(A/N) Welcome to chapter 2, worm-babies. Prepare to wander the streets of Irk in endless circles, because this chapter delves into some of the planet's darkest secrets.

Meet Lark, the embodiment of such secrets.

I apologize that this chapter is a tad bit wordy. Irk itself isn't well defined in the series... so I had to indulge in a bit of detail. But a lot of exciting stuff is still going down in this chapter, believe me. ^_^

Thanks to TwoCute, AsianCutie93 and Lileipad for reviewing! *hands out waffles*

I do not own Invader Zim. Perhaps thankfully, I do not own a PAK, either.

Zim waited, right there. He waited, determined to be just where he had promised he would be when his human-turned-Irken came back down that hallway; when Dib looked at him with those eyes that seemed independant and needy at once.

He waited for the alien boy.

He waited anxiously; first his foot started to tap, then he began to pace. No Dib. Minutes turned into hours; the foodening in celebration of Earth's conquering passed without its guest of honor in attendance; the Tallest retired to their chamber on the top floor, leaving Zim waiting at the bottom.

"I told him Zim would be here!" the invader snapped at a well meaning SIR unit who tried to usher him to a guest room. "I promised him that Zim would be here when he got back!" Then he turned away, moaning, "Why is the Dib-human not back...?"

Night filled the building slowly, the mild Irken sun setting in a pale imitation of the brilliant firestorm sunsets of Earth; still Zim paced, looking worriedly down the hall where his human had disappeared. And he was still there, frazzled and frantic, when the Tallest descended on their hover pad for breakfast. Before they even landed he was up beside them, using his metal limbs to lift himself so as to push his face into Red's.

"Where is the Dib-human?" he demanded, antenna flattened. "Where is he? Tell Zim, tell Zim now!"

Purple blinked in a confused manner, but Red narrowed his eyes. "I don't know, Zim."

"You do!" the invader snapped. "You lie! You're playing with Zim, laughing!"

"This is no laughing matter, Zim," Red said, his voice dangerously soft. "The Control Brains might not agree but I, for one, know you are a defective."

Zim drew back sharply. "Eh? Y-You speak nonsense! And what does that have to do with the subject of the Dib human?"

Red ignored the question, turning instead to Purple. "We need to check in with Invader Nen today. It's been awhile, since before this whole thing with earth began, and he was doing fairly well when we-."

"You will answer Zim!" the invader screamed, grabbing Red's collar. Stunned, the Tallest stared at him for a moment before slapping the small hand away and staggering backwards.

"I don't know," he snapped. "That's the truth, Zim. But he was released yesterday; he won't be coming down that hallway."

Zim's metal limbs folded in his surprise, and he found himself staring up at the Tallest. "Why... would he leave Zim...?"

Red didn't answer, and Purple still looked more bewildered than anything else. The hoverpad landed and the two figureheads disembarked, leaving Zim to slink off and back away. With one last glance at the receding figures of his leaders, he took off down the hall that led to the Smeetery.

"Stupid Dib-worm!" he burst out on the way, though he was talking to no one but himself. "Just leave, will you? Stupid earth-stink! Zim will not allow it!"

The Smeetery yawned in front of him abruptly, an underground cavern extending for hundreds of miles and filled to the brim with smeets of every stage of smeethood. Sliding across the sloping metal wall, Zim hopped down beside the closest robotic arm, seizing it roughly.

"Where is the human that was brought here?" he demanded. The computer jerked at its limb for a moment, seeming like it wasn't going to answer. But eventually it gave a mechanical sigh.

"Zim. We've missed you around here."

"Yesyesofcourseyouwould," Zim said, waving his free hand. "But where is my Dib?"

"... 'Your Dib?'" the computer asked innocently. "You wouldn't be referring to that lucky human who wandered in here, would you be?"

"Of course, there is no other!" Zim snapped. "Where is he? Answer Zim, answer Zim now!"

"First of all," the computer said with a mechanical chuckle, "no Irken owns another; you all belong to the Control Brains. So he isn't 'yours.' Second, he isn't called 'Dib' anymore, nor is he human. He is a proud member of the Irken empire, and he answers to the name the Control Brains have given him.

"Lark. He is now the Irken called Lark."

… … …

Though he spent hours and then days trying to track down the Irken called Lark, he found only dead ends. He couldn't seem to get in touch with the Tallest; he couldn't find GIR, either.

It was as though Irk had forgotten about the tiny, defective invader named Zim.

But he would never give up; no matter how faulty his programing, that characteristic was indelible. Perhaps he should have given up, for his mind was beginning to slip; he did the same thing day after day and expected, by some miracle, to find his precious human. And so he was reduced to wandering the streets of Irk endlessly, weaving circles through the maze of metal.

A raving lunatic just outside the Control Brain's reach. A neutralized threat.

"Where is my human?" the Irken begged, clinging to a passing kinsman's PAK. "Have you seen him? He is the only human on this wretched... this horrible, glorious planet of Irk!" Shrugged off in an annoyed fashion, he turned to a female. "Where does he work? The Tallest sent him somewhere...! He's called Dib, the Dib-human is! They're keeping him somewhere, I know it...!" Ignored again, he looked to the sky. "Someone answer Zim!"

But no one even noticed the little invader's existence; they had duties to perform. Even GIR, fixed up and, unbeknownst to Zim, assigned to a new master, had a place and function in the flawless society.

Zim did not. And so he wandered.

"Zim will not be ignored...!" he gasped out, physical exhaustion dragging at him. Though Irkens did not sleep, their bodies were not made for the kind of strain Zim had been putting his under.

"They tricked Zim...!" he raved, his feet scuffing out an unbroken pattern. "I said... ha! Zim said that he would no longer be an invader if they spared the Dib-human! I gave up my whole life for that stinking little earth-monkey, and still they deny Zim!"

Ignored, the Irken continued to walk; a passerby clipped his shoulder, but even that didn't interrupt him; he simply lurched and changed directions. Another worker, annoyed when he swerved in front of them, shoved the pitiful creature, sending him stumbling away. His foot caught in a grate and he reeled, crashing to the ground and sending lurid blue blood splattering across the metal walkway.

And he lay there upon the ground, the flow of foot traffic parting to swirl uninterrupted around him as he slipped away.

… … …

When Zim woke, he was surprised to find a compress on his forehead. It felt of human make, even moistened slightly with the pure groundwater of Irk; such things were simply not done on his home planet.

Sitting up quickly, the Irken boy found himself alone, sprawled out on a handmade mat in the shadow of an abandoned building. A sign beside his head warned in bold red letters that the building had a faulty structure, and so was condemned as defective. Removing the scrap of purple cloth from his forehead, Zim examined it. Too rough to be Irken material, the fabric was obviously of alien origin.

Dib...? Couldn't... be...

Rising unsteadily, Zim glanced around. His eyes fell on a small brown bag, oddly familiar in shape and in... scent? Leaning down, he unwrapped it slowly, almost warily.

Inside the brown paper lunch sack he found a stack of waffles, dripping with maple syrup but without butter, as he had always ordered GIR to make them.

GIR, then...? But... no.

Though made with primarily Irken ingredients, they were a nearly flawless imitation; eating his waffles with silent relish, the Irken invader felt strenght flood back into his limbs. Then he poked his head out into the street, segmented tongue cleaning up the last of the syrup on his face.

"Hear me now, Irk!" he called out in typical Zim fashion. "You will not defeat this invader! You will not defeat Zim!"

Storming down the street with a renewed sense of purpose, Zim found himself on a slight incline, heading down towards the mining pits. He had never been so far into what Irkens called wilderness, the uncivilized jungle of metal and untamed technology; that was for workers, not soldiers; certainly not invaders. It had been forgone several times in his search for such reasons, but the new flush of motivation urged him to throw all caution to the proverbial wind.

That hunch proved to be correct, and all doubt vanished from the lost Irken's mind when he spotted them, lying there on the pathway. Slipping obtrusively between commuters, Zim skidded to a halt.

There was a crack in the glass and one bow was twisted, but they were unmistakable; no such thing existed on Irk. Zim picked up the glasses gingerly, almost reverently, gazing at them for a moment before cradling them to his chest.

Certain that he was on the right path at last, Zim skittered on metal limbs down into the proletarian part of his planet; conquers by nature, most Irkens spit upon those who lived and worked there. The worker drones, however, were the very creatures creating the weapons and the ships used to build the great empire; they tended the machines that produced Irken food and the air that they all breathed- things no slave could be trusted with. It was even said that PAKs were constructed in some underground facility there, though no one could seem to find evidence of that claim.

Zim clambered spider-like down the final slope, sending crumbs of concert (a rare, contemptible material on the metallic world) skittering down in his wake. Once on solid ground, he reverted to his natural legs.

"You! Worker drone!" he called, waving to attract the attention of one Irken worker. "Come! Be honored to speak to Zim! What is your name, inferior Irken?"

The worker shuffled over, seeming mildly irritated. "Glort. I'm Glort. What do you want, oh Mighty Invader Zim?"

Zim puffed out his chest, although he was almost a head shorter than Glort. "I come in search of a lost human, the Dib-thing! Where is he? Tell Zim, tell Zim now, all that you know!"

It took a moment for the lightbulb to come on, but then the worker's eyes brightened. "Oh yeah... yeah, they did bring that freak through here, come to think of it."

"The Dib-human is no freak!" Zim snapped. "Where is he? Where is Zim's human?"

"Jeez man, I'm tryin' to tell you," the Irken said, annoyed. "They assigned him to underground weaponry duty. I think he was on the line for Rei Blasters. Oh, but they weren't callin' him 'Dib' or whatever. They were callin' him... 'Lark' or something."

"I'm aware," Zim muttered. "And they will pay for such disgraceful, heinous actions..."

"Man, are you defective or somethin'?" Glort asked nervously, then backed away. "Man, you're on your own!"

Watching disinterestedly as the worker returned to his task, Zim craned his head to see the entry to the underground facility. He shuddered; no self-respecting Irken went down there. That was where the lowest ranked workers dwelt, spending centuries of their life without glimpsing the sky.

Dib...

Trotting forward with little more thought, Zim was distracted by a flash of movement. A recycle truck was making its rounds, and for an instant the invader swore he saw movement- a creature -on the lid of the next bin in line. His breath caught, and instantly he was there, ducking under the collection ship's outstretched claws and snatching the items from the recycle can. Then he skidded to a halt, staring in horror at the clothes in his hands, the familiar pattern staring up at him.

"Dib..." He spat the name, seeming surprisingly annoyed as he bundled the human's clothes with his glasses and tucked the whole clump into an empty segment of his PAK. Then he dove into the mines without a breath of hesitation, plunged instantly into darkness. Blinking rapidly, he willed his eyes to adjust faster. When they did, however, he wished they hadn't.

The sight of his own people toiling in such conditions didn't disturb Zim; it was the thought that Dib was among them that made his sqeedly spooch twist inside him. Weaving through the shadowy rows of machinery and dutiful, mindless Irken workers, he refrained from rising up on his metal limbs; for once he didn't want to draw attention to himself. So he scuttled among the rows of assembly lines, deafened by the clatter of metal on metal, stretching his neck up in some vain attempt to find his human.

Every minute took him deeper into the bowels of Irk, but he pressed on determinedly. An hour passed, though, and then two, and he began to wonder if he had missed his human in the dark, crowded spaces or if- he shuddered -Dib wasn't there at all.

"Break!" squawked the overhead, and Zim jumped clean out of his skin. "All worker drones in section 10-32, report for your break!"

The Irkens backed away from their workstations with a sudden eruption of murmuring, some groaning as they stretched sore limbs. As the ocean of labor began to swirl around him, Zim looked about frantically, all but lost in the sea of worker drones.

Then, amid all the bobbing antenna, he saw it:

Dib's hair.

Forgetting about his skittishness, Zim leapt up onto the nearest block of abandoned machinery. His foot slipped and he nearly tumbled into the contraption itself, but didn't even flinch as blades sliced the empty air just inches behind him.

"Dib!" the Irken called, catching a glimpse of his human's back through the crowd. Keeping that bobbing hair in sight, he vaulted through the river of workers, stepping on heads and shoving at the confused and innocent Irkens. Plunging the last few feet, he grabbed the human's shoulder, vividly aware of the foreign-looking PAK with its blue spots and the cold frailness of the body under his hand.

Turning his lover to face him, Zim felt a shiver run through him. It was Dib, unmistakably, but his eyes were empty, pupils dilated to an unnatural size to compensate for the constant blackness. The drone blinked slowly, his eyes adjusting visibly to the close up view.

"... Zim...?"

The Irken went weak with relief. "Yes, yes! I knew you would not forget Zim!"

The boy blinked again, even slower this time. "... Of... course. But what do you want?"

"!" Zim drew back as though struck. "What do I want?" he squeaked. "What do I want? I want my Dib-human! I want him back and I want him now!"

The worker blinked. "But... I'm not...

"Who's Dib?"

The Irken's jaw dropped. "Eh? What? What?"

"Who is Dib?" the boy repeated, those hazy eyes of his fixed on the Irken. "You're looking for a human called Dib? Let me help."

"You're the Dib! You are the Dib-thing, foolish earth-stink!" Zim snapped, seizing the other's shoulders and giving him a none-too-gentle shake. "The Dib-thing is Dib!"

But the Irken worker drone shook his head. "No, I'm not Dib. I'm called Lark. It's the name I was given by the Control Brains."

Zim felt his heart-equivalent lurch inside his chest, threatening to stop. "No... no, you are Dib! You are Dib and I am Zim! Listen to me, you stupid human!"

"Oh, I'm not a human," Lark said jovially, a half-smile melting into place. "I'm an Irken, a worker drone, proud to serve my Tallest."

In sudden desperation, Zim mashed his mouth to the startled boy's, forcing his segmented tongue past the lips to stroke along the palate. Lark had frozen in place beneath his hands, not unlike Zim himself had the first time Dib kissed him.

"What are you doing?" the confused Irken worker asked, speaking around his lover's tongue. "What... what is this?"

"It's called a kiss, earth-stink!" Zim spat, thrusting the drone away with a disgusted motion. "You taught Zim how to."

"I've never heard of such a thing!" Lark exclaimed, then paused, touching his lips thoughtfully. "It's... it's just so alien!"

"Exactly!" Zim cried, grabbing the other's hand, which was so much more calloused then it had been two months before. "Exactly, that's because the Dib-worm is human! The Dib-worm taught Zim how to kiss, because..." For once the great invader was lost for words, still shaky on the subject of love himself; Dib had always been there to answer his questions, to explain the things that were, in essence, so alien to him. So he fell silent, his fingers simply stroking that soft, calloused hand.

"Oh!" Lark said suddenly, his eyes brightening. "You and this Dib fellow were in love, is that it?"

Something inside Zim snapped, then, and the tears started to flow down his cheeks. "I've found my Dib-thing..." he whispered, taking both of Lark's hands in his, "but he's broken."

"It's alright," the Irken worker said soothingly, reaching up to stroke his lover's antenna, just as he always had and always would. "I'm sure he's not broken broken; everything can be fixed with time."

"Yes... everything can be fixed..." the Irken murmured, a sudden flare of hope coming to life inside him. "If the Dib-human says everything can be fixed, then... it must be so."

Lark gave a little Irken purr that sounded odd on his human tongue. "I'm sure the Dib-human is right."

"Break is ending!" came the shrill voice over the speakers, making Zim jump. "All workers, report back to your stations! All workers, report back to your stations!"

"I have to go," Lark said, giving the invader's hands a quick squeeze. "I hope you find your Dib-human."

Zim's eyes widened, panic suddenly filling him at the thought of his Dib slipping back into the shadowy crowd of Irken refuse. Just as the pale hands were slipping free of his, he grasped them tightly.

"You can't!" he hissed, pulling the startled Lark close to his chest. "Zim won't let you do such things!"

"I-I have to!" the worker drone stammered, struggling feebly. "M-my Tallest... I have to serve them as the Control Brains say I can best serve them!"

"No you don't!" the Irken snapped. "They assigned Zim to be a food service drone, but Zim is an invader! And Zim conquered earth, you see? The Control Brains were wrong!"

Lark squealed, seeming honestly terrified. "Zim, don't say that!" he whispered frantically, wrenching his hands free of the embrace and clapping them over the Irken's mouth. "Don't say things like that! It's treasonous, horrible! A... a defective would say things like that!"

Zim blinked, startled by the use of the word. "A... defective...? No, no, Zim is not defective," he decided with a shake of his head. "Zim is... an invader! And the greatest invader on all of Irk! Now, Dib-human, we shall leave here!"

Lark wavered, glancing uncertainly towards where most of the workers were already lining up. "Well... y-you are my superior... as an invader..."

"Yes, yes..." Zim urged, pulling his human toward the exit. "Yes, you will obey your superior, Zim!"

Frowning, Lark followed the Irken invader, though with continuous glances backwards. "Th-they'll notice I'm-" he started to say once, but Zim quickly hushed him.

"Worker drone Lark, please report to your station," the announcements drawled suddenly, and the drone jumped.

"That's me! I have to get back to-!" He cut himself off with a squeak as Zim grabbed him, metal legs unfurling as he vaulted over machinery and Irkens, suddenly racing toward the exit.

"Hold on to Zim," he commanded sharply and Lark, not knowing what else to do, clung with sudden fear to his abductor.

"What in the Tallest?" a supervisor shouted, leaning over his bench as Zim sailed by. "Catch him!" he called to the confused workers. "By order of the Tallest, catch that defective!"

The word rang in Zim's ears, but he wouldn't allow himself to consider it, focusing instead on the human in his arms. He lurched, off balance, as one of his metal legs was grabbed; with little thought he switched on his boosters, tearing the limb off as he flew away. But more worker drones were catching on, reaching up with grasping hands and beginning to overwhelm him with sheer numbers, clogging his escape route.

"This way!"

Zim didn't pause to consider the impossibility of it, simply obeyed the trusted voice and swerved, bursting through a thin layer of concrete and into a veiled air vent. The glow of rockets shone in front of him, and he followed the blue dots until he shot out into the cool night air, greeted with the familiar sight of the night sky.

Lark whimpered suddenly, burying his face in Zim's chest and startling the Irken. "Bright...!"

Concern shooting through him, Zim pulled Dib's face up, though the boy's eyes stayed screwed shut. "Dib-thing, it's just the moons!" he said critically. "Two months down there and the Dib doesn't even want to see the sky?"

Lark frowned, eyes still closed. "Why would I want to see the sky?"

Zim heard a strangled little sob; it took him a moment to realize that it came from his own throat. "Dib-thing..."

"This way!"

The chirp came again, and this time Zim spun, surprise emerging in the absence of adrenalin.

"GIR...?"

The little SIR unit flew up beside him, hovering there and nodding. "Master said to fetch you both," he said in a businesslike tone. "This way."

"... GIR, Zim is your master..." Zim said softly, but was promptly ignored. So, cradling Lark to his chest, he followed the little robot wordlessly across the sky.

It took the odd trio an hour to reach their destination; Irk's short night was ending, the weak sun making its appearance over the metal horizon. Where GIR led them was a junk heap, rare but not unheard of on Irk, an uncivilized sprawl of scrap metal and half-functioning robots- a haven for dead and dying technology seeking escape from recycling. The SIR unit led the visitors expertly through the maze of metal, picking the most solid and direct paths, though within minutes Zim knew he would be hopelessly lost without their guide.

But he trusted GIR, no matter how oddly the little robot was behaving. Where else would we go...?

he thought dismally, feeling the Dib-thing stir against him.

"We're heeere," the SIR unit chirped, sounding like the old GIR for a split second. Then he descended, landing on a wide, flat piece of metal that rested atop what seemed a painfully unsteady pile of garbage. But GIR walked confidently across it, and Zim landed on the surprisingly solid surface.

The SIR unit pried up an old, dented door at the edge of the sheet. "Come." Seeing little alternative, the invader padded up and peered into the blackness. Again it was Lark's soft, incoherent murmuring that convinced him, and he picked his way carefully down an invisible staircase. Each step was right where he hoped it would be, and Zim reached solid ground safely. He could hear metallic clanging all around him but it didn't alarm him, simply intrigued him.

Suddenly, a light flashed on; Zim blinked, momentarily blinded by the brightness. When his vision cleared he peered around, quickly finding the sparsely furnished room's only occupant.

His voice held disbelief and a touch of annoyance as he greeted the Irken by name.

(A/N) And so it begins.

Reviews get the first sentence of the next chapter... But if you can guess who this strange Irken is, a reward/request may be in order. ^_^