Vasquez, If I owned It I wouldn't be writing fan fiction I would be writing scripts~
