A/N: Sorry it's been so long since my last update. I've been having a bit of trouble juggling my schedule lately. Hopefully, the next chapter will be up in less time than this one. Regardless, happy reading!


"You know, for a bird, you're pretty slow," Dib said as he hurriedly jogged down the back roads leading to Zim's house. Spoofy was following behind him, her wings fluttering at maximum speed as she desperately tried to keep up. However, her size left her at a disadvantage, and Dib found himself slowing down for her on more than one occasion.

"I don't see why I even waste my time waiting for you," he mumbled angrily. "I already know where Zim lives . . . and I might not have a plan to get Rin out, but I'll come up with one. I really don't need you anymore—you're just slowing me down."

Spoofy's eyes narrowed as she went off on one of her meeping tangents. To the well-trained ear, one could clearly hear her complain about Dib's impulsive and discourteous behavior. Why, without her help, he wouldn't have even known Rin was in trouble. She searched him out, knowing that Rin was his friend after detecting his scent on her clothing a few days ago. Spoofy had done him a favor, and this was the thanks she got—some ungrateful little preteen whining about her speed. She had half a mind to begin pecking at that large head of his, if she wasn't so certain that it would upset Rin. Why did her master like this boy, anyway?

"For the last time, I don't understand you." Dib rolled his eyes and sped up, hoping to lose the annoying little meepie before he reached Zim's. "I knew I hated birds for some reason."

Before he knew it, Spoofy had rammed her small feet against the side of his head. He stumbled to the side, losing his balance in the process. She began spewing her spiteful meeps over him once more, this time reminding him of her species. She wasn't a bird from his horrific planet—she was a meepie, a native of Anadolia! Earthlings were so full of themselves.

"Ow! That hurt," Dib grumbled, gingerly rubbing the side of his head. "I thought you liked me."

Spoofy stuck her beak in the air, obviously through with acknowledging the human. She took off in the direction of Zim's house before Dib had a chance to get to his feet.

"Wait up!" he called out as he rushed to regain his footing, and then sprinted to catch up with the little animal. He let out a sigh on the way. "This had better be worth the abuse."


Back at Zim's lab, Rin could feel herself beginning to teeter on the verge of hysteria. She could hardly contain herself as he approached her with that fat, ominous syringe. When he'd reached the left side of the examination table, he removed the cap to expose the wire-thin, razor-sharp needle that would soon inject a frothy, citron-tinted fluid of pain into her bloodstream. A scream began to itch at the back of her throat. She wanted to open her mouth and shriek until the very glass on his containment chambers shattered, but her vocal chords seemed to be knotted into a tangled mess.

He drew the needle ever closer to her abdomen, causing Rin to shut her eyes and bite her lip in anticipation for the inevitable anguish. When nothing happened, she slowly opened one eye, then both of them once she realized he'd put the syringe down and was searching for something else.

"All of this excitement almost made me forget to prep the injection site," he muttered to himself, once again sifting through a large pile of sorts. He came up with a jar of some clear, gelatinous substance, but he moved too quickly for Rin to decipher the Irken labeling.

He unscrewed the lid and placed it next to Rin's left shoulder on the examination table, almost mocking Rin in her inability to knock the despicable jar to the floor. After accumulating a good amount of it on his fingers, he roughly scrunched up her skirt and slathered the cold, thick gel over her thin stockings, on the area where her thigh met the lowermost part of her abdomen. She shivered from the contact, and the seriousness of the situation finally began to register.

He was actually going to go through with this—it wasn't some sort of sick joke, but horrifying reality. Zim planned on making her eyeballs sprout hair, even though she'd never done anything to him to cause such aggression. It seemed the only reason he was being so mean was due to his misguided beliefs about Rin being in love with Dib . . . and running low on female "specimens."

I can't just lay here and let this happen, she concluded. I've got to fight back—even if it scares the very life out of me.

So, she started wriggling. She flailed her legs and tried kicking him in the squeedly spooch when he got too close, and had almost done so more than once. All she had to do was clear her mind and pretend that Zim wasn't a bloodthirsty invader, but some normal human who'd crossed the line.

"I knew I should've used shackles," Zim grumbled, stepping back from the examination table. He waited a moment for her to calm down, then leaned over and stretched out a hand to scrunch her skirt back up. She almost dealt a blow to his face in the process.

"Stop squirming!" he ordered, tossing the syringe to the side before roughly grabbing her legs.

She continued to writhe beneath his hands. "No!"

"Stop it!"

"I said no!"

He growled. "Computer!"

"What?" his computer answered in an agitated tone, perpetually fed up with Zim's requests.

"Prepare a sedative for me to administer to the unruly human. I still want her to be conscious, so make it minimal," he said with a grimace as he looked to Rin. "That should put a stop to your annoying outbursts."

"Before I do so, sir, you make like to know you have an intruder," his computer interjected lightly, causing Zim's face to flare up in aggravation.

"Who could it be now?" He walked over to one of the smaller monitors, ran his fingers over a few buttons, and a live camera feed of the ground floor came into view. Darting through the front door was his least favorite pointy-haired paranormal enthusiast, followed by a strange pink bird.

Zim's eyes narrowed. "Dib." He walked over to the elevator shaft connecting his lab to the ground floor, looking back to Rin briefly before stepping inside. "We shall continue this after I take care of your meddling, little . . . love monkey-thing."

He was gone before Rin could correct him on the status of her relationship with Dib—which, as far as she was concerned, was barely a friendship yet, let alone something based on intimacy. Granted, they'd been able to put Dib's short-lived obsession with exposing her behind them, but they were only just starting to get to know each other. They got along and everything . . . but . . . well, he was a human and she was an Anadolian. She could manage to be his friend, but going anywhere beyond that was dishonorable; her people were very strict about the purity of their bloodlines. She may not have agreed with it entirely, but it was a code that Anadolians had lived by for centuries and had prided themselves over. Being the only free Anadolian left, she felt a duty to uphold her people's honor and dignity.

Besides, it's not like I have anything to worry about, she reminded herself. He's so involved with foiling Zim's plans, he probably hasn't even 'noticed' girls yet . . . at least, not the way his other classmates have.

Suddenly, she felt something poking at her forehead rather roughly. It didn't take long before she realized Zim's little robot was the cause. G.I.R. had jumped onto the examination table and was currently sitting on her chest. He gave her a goofy smile when he noticed she was looking at him.

"Aw, you're so cute," he said with a beaming grin, amused by the expression she gave him as he mashed in her cheeks. "Your face is all squishy, too . . . like mashed potatoes!"

"That hurts," she tried saying, but it came out distorted and muffled as G.I.R. continued to abuse her face.

"Master says you smell funny, but I don't think so. You smell like cupcakes . . . I like cupcakes." He looked dangerously mellow for a moment, and then he gasped. "You know what will make you look even cuter? Piggy tails!"

He hopped down from the examination table and quickly sprinted down a long hallway, lit only by the dim, mechanical glow that seemed to be the primary source of light in Zim's extensive lab. The little robot was back in seconds with a handful of mismatched rubber bands.

G.I.R. jumped back onto Rin's chest with a squeal, proceeding to yank large clumps of hair and twist rubber bands around the jumbled strands. Rin yelped and tried to knock him off by wriggling back and forth, but nothing seemed to work. Her only comfort was in knowing that her hair was short, so there probably wasn't much for G.I.R. to pull. That didn't, however, stop her from screaming.


Zim made it upstairs through the small trash can just in timeto catch Dib trying to sneak down the toilet, which—as Dib was well aware—wasn't actually a toilet, but a "cleverly-crafted" structure built around an elevator leading to the lab below. The human had somehow managed to break into Zim's base many times, so he knew most of the hidden passageways, as well as various other secrets that were normally imperceptible to the untrained eye. This was more than just slightly grating, but Zim decided not to focus too much on it. Right now, he just needed to make Dib leave—Zim could finish him off once he was finished experimenting on Rin.

"What are you doing in my house?" He questioned lividly, rushing over to the toilet and jerking Dib backward. This caused the human to stumble about ungraciously for a few seconds before regaining his balance.

"I know you've got Rin, Zim," he said with a grimace. "What are you doing to her?"

"I'm afraid that doesn't concern you, Dib-worm."

"She's down in your lab, isn't she?" His eyes were transfixed rigidly on Zim's face.

"What makes you think I'll tell you?"

His glare intensified. "Is she?"

Zim hesitated, eventually replying with a smug grin, "Yes."

Dib lunged for the toilet and managed to get a foot inside the bowl before Zim could stop him. He pulled the handle and ducked as Zim grabbed for his head, only to have the alien hastily scramble down the shaft after him. They began to tussle, Zim ramming Dib's head into the side of the elevator and Dib appropriately kicking Zim in the shin. Zim staggered backward until he fell, which Dib took as his cue to jump at the Irken and begin trying to choke him. Zim, however, quickly caught on and pushed him backward, causing Dib to lose his balance and plunge to the floor.

Once they'd reached the lab, they rolled out of the elevator together. G.I.R. temporarily stopped tormenting Rin long enough to watch the two wrestle, laughing as Zim succeeded in pinning Dib to the floor by putting him in a half-nelson. However, as soon as Zim flipped him over, the human quickly snatched one of his antennae and wrenched it toward the ground. As the struggle marched on, Rin began to wonder when either one of them would notice she was still strapped to an examination table.

Her worriment was alleviated once she saw Spoofy swooping down one of the elevator shafts, intent upon rescuing her master. The meepie, out of sheer excitement, accidentally flew in rather close to Zim's head, which proved to be beneficial. The Irken instantly jolted to his feet and began to shriek, labeling the meepie as a "demon bird" as he ran toward the opposite side of the room and cowered behind a chair. Spoofy, amused by his fearful reaction, flew to his side of the room and began to unleash her natural electrical charge upon him.

G.I.R. giggled until Zim ordered him to go into defensive mode, which prompted the robot to begin pulling Rin's hair again. The mayhem continued for about a minute before Dib realized what was going on.

He rushed to the examination table and shooed G.I.R. away, but once he saw Rin's hair, he almost tumbled to the floor in a painful fit of laughter. Various tufts of hair were bunched together with tiny rubber bands in an assortment of colors, but the placement of the pigtails was truly what made her hairstyle so embarrassingly hilarious. There was one positioned near her left ear, another directly above her forehead, and a few scattered along the top of her head. He felt guilty for finding it so funny, but he really couldn't help it.

"You can stop laughing now," Rin said with a bitter glower.

"No, I don't think I can," he replied with a nasal giggle. However, once he noticed she was still glaring at him, his laughing came to a close with a cough. "Sorry. Let me help you with that strap."

He successfully liberated her without Zim noticing—actually, Zim was still too preoccupied with being zapped by Spoofy to notice much of anything. He remained in a state of shock even after the trio had left his base, crouching behind his chair and shivering. It wasn't until G.I.R. had snatched the remote and flicked the largest monitor to some pointless television show involving a singing sunflower and a fat, freakish-yet-adorable bunny that Zim snapped back into reality.

"Wait! You can't just leave! Get back here!" Unfortunately, they were long gone, leaving Zim to resign to another section of his lab, tinkering away with some new device and trying to put the entire experience behind him. He would try for the remainder of the day without success.


Dib decided to walk Rin home, even though he was having difficulty abstaining from chuckling as she gently freed rubber bands from her hair. She'd sent Spoofy home ahead of them, and was currently wrestling with any remaining unwelcome elastic. Once all seemed clear, she ran her fingers through her hair in an attempt to detangle any newly formed knots. She gave up after getting her fingers stuck a few times, and simply ruffled her hair to try and return it to its normal shape. It didn't quite work, but at least the deformed pigtails—and Dib's snickering—no longer plagued her.

"So, how did you know where to find me?" Rin asked once they'd reached a safe distance from the green alien's house.

"Well, when I noticed Zim was missing from school and your pet came to tell me 'save Rin,' I just put two and two together." He looked down to his feet. "I'm just glad I got there before anything horrible happened."

"Me, too." Rin nodded. "You saved my life, Dib. I am in your debt."

He smiled sheepishly. "Let's not get carried away. It didn't look like Zim was planning on killing you."

"No, but he was planning on turning me into one of his test subjects." She sighed. "I had no idea the problem was so serious. I didn't realize he'd gone so far as to take human prisoners. He's bent on this planet, even if it means attacking one human at a time."

"See? I told you," Dib was quick to remind her, his eyes ablaze with new hope. "Rin, he's never going to stop unless someone makes him—and so far, that someone has just been me."

"Well, it doesn't have to be." She looked over to him. "Dib, it is Anadolian tradition to offer a gift for a random act of kindness—and an even greater gift when a life is saved. However, I've been away from Anadolia so long that I have nothing of value to give. All I have left to offer are my services . . . and my eternal gratitude."

His face lit up almost immediately. Rin didn't even have time to blink before she felt his hands on her shoulders, and his face was only a few inches from her own. "Are you saying you'll help me? Is that what you're actually saying?"

"I'm afraid that is all I could ever give to you," she shrugged.

He had his arms around her before he even had time to convince himself otherwise. His face was nestled into her hair, which smelled absolutely amazing, and her skin was even warmer than he'd remembered. He probably would've kissed her out of sheer excitement if the mere thought didn't scare him senseless.

"This is just great, Rin! You won't be sorry, I promise!"

"Did I make you that happy, Dib?" She asked innocently, her cheeks aflame at the unexpected intensity of his emotions.

"I'm not just happy—I'm ecstatic!" He broke away, only to place his hands on her shoulders again. "Now, come on. I have a bunch of stuff at my house I've been saving for the day I found my partner in Earth's salvation."

Suddenly, Rin's expression changed to that of hesitance. "Oh, Dib, I couldn't. It wouldn't be right for me to accept anything when I am unable to give something of my own."

"Hey, you said you were in my debt, right?"

She raised a tentative eyebrow. "Yes, but I don't see what—"

"Well, consider this another way of making it up to me." He lightly pulled on her arm. "Now, let's get going before it gets too dark."

She sighed. "Fine."

Before she knew it, Rin was running a few paces behind Dib, following him over the winding sidewalks as they made their way toward his house. She was beginning to regret that whole "I am eternally grateful" spiel—she had no idea Dib would turn out to be so manipulative. Sure, he seemed a bit obsessive, what with his fanatical observations of Zim over the last few months; she was surprised no one had confused his spying tactics with stalking yet. However, she would've never suspected him to be so fluent in the art of manipulation.

All characteristics aside, it would be rude to deny his wishes after he saved her life, no matter how much it pained her to admit it. Maybe he'd forget about it after a few days, and things would just go back to normal.

Little did Rin know that things would never be the same again.