Invader Zim: Might of the Empire
Chapter 1: The Planetary Sweep
The doors to The Massive's onboard auditorium and viewing station opened to allow a swarm of irken soldiers, scientists, and dignitaries inside. The green-skinned aliens quickly piled into the seating areas, which, once full, proceeded to rise off the ground slightly in order to give the audience a better view of the main stage. There was only ever one time that the Tallests opened up their private viewing room to the public, and that was when a new planet was about to fall into the hands of the empire. Many in the audience now were surprised to have found out earlier today that a planetary sweep was scheduled to occur, as everyone who stayed up to date on the progress the invaders were making knew that another planet wasn't scheduled to fall for at least a month.
As the last of the viewing platforms was filled, a cadre of honor guards wielding rather painful looking shock spears dropped down from above using jetpacks and took up a defensive perimeter around the stage. Moments later, the Tallests themselves began their descent, which immediately caused an uproar of cheering and applause which only grew louder as the platform neared the ground.
"Yes. Yes. Thank you! Thank You!" Tallest Red said as he and Purple waved to the audience.
"Almighty Tallests rule!" A random voiced called out from above the cheers.
"Yes, yes we do!" Purple called back. "And thank you!"
As the Tallests' platform came into contact with the stage, the crowd instantly grew silent- well, accept for one guy who was late on the notice, who received a few elbows to the ribs.
"Greetings, fellow irkens!" Red started the speech after clearing his throat. "We, your almighty and powerful rulers, would just like to start by saying thanks for dropping everything you had planned tonight and coming to personally view the empire's latest acquisition."
"It's gonna be a great show! Woo!" Purple added in, electing a short cheer from the audience.
"Yes it is," Red continued on. "Now, you're probably wondering why we're suddenly doing a sweep on a planet that was previously not singled out for conquest-"
"Officially!" Purple interrupted. "That's because it was actually a secret assignment! Yeah. So, surprise!"
"Ladies and gentlemen!" Red said as The Massive adjusted its orbit to bring the planet below into view and two huge monitors also flickered on to display the doomed world. "I give you, PLANET EARTH!"
A huge gasp erupted from the gathered Irkens. The hell was planet Earth? Not that it really mattered; a new conquest was a new conquest, so the crowd quickly resumed their fanatical cheering.
"And let's give it up for the brave invader who completed this secret mission!" Red said as he gestured towards a platform floating towards the stage. "Here he is! INVADER SKOODGE! The first invader in Operation Impending Doom Two history to successfully conquer not one, but TWO planets!"
The cheering continued as the stout Irken crossed onto the main stage and posed before the sudden arrival of floating cameras live-feeding the proceedings all across the empire.
"Invader Skoodge rules!" another anonymous voice pierced through the crowd.
"Are you SURE it's okay to give this guy ANOTHER award ceremony?" Purple whispered to Red as the crowd continued cheering Skoodge on.
"He was the only guy in the area who wasn't ZIM! Would you have rather given it to him?" Red's response caused purple to visibly gag, which he quickly followed up with a nod of agreement.
"Besides," Red continued in his mind. "He might be a short, ugly excuse for an invader, but he's proven to be a very effective short, ugly excuse for an invader."
"Hello everyone!' Skoodge said with a wave to the crowd. "Great to see you all again. Before we begin, I just wanted to say-"
"Yes, well, good job Skoodge," Purple butted in and nudged the much shorter irken slightly out of the center of the stage. "Now who's ready to light this candlestick?"
The crowd cheered once more as the monitors switched to a viewing of the rest of the fleet moving into planetary sweep formation.
"So, have we decided what we're going to do with this one?" Purple whispered to Red yet again.
"Eh, beats me. Might be nice to have a shipyard out on this side of the galaxy."
"Parking structure planet. Got it." Purple said with a nod as he and Red turned to face the screen themselves. The last of the armada had just pulled up to the planet, as every ship began concentrating a beam of energy in their main cannons. After an extended minute deliberately planned to build up the suspense, each ship fired in sync with one and other, causing enormous pillars of energy to crash down onto the planet's surface. Just as the second round of bombardment was beginning, the display monitors suddenly cut to an automatic warning sequence.
"WARNING! Collision imminent!" The robotic voice announced to the crowd, causing the entire room to be filled with a sudden panic.
"What!" Red suddenly opened a communication line with the bride of The Massive. "What's going on? I thought we cleared the area of all nearby deb-"
The Tallest's question was cut short by a Voot Cruiser suddenly crashing through one of the viewports, plowing through an entire seating section of the audience and getting at least a dozen individuals sucked out into the vacuum of space before an emergency blast door came down and resealed the room.
"We come in peace!" A high pitched voice escaped from the personal ship as the top opened up to reveal a SIR unit, who proceeded to run around the room and steal food from the audience members who were fortunate enough to have not been seated near the right side viewport.
"Oh god!" Red said as a look of absolute horror took over his face. "That's Zim's SIR unit!"
Purple's expression quickly altered itself to mirror Red's. "Then, that means-"
"I'm sorry I'm late, my Tallest. I can't believe that I didn't receive a notification that the celebration of my MOST GLORIOUS conquest was happening today. Those guys down in Communications must be slacking off again." The shortest and by far most reviled invader ever in the empire's history said as he stepped out from under the rubble his ship had created. "Now then, POINT ME TO THE NACHOS!"