Flip leaped at the bounty hunter blocking the way out of the alley. His Pak legs scraping the asphalt were enough to make the hunter turn, and he knocked Flip aside with the rocket-rifle's barrel. He hit the bricks of one of the buildings and bounced to the ground, metal extensions sprawling.
He shoved himself up with a wince as his Pak legs retracted. He raised his head, gasped, and did a tuck-and-roll between the bulky hunter's legs before a freshly-fired precision rocket made contact with the building.
The MacMeaties exploded into flames, fed by copious amounts of meat and grease, some of it still human-shaped. Flip crouched and covered his head with his arms as charred brick fragments fell, but looked up a couple seconds later when he didn't get blown away by any shockwaves. He stood and turned—the power-armored hunter had taken the full brunt of the blast.
The hunter lurched backward, and Flip skittered hastily out of the way as the large alien hit the ground, precision rocket-rifle clutched in all four arms. The armor on his torso and limbs had blocked the heat and shrapnel with only soot and scrapes to show for it. His exposed face hadn't.
Flip ran out of the alley, away from the smoking wreckage, away from the sizzling knot of meat inside the bounty hunter's helmet. He locked his eyes straight ahead, hoping he wouldn't hear those power-armored legs thudding up from behind.
When they happened anyway, it didn't sound like that four-armed, two-legged guy. It sounded more like lots of guys with lots of legs. Flip risked a glance over his shoulder, shrieked, and ran faster.
The hulking menace had thankfully stayed down next to the demolished MacMeaties. But the explosion had attracted dozens more suited-up and weapon-wielding hunters. Some were taller, some were stouter, some slithered on weird appendages, and every single one was way bigger than Flip.
As he tried to outrun the bounty hunter deluge, some of their voices carried over the noise. "Izzat him? Izzat the guy?!" Talking about his teacher, no doubt. Flip knew for a fact that visitors didn't come for a friendly chat with that many guns. That also meant he couldn't go back to the base to hide—not without leading every single hunter right to Zim.
So he went with his only other option. Flip ducked through a fence hole GIR had made, buying himself some time as the hunters had to deal with the white picket barrier. It was already splintering behind him as he jumped over a big-wheel trike and ran under a leaf-strewn trampoline. He jumped the chain-link fence on the other side, and crawled under the neighbor's parked SUV.
Flip got to his feet on the other side of the driveway, panting. He hadn't quite been in the heart of the city when he'd started running, but GIR's playful trek had spanned several blocks. He didn't wait to catch his breath, though, and went around the side of the house into the street.
He darted his head left, right, then ran to his destination. He'd slowed to more of a loping stagger by the time he reached the house's front walk, and knocked on the door.
Some noise came from inside, and the door opened partway. Flip shifted one foot back and stared up at Gaz, as she squinted down at him. She had one hand on the doorknob, and the other holding a wireless game controller. Flip couldn't find the words to ask someone that dark and scary for help.
Power-armored stomping came from around the side of the Membrane house, and Flip froze. Gaz snapped her gaze up, whipped her arm back, and threw the game controller over Flip's head. He ducked in reflex, then looked behind him when the controller collided with something metal.
The closest bounty hunter, standing just past the garage, stared down at his primed-to-fire plasma bazooka, now jammed with an eight-button input device.
"Oh, mother," he muttered.
The gun exploded in his face, catching several other hunters behind him. Gaz stood to one side as she opened the door wider. Flip jumped inside before Gaz slammed and double-locked it behind him.
Flip turned his wide, disguised eyes up to Gaz again. "Help me!"
She raised an eyebrow. "Who did you piss off?" The living room blinds, drawn to shut out sunlight, trembled from the stomping of alien bounty hunters skulking around outside.
"I dunno!" Flip scurried away from the door and pressed himself flat against the wall, opposite the window. "They wanna kill Teacher, so I can't go back to the base."
"So you led them here," Gaz said, watching the blinds rattle against the panes. "Instead of the painfully obvious glowing green house you live in?"
Flip's eyes bugged out, and he whispered, "They'll hear you!"
The blinds rippled away from the windows as something large banged against the front of the house. Flip screamed and curled in a ball. Gaz strode to the window and yanked down an opening in the blinds, revealing one of the power-armored hunters backing up for another go.
"It'll be your fault if that bozo destroys my house," Gaz said, voice raised enough to carry a hint of threat.
Flip covered his head, still curled up. "But what am I supposed to do?!"
Gaz fixed him with a squinty brown-eyed glare. Behind her, the blinds fell still. "You can face what's out there. Or you can get cornered, and die."
The living room window burst inward, glass shards and mechanical wall bits flying past an unflinching Gaz. Pieces of the Membrane house pinged off the TV and furniture.
"What's going on?" Dib called, thumping down the stairs. "Gaz, are you playing that dumb space marine shooter agai—woah my god."
Gaz stepped off to one side as the dust cleared. A giant black and silver rocket-fist sat in the wrecked wall. It retracted on a thick tether cord, and clanged back onto the end of a bounty hunter's blocky, gauntleted arm. He swaggered in on tiny legs with rocket-fists on both huge arms, sneering through a tusky underbite.
"C'mon out, Zim!" the top-heavy alien rumbled. "I got a nice cool box for ya." A smaller arm swung out from behind his back, holding a compact white cube, perfectly sized for an Irken's head. Cold white fog leaked from within.
Dib picked his way over glass and metal shards in his socks. "Zim's not even here, so stop destroying my house!"
Flip stood, catching Dib's attention. He only had one second to give the human a pleading look before the hunter pointed a rocket-fisted hand at Dib.
"Sounds like ya know the guy. Tell me where he is!"
Dib glared at him. "I'm not your psycho alien GPS."
The hunter's upper lip curled back, almost like a smile. "Think you're funny, huh." His armored fists gave off a high-pitched whine as their engines primed for rocketing. "I'll letcha keep thinkin' that."
Flip's legs refused to do anything but tremble. Dib stood between him and yet another huge, scary alien after his teacher's life. Teacher trusted these humans.
Two simultaneous clicks sounded as the catches for both rocket-fists released at once, blasting off in flares of cosmic fuel. Flip didn't hear their engines as his focus locked itself on the metal fists closing in on Dib.
Flip shoved his arms back against the wall, throwing himself forward as he dove between Dib's legs. He didn't wait for his own legs to cooperate, and rose up on his lower Pak extensions, high enough for the upper ones to meet one rocket-fist each.
He swayed in spindly suspension for the longest instant. Then two Pak lasers fired, ripping the protective shells off the rocket-fists to expose the combustion devices within.
They sputtered outside their destroyed confines, and exploded.
With no time to dodge, Dib brought up his arms to shield himself—right before something green and purple popped up between him and certain doom.
He shut his eyes as the fists detonated, flying back into the wall. The explosions were small, but close enough to lift him with their concussive force.
The tiny Irken thumped into his chest, and fell into his lap. Dib waited until some of the ringing in his ears went away before he risked opening his eyes. The beefy alien had been sent flying as well, straight out the gaping hole in the front of the house.
Flip, who had saved Dib's life in an act of unwitting payback, was completely limp. His spiky-banged wig was coming off, one notched antennae peeking out from underneath. He wasn't as scorched as Dib expected, but then again, Irken skin was surprisingly flame-resistant.
Dib flicked a piece of rocket-fist casing off his shoulder, gathered up the smeet, and stood. Flip, barely seven weeks old, showed no response as Dib turned him over to check for signs of life.
Gaz walked out from behind the couch, her explosion shield. "I think he's dead."
Dib stared down at the Irken draped over his hands. "He can't be dead," he said, panic worming its way into his voice. "Zim would murder me."
Gaz pointed at the hunter's scorched corpse decorating the lawn. "I meant that guy."
Dib peered out into the yard. Other bounty hunters milled about, apparently unaware that anyone was still alive inside. A pink force-field flickered across the jagged wall gap; the temporary barrier built into the house had activated.
Dib went to the explosion-blackened couch, and sat Flip in one corner. "Come on, wake up," he said. "You have to tell me what's going on. What did Zim do to get this many aliens out for his blood?"
A soft, short tone came from inside Flip's Pak. Dib glanced at it, then at Flip as the smeet's eyes cracked open. He flinched awake a second later, looking around wildly.
Dib held his hands up. "Easy. You exploded that guy. It's okay now."
"No it's not." Flip was breathing kind of fast. "There's like a million of 'em!"
The Pak continued beeping. Dib said, "Are you gonna answer that?"
Flip tried to look at his Pak in horror, but his neck couldn't turn that far. The most he achieved was a frightened gawk over his shoulder. "Teacher's calling. But I can't answer it here. They'll trace the signal back to the base." His Pak kept beeping.
"I know," Dib said. "We can use Tak's ship. The cloaking should allow you to answer from inside of it undetected."
The tension leaving Flip's body was almost tangible. "Where is it?"
Dib stood, and led Flip to the garage. Gaz followed as well, prompting Flip to walk a little faster.
The trio piled into Tak's ship, which stayed tethered to the house's internal electronics while dormant. Dib shut them inside, powered it up, and hit the cloaking key. Nothing changed for them, but the glowing fuchsia CLOAK signal meant the ship had vanished as far as anyone outside was concerned, occupants and all.
Flip removed the beeping handheld communication device from inside his Pak, and pressed a button on it. It projected a rectangular holo-screen, with Zim dominating the middle.
"Flip! Why weren't you answering?!" Zim's voice was the loudest thing Dib had heard since the rocket-fist explosion. "This is no time to be playing with humans."
Flip, wedged between the Membrane siblings, shook his head. "I came here 'cause I can't go back to the base. The bounty hunters will follow me."
"Can't is the worst excuse!" Zim said. "I trained you to be a death machine, only slightly less unstoppable than me."
"But they're huge!" Flip squealed, clutching the communication device. "And they keep shootin' explodey things at me!"
"And my house," Dib butted in, glaring at Zim's projection. "You owe me a new living room. Why do they want you, anyway?"
"Not now, noise-hole!" Zim snapped. As Dib sat back, muttering "Noise-hole?" to himself, Zim focused on Flip again. "Bounty hunters from all over the universe are after my sweet cranial meats for some unfathomable reason. I've put the base on lockdown, but that'll only last as long as the reserve power does."
Stomping came from outside the dim garage. Dib glanced back at the door leading into the house, hoping none of the bounty hunters realized the temporary force-field in the wall wasn't the shocking kind.
"Even if I canceled the lockdown, there'd be too many hunters in the area for you to..." Zim gave the ship's occupants a thoughtful little squint. "Are you sure this call isn't being monitored?"
Flip nodded. "Uh-huh. We're cloaked inside Dib's spaceship." To his right, Gaz grumbled, extracted Flip from between Dib and herself, and plopped him on Dib's knee.
"That's Tak's—nevermind," Zim said. "Here's what we'll do. We'll both come out of hiding, so we can meet half-way."
Flip shrank back on Dib's thigh.
"The plan will fail unless you work with me," Zim said.
Dib looked down at the tiny alien sitting on his leg, staring at the device rather than the holo-screen. In their current situation, Flip didn't have time to be too little or too scared.
The smeet met Zim's steely gaze sooner than expected. "Okay. I'll do it."
Zim gave him a nod. "Good. We'll meet at these coordinates." He messed with something off-screen, and Flip's Pak made a soft beep. "Now get there as quickly as possible. Be speedy, be stealthy, and don't stop for anything."
"Roger," Flip said, sitting up straight and throwing a salute. The transmission ended, and Gaz uncloaked the ship.
"Wait!" Dib said as Flip slid off his knee and hopped outside. "We can just keep the ship cloaked and fly you there."
"Nope," said Gaz. "I'm not dealing with this crap. I was in the middle of something important before the bounty hunter brigade ruined everything." She pushed a button, and a spare game controller and console emerged from beneath the flight controls.
"How long has this thing had video games?"
"Since I was ten. Right after I upgraded the weapons." Gaz picked up the controller, powered up the game, and said, "Get out."
One of the ship's metal tentacles whipped inside, coiled around Dib, and tossed him out. He got to his feet, rubbing his face, and looked up. Flip was stretching an arm to open the door leading back through the house.
"Wait a minute." Dib cleared the distance to Flip in a few strides. "You probably shouldn't go that way." Flip peered back at him, still reaching for the doorknob. "Let's go through the lab instead. We can get outside through the staff entrance."
Flip turned to face him. "You're coming, too?"
"Well... Gaz took the only real safe spot. And I might as well." He stepped away from the door toward one of the garage walls. He shoved aside a set of shelves lined with eviscerated electronics, revealing a blank wall with an embedded keypad in the middle. He punched in 70457, and the wall vanished into the ceiling with a shwink.
"This way," Dib said, starting down the stairs to the underground tunnel connecting Membrane Labs to his house.