Author's Notice:
This is set in the "Red Velvet" universe(the story can be found on my profile). This won't be happening in the actual story, since the story should end where Cyan is still a child/maybe early pre-teen. However, the whole bit where Zim had his leg injured will actually happen in "Red Velvet", so it's a reference to that. Also, I will be making a one-shot here soon with Zim and Dib's antics on the Massive when Zim becomes Tallest as a more fluffy/smutty fiction; though Cyan will be absent from it, and it can stand alone but is implied to go along with the memory in this fiction.
I kept tossing around an idea of Cyan older, and I really wanted to write something with her older, but I couldn't find a proper timeline or setting so I came up with this. I like the idea of Zim being sentimental, but at the same time I don't like him sappy, so I hope this is a somewhat middle ground.
"Interlude"
'One-Shot'
By: Emo Fox
Cyan stood on the bridge of the Massive, her lithe arms stretched over the railing, her head craned towards the huge expanse of glass before her; staring sightlessly at the mass of stars. Drones of workers busied themselves below the bridge; the humming of machinery mixed with the 'clacking' of keys a humble sound in the back of her mind.
It had been eighty or so years since they had left Earth.
She was in her fifties; but she didn't look a day over eighteen, blessed with the longevity of an Irken, yet the body of a normal female human(if you disregarded the fact that she had no nose, no ears, and two curled antennae sprouting from the top of the mess of black curls on her head). She didn't really know how long her life-span was, but she didn't feel like she was close to dying yet, so she assumed she had quite a few more years ahead of her.
She pushed away from the railing, shoving aside the lingering grasp of sorrow from her mind as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a pair of round glasses. The rims were a little beat-up, the glass itself a little scratched, but they shone like new. Her mother never gave in to letting Zim fix his eyes, or to enhance him to make him 'more Irken'.
The introduction of a Pak would have made him 'live forever'. After all, all the memories, his personality, everything would have been able to have been stored in a Pak; so creating a 'new Dib' to replace an old forgotten body wouldn't have been hard, or even absurd in Irken culture. They could have just stored his DNA and cloned another, fasten the Pak, and then she'd have her mother all over again.
However, it was a little too sci-fi and strange for Dib to ever wrap his head around. He was born as a human, and he wanted to die as a human; flaws and all. She remembered how her father raged for days on end, avoiding Dib hoping he'd concede. He never did, Dib's stubborn streak rivaled that of Zim's; and despite how the Irken had wanted Dib to see his way, Zim didn't last more than a week without his company and the whole Pak matter had been swept under the rug.
She smiled faintly at the memory as she set the glasses over her eyes. Lacking a nose forced the lenses to dip just under her gaze.
"Isn't it pretty mama?" She said softly, looking off towards the stars with her double vision. She blinked the moisture from her eyes, trying to ignore the quivering of her heart.
Cyan's coiled antennae perked to the sound of calculated steps on the metal floor; the militant step hiccupped minutely from the almost nonexistent limp due to the male's left leg. Zim had found himself in a scuffle quite a few years back, had a laser shoot clean through his leg – right through the bone. Irkens healed quickly, almost seemed to regenerate, but bones couldn't be re-formed and after surgery the bone was just a half inch shorter than it used to be; it was enough to throw off Zim's usual stomping step.
Of course, she doubted anyone but herself could really notice it.
She quickly took the glasses off her face just as her father stepped beside her, his gloved hands gripping the railing almost as if he wanted to crush it. She let her burgundy eyes flick up to his tight-lipped expression; noticing how taut his skin had become over the years, pulling so hard over his bones that it gave way to every dip and contour; the angular expression eclipsing what he had looked like when he was younger.
She followed the hard line of his jaw up to the sharp edge of his skull; noticing the curve of his antennae – an obvious sign of an older Irken(antennae lengthened as Irkens aged, but after a point they stopped growing out, and instead started to pull back inward). Cyan noticed that his pink-red eyes were narrowed, looking more than a little displeased as he glared out towards the universe.
"Hey papa." She offered, fingering the edges of her mother's glasses, feeling a little too out of her element with Zim's presence.
Zim's antennae twitched to her voice but he didn't accept nor reject her greeting, his stance still as rigid as ever.
She hadn't witnessed her father grieve, or seem to care at all when Dib passed away. It had only been a year before, and where his death had left her feeling like a shell of nothing; Zim seemed to take everything in stride, not missing a beat in the political scene and it threw her for a loop.
After all, she had been under the impression that Zim cared. Why else would he want to fix Dib and give him a Pak, if he hadn't wanted to keep him forever?
She never understood Zim, and she didn't pretend to understand him now. She was still hoping that he had cared for her mother, since it was obvious Dib loved him, but she wasn't so sure about anything; especially from how he had been acting.
She let out a sigh, leaning back on the rail, "What're you doing up here?" She finally probed, not used to seeing Zim wander the ship; not since Dib died anyway, her mother was normally the one to pull Zim away from usual activities. When they were younger they'd run up and down the ship chasing each other – not the usual image a leader should have, but her mother didn't give much of a damn about it, and it did always seem to lighten Zim's mood.
She only had memories now.
Her antennae wilted; she'd give anything to have Dib back.
Zim had ignored her question entirely as he set his gaze on his daughter, noticing the glint of metal in her hands. Without warning Zim reached out, his lengthy claws clamping down on her wrist and yanking her hand away from her, "What're you doing with these?" Zim all but hissed, the sight of the glasses burning him in a way he was unfamiliar; having purged the entire ship of Dib's existence once the human departed.
Cyan yipped in surprise as Zim all but yanked her up, her fingers still desperately clinging to her mother's glasses, "I was—" She fumbled with her words, "I was showing mama the stars."
Zim's brow furrowed hard at the mention of Dib, an almost pained sound threatening to spill past his lips only to be hidden under an irritated snarl, "He's dead." Zim snapped, "You can't show him anything." He shoved her aside with as much force as he was able; forcing Cyan to fall back into the railing.
She gained her bearings quickly, using the metal for support as she stood her ground. Zim was definitely an imposing figure at his height of 6'1, but she had seen something in his eyes just then; no amount of anger could hide it. Cyan had witnessed the ill-covered hurt that graced her father's expression, and it gave her courage to continue, "He saw everything with these," She murmured, "I like to think he can still see with them, that maybe he can still look out with me, that he can still look at the things he loved." She took in a shaky breath, holding up the lenses as she swept them towards the stars, "He loved the stars," She turned the glasses on herself, "Me," She said with a watery smile before she twisted the glasses to face out towards Zim, "He especially loved you."
Zim's frown deepened, trying to ignore his daughter's words but they stung. Each one was a little thorn and he was having trouble digging them out. He didn't want to believe, he didn't want to believe anything.
Dib was dead, gone, he wasn't coming back and running around the ship with his glasses wasn't going to change that.
He wanted to have the strength to crush those foolish lenses, he wanted the strength to just ignore Dib's previous existence, but the burden of burying it was just too hard.
The silence spoke volumes to Cyan and she finally breached the small distance between them. She reached out for Zim's hand, cupping it with her own as she placed the glasses in his palm, "I've been showing him everything he's been missing," She murmured, forcing Zim's claws to close around the frames, "But I'm sure he'd love it if you showed him instead."
Zim swallowed thickly, his fingers trembled with the weight of the lenses in his hand. He bowed his head towards the stars and closed his eyes, "Leave." He said in a hard, hollow tone.
Cyan smiled gently, wiping her eyes as she took a few steps away from Zim, down the steps of the bridge. She hid just at the bottom, enough to see his back as the Irken finally unwound his fingers as he hooked the glasses in the waistline of his robes.
"Our daughter has so many stupid ideas." Zim groused, lifting his head up to see the stars.
Cyan stepped out of ear-shot of her father, stepping down the last few steps. She felt lighter than before, placated by the knowledge that she had helped her father cope, hoping it might ease his bad mood.
She tucked her arms behind her back as she stared up at the Massive's ceiling.
It felt strange wandering these halls alone, seeing no other human face but her own. It didn't feel right anymore, it didn't feel like home anymore.
Zim could finally have Dib again in memory; but where did it leave her?
Perhaps it was finally time for her to make her own mark. A little adventure might be fun and she could write her mother all about it; he had always wanted a real space adventure; One that took him to distant planets and unnamed stars. Cyan decided she would throw herself in the moment and see where it took her.
It was finally time to leave the nest.