Yeah, late again. I'm sorry. Look, it's the last chapter, so... you don't have to deal with it again! Enjoy the last chapter!
Disclaimer: I do not own Invader Zim. I only own Kloof and the contents of this story!
Rewrite Ch. 6
I'll Be Back (Goodbye)
"I'm sorry," Kloof said very evenly, "I must have had a wad of bad news caught in my aural circuits. Did you say the weapons were destroyed?"
"That's exactly what I said," Gaz muttered. It pained her to admit that she had let Tak even get some hits in during the fight, let alone a critically damaging attack like that one.
"Well, that makes our prospects a lot darker," Kloof admitted, a bit of artificial cheeriness creeping into his voice, "but we've still got a few options left to us. GAZ! I'm going to need your best maneuvering skills here, or we'll die and you won't get your handheld system! Can I count on you?"
"Where's the game system?"
"We'll DIE, Gaz!" Dib pleaded.
"Shut up! Kloof, where's… the… game… system?" Kloof calmly opened the glove compartment, then opened a second compartment inside the glove compartment, revealing a black device similar in shape to her Gameslave, but with a few clearly alien touches to the design. For one thing, the directional pad was on the other side. Gaz nodded, allowing herself something that might, under some circumstances, be called a smile. "This will be the roughest chase sequence I've ever faced," the purple-haired demon child admitted, turning back to the controls, "So anybody who wants to live should buckle up." As soon as she finished her sentence, the ship took a sudden lurch as she dashed between two Shuvvers that had been waiting for her to make the first move. Trying to cut her off, they only succeeded in smashing into each other.
"Right then," Kloof chuckled. "Dib. There's a self-repair program, and you can read the Irken menu. Find it ASAP so Gaz can get some manner of weapons."
"Right!" Dib opened a viewscreen on his corner of the windshield and began browsing the interface with an admirable speed, considering he had only first seen this alphabet three or four months ago. The ship lurched as Gaz dodged a Viral Tank's swarm of beams, and Dib's head slammed into the dashboard with an audible thud (and a more audible yelp), but he did his best to shrug it off and keep poking at the keyboard, ignoring a bit of blood seeping down his forehead. He heard the pounding of faster, more frenzied typing, and looked over to see Kloof working on something else. "What're you doing?"
"When I joined Black Ops, I gained access to all their override codes – you saw me use one to shut down Zim's computer – but I'm not sure if they'll work, or to what extent. Black Ops was in a HORRIBLE state when I joined – I was the only new recruit in sixty years, and the only young Irken left by any measure, because Miyuki and subsequent Tallest had disproved of them AND cut most of their funding. Their codes were mostly outdated, but luckily so was Zim's equipment. The ships that accompany the Massive are newer, and these codes might not work. Even if they do, there's probably a limit on how many codes work at a time, to prevent Black Ops from attempting a coup." Kloof had been typing continuously as he spoke. "Unfortunately, I've tried every code I have for these ships. I think these codes are worthless except against outdated Irken tech. WORTHLESS!" he nearly smashed his fist into the control panel, but stopped himself in time. "How are things on your end, Dib?" he asked, the false cheeriness back.
"Good, kinda. In another… thirty seconds, the missile launchers will be back on, but it'll take a few hours to repair the laser – Tak mostly damaged that."
Gaz growled. "The missile launchers are useless! I ran out before Tak got me!"
"Crap," Kloof said simply.
"And these bastards are herding me back towards the Massive! If we get within a thousand feet of that thing, its lasers will obliterate us!"
"Double crap – wait a minute. We can load things into the missile launchers from in here!" Kloof turned to Dib, who had done all he could for the self-repair program. "Dib, what in here can we feed into the missile slots?!"
"What?" Dib scratched his head. "Maybe that SIR Unit I got?"
"No, that's too big. This thing launches missiles about the size of…" Kloof trailed off as an explosion, dangerously close, rocked the cockpit.
"About the size of what?!" Dib questioned impatiently.
Kloof stroked his chin. "…the size of… a can of soda." He leapt from his seat, only to immediately fall to one knee from another shockwave. "QUICKLY! Help me load all the soda into the missile slots, Dib!" He brought an entire case of soda cans, Irken in origin, out of the fridge.
"All of this?!" Dib asked incredulously, crawling across the floor of the ship towards the cans.
Kloof sniffled a little as he opened a circular hole under the right-hand side of the control panel. "All of it," he said sadly. "Remember, throw the cans in unopened. They should burst in the vacuum of space and create a foamy smokescreen."
"That plan's totally insane!" Dib argued.
"Any better ideas?"
"… I'm stuffing already!"
"Grab onto something!" Gaz warned, barrel rolling the ship to dodge a flurry of spherical energy blasts. She was now being flanked by a quartet of Voot Cruisers, each of a newer, faster model than Zim's. She looped the ship upwards, and the Cruisers followed the move exactly, but instead of completing the loop, she pushed away the throttle and completed an S-shaped climb, shaking the Voots for the time being. Unfortunately, this put her into oncoming traffic with a dozen hostile Spittle Runners, all of which tried to ram into her and get their claws into play. Gaz managed to dodge through the flurry, even sideswiping one into another, but it was only a matter of time at this rate.
There was suddenly a pleasant ding from the console. "The missile launcher is repaired!" Kloof said happily.
"Is all the soda loaded?" Gaz asked.
"Last can!" Dib yelled, pushing it into the machine.
"Alright, Gaz! Fire when ready, but be warned it's only an escape cloud!"
"Right," Gaz growled as she pressed down on the missile trigger, targeting every ship she could find. Instantly soda cans were fired in all directions from the ship's missile pods; after a few seconds, the cans could no longer take the sudden lack of air pressure, and exploded, sending thin waves of foaming soda in all directions. The soda distorted light passing through them, quickly making the Squidge invisible, and it tended to coat any ships that passed through it, getting sticky in all the absolutely worst places.
"Alright, Gaz, there's the ONLY hole in the soda cloud!" Kloof pointed almost straight up. "Hurry through it!"
"You can do it, Gaz!" Dib added.
"Shut up, Dib. I don't need your stupid encouragement." With practiced ease, Gaz flew the gunship through just before the soda foamed up and closed the hole.
"All the small ships are still focusing on the cloud!" Kloof cried. "We're in the clear!"
"What's with the Massive?" Dib asked. "It's just… sitting there."
"NOT the time to look a gift horse in the mouth, Dib," Kloof argued as a few stray lasers began to pass around them again. The Armada had caught on. "Is the hyperdrive working, Gaz?"
"Yeah. Activating it."
---
Meanwhile, aboard the Massive, Purple had worked himself into a froth at the Armada's inability to stop Kloof's ship. Literally, in fact – he was currently busy having his face de-frothed by a service drone. Red, as usual, had managed to keep only a little more presence of mind. "Where are our lasers? The Massive has HUGE lasers, I'm sure of it!" He turned to the techs on the bridge. "If you're worried about friendly fire, you can stop! We'll get new ships, new pilots, but I want that aberration gone!"
"It's not friendly fire issues, sir!" a red-eyed tech reported. "All of our major weapons systems are unresponsive! We're running a diagnostic to find the problem!"
"Results are in!" a green-eyed tech added. "We can't connect to the weapons due to… ripped wiring!"
---
The hatch opened, and Dib stumbled out onto his roof. He never thought his town's polluted air would smell so good. Smiling, he got up on his hands and knees, but Gaz used him as a doormat, stomping him back down before he could rise fully. "I need to thank you guys," Kloof said. "The mission failed, yes, but I never would have made it out of there without both of you."
"I was promised payment," Gaz said with a frown, stepping backwards off Dib.
"And so it is delivered." Kloof tossed her a black handheld device. She snatched it out of the air and looked it over. "It's Vortian tech from back before they were blindsided by the Irken WAR machine. Totally modular. It'll work with any game here on Earth."
"Gamethrall?" Gaz asked, reading the cover. She pulled out a Gameslave disc and held it above the too-small slot on the alien machine, trying to decide how to cram it in. Without warning, the Gamethrall's slot widened and extended slightly into the air like a pair of plastic lips. It grabbed the disc from Gaz's hand with a disturbing slurping sound and pulled it inwards, closing a slot now perfectly shaped for Gameslave discs. "Cool." Then the game system booted up with a faint chime, and Pig Cannon XI instantly started up. The sound and resolution were flawless, and the brightness automatically corrected itself to best suit the game and the ambient light. "Very cool." Without so much as a goodbye, Gaz turned away, her nose in the new game system, and made for the stairwell.
"HEY!" Dib cried, looking over the railing of his house. "My ship! It's gone!"
"Tak took it back, so I blew it up," Gaz said with a shrug, opening the door to the stairs. "SUCKS to be you." Then she was gone.
"I'm sorry, Dib. I knew she was planning to get her ship back, but I didn't know she'd immediately grab it after we left." Kloof shook his head. "Look, you got me the SIR. I'll get you a new, fresh-out-of-the-box Spittle Runner, with no personality plugged in at all!"
Dib turned, and his eyes lit up with the kind of mania that came naturally to experienced paranormal investigators. "Really?!"
"It's the least I can do… Well, not the least… I'm trying to say that I OWE you." Kloof looked around, rubbing the back of his neck (which made a thoroughly unpleasant metal-on-metal scraping sound). "I don't doubt that you can… at least keep Zim in CHECK. He's only the tip of the Irken spaceberg, you know. But if things get especially nasty around here, and especially if Tak returns…" Kloof threw Dib a silver disc. "…you can call me. Just… don't make a habit out of it, alright? If you can stop Zim, there might be a future in the Resisty for you."
"Really?" Dib asked. Flying around space, with a bunch of friendly aliens, blasting an evil empire… man, that'd be the life…
"Uh-huh. Anyway, gotta go. My cover is blown, so that means more… open operations against the Empire. My face will probably be burned with HATE into the brains of every Irken, everywhere… but I'm trying to save them." Kloof turned, striding back into his ship and restarting the engines. "What do they know, anyway?!" Then the door shut and he was gone.
"Doesn't anybody say good-bye anymore?" Dib asked rhetorically.
"GOOD-BYE, DIB-STINK!" Covered in burns and bruises, sans-disuise, Zim was right behind where the Gunship had been.
"Ahhh!" Dib fell on his butt, waiting for the end… but nothing happened.
"…is what I would say if I had any working weapons left on me…" Zim finished lamely. "Anyway, I just came to tell you that I GOT BACK TO EARTH A WHOLE FIVE MINUTES BEFORE YOU!"
"…so?" Dib asked.
"I could've taken over the Earth by now!" Zim claimed triumphantly.
"In five minutes?"
"YES!"
"Then why didn't you?"
"Well… I was too busy running to your stupid stink-house to wait for you, so I could tell you I COULD!"
"Okay." Dib decided the logic was getting him nowhere. "Where'd you get the burns?"
"I flew right through a lava asteroid to get here first!"
"The lava was squishy and pink! SMELLED LIKE ROSES!" Gir screamed, his metal body rattling… like a rattle.
"WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? It did not!" Zim turned to Gir and began arguing with him… well, Zim was arguing, and Gir was contributing a string of non sequiters.
Dib listened to a few minutes of it before interrupting. "Well, that's fascinating (I didn't even know there were lava asteroids), but I'm tired. I'm going to bed. G'night."
"Goodbye!" Gir yelled, flailing his arm in what might generously be called a wave.
"No, Gir, it's goodnight," Zim corrected.
"But you an' big head boy were talkin' bout' goodbye…" Gir mumbled, confused.
Zim sighed. He had a lot to think about – how could that scum traitor humiliate him like that? It didn't fit… he was ZIM! He was perfection! Why did Tak keep insisting he was so horrible for the Empire? And why did he keep needing help to best Tak and Kloof, if he was so perfect? It made his head hurt – and he'd sustained a lot of blows to the skull today. More head pain was the last thing he needed. He needed to relax, repair his Spider-legs and Minimoose, maybe abduct and torture a few hobos. "Come on, Gir, let's go home."
"G'night," Gir responded cheerfully as he followed Zim.
End of Story
Yeah, thanks to everybody for coming along for the ride! Special thanks to Yellowfur for writing the original and beta-ing this version, and to ngrey651 and SusieSaysNo for providing the vast majority of the reviews! Also, special thanks to Jhonen for ... ahh, forget it, you know already.
I have two more in this series (Shadowboxing and Dommination Industries), and I plan to make three more somewhere along the line. Be warned that Shadowboxing was the first fic I wrote solo, so it's a sharp drop in quality from this. Not in spelling and grammar - I was always pretty good with that - but don't look too closely at the character's motivations at any given moment, I was still learning as a writer at the time. I'm afraid I have no plans to rewrite Shadowboxing, so if you want to continue you'll have to make do.
