A/N: So… five years later since I last updated the story… I guess I owe an explanation. Life happened—school, girls, job, personal projects. Not a great excuse but it's gonna have to do. Okay, so last we left off Tak and the others had just escaped Miz's attack on Earth. So here we go!
Chap X: Almighty Tallest Vas-Quez
Tak sat in the cockpit of her Spittle Runner as it flew into the outer atmosphere of Earth. After the events of their escape, she found herself tuckered. Her passengers Dib and Gaz were tired too. Dib sat in the back with his head thrown back, snoring loudly. Gaz spent her time with her game slave, completely unshaved about the complete takeover of Earth. Tak rested her chin in the palm of her hand and sighed.
MiMi, who had her black cat disguise on, had crawled up to Tak, taking a seat in Tak's lap. Tak ran her hand down MiMi's back, hearing her S.I.R purr. MiMi looked up to Tak with large sad eyes. Tak placed her hand on MiMi's head. "Yes, MiMi," the Irkeness said. "I am sad too."
How can she feel this remorse for a dirty rock like Earth? She nearly destroyed it just to appease her once rulers. But yet, as Tak looked through the ship's glass, she felt sorry for the Earthlings. Miz's ruthless takeover of the planet was completely her fault, and knowing that this was her fault made her gut burn with intense hatred. She gripped the handles of her ship tauter, her gloves crunching against them.
The Spittle Runner flew past the moon, but Tak took no interest in the orbiting satellite. She sometimes wondered why Earth only had one moon. Other planets had several moons but did this one only have one? It made no sense as she thought about it. Then, as she kept thinking about it, Tak took a liking to the moon. It had a sort of essence to it; one that would make Tak think of Zim. Perhaps when I rid of Miz and his infuriating D.R.O.I.D army I will claim the moon, and offer it to Zim.
Dib just awoke, his arms stretching and a yawn escaping his mouth, when Mars was in few. Dib ran to the glass to observe the red planet, face pressed up against the glass. He recalled the time he had to stop Mars from colliding with Earth—another one of Zim's pitiful invasion plans. Then he realized; he was in space! It's not every day that he can just zoom up into the star covered blackness of wonder of space. There was so much that he wanted to learn from this. But most importantly, the Irken race.
Dib left the glass while he pulled out a pen and notepad from his coat. He slid up to Tak with a big grin across his face.
Tak was taken aback by Dib's sudden presence. "What is it you want, Dib?" she demanded, angry that the odd human interrupted her train of thought.
"So, I was thinking," Dib explained. "You Irkens seem to have plenty of technology capable of taking over a planet. Your leaders, by what I know, just seem to be taller than everybody else. And Irkens need those PAKs to stay alive." He pointed to Tak's PAK.
"What are you getting at?" Tak asked.
"I want to know more about your race," said Dib. "Maybe it will be useful when we return to Earth to take down that Zim duplicate."
"What makes you think we're returning to Earth?"
"Because, if anything, Zim will return," Dib said. Tak just stared at Dib, her cheeks growing a shade of light green. "Which means you will return."
Tak sighed with defeat. She didn't want to give Dib a complete history of her race, but it was going to be the only way to shake the human off of her. With a deep breath, Tak explained,
"Okay, Irk is a highly advanced race. Our way of life is much different from yours. Our PAKs determine our duty to society. If one is chosen to be an Invader, his PAK will be encoded to that trait. The same goes for a Service Drone, Janitorial Drone, Food Service Drones. But we would be nothing without the Tallest."
"Your leaders." Dib implied.
"Height has much to do with power on Irk. They are the figureheads that control all of Irk, besides the Control Brains."
"What are those?"
"The true leaders of my planet. Much like your Congress or Parliament, they hold the absolute power. But, I digress back to the Tallest. All of them have been different. The current ones are Tallest Red and Purple,"
"Really?" Dib asked, still interrupting Tak. "Their names are Red and Purple?"
Tak turned to MiMi. The S.I.R Unit transformed back into her metallic robot form. She grabbed Dib by his abnormally large head, lifting him off the ground. "Keep interrupting me and I'll have MiMi throw you out into the void of space. Understand?"
Dib nodded. MiMi released Dib.
"Back to where I was," Tak cleared her throat. "Red and Purple are the current Tallest that are in control. Before them there was Spork. Not much of a leader, but he demanded more from the Irkens, setting the seeds that would be Operation Impending Doom I. Before him, there was the fair Tallest Miyuki. Out of all the Tallest ever she was the best. She brought forth the golden age of Irk, heightening its technology, creating the Massive, and treating the Vortians with respect."
Dib's hand was starting to get strained from writing so much. "So, so far you've only had four leaders out of your long history?"
"No," explained Tak. "There was one more Tallest that I forgot to mention." Her PAK opened and a hologram projected an image of an Irken. The alien was tall with what looked like a mechanical body. The body was meant to look like a robe of some sort. Its waist looked like an exposed spine. Unlike Tak, or Zim, this Irken only had two fingers, or claws, protruding from black gauntlets. "This is the first Tallest ever. He is Almighty Tallest Vas-Quez."
Dib was intimidated by the menacing looking alien in the hologram. The Irkens image demanded authority.
"My Tallest Vas-Quez was the founder of the Irken race. He saved us from extinction by a cloning process called Looming. He mass produced the race within months, building us into the superpower we are today."
Gaz came into the conversation, "So, your race forgot how to have sex?" she asked, never taking her eyes away from her Game Slave.
Tak's cheeks blushed. "That's… that's another story. One best told later." Tak continued with her history lesson. "Vas-Quez also gave us our PAKs so we would live longer." Dib found respect in Tak's tone. "My Tallest Vas-Quez is the reason Irk is alive and well."
There was still plenty more that Dib wanted to know; that he needed to learn. The more he knew of the Irken race the more prepared he could be when he went up against Miz. "What happened to Vas-Quez?" he asked.
"He didn't suffer the same fate as the Tallests after him, that's for certain." Tak responded. Dib didn't understand what that meant, but shrugged it off. "My Tallest Vas-Quez expended his life in his in his PAK. He died peacefully." Tak hung her head in sorrow, and respect for her fallen leader.
"He almost sounds like the founding father of your race." Dib added.
Tak groaned. "That's exactly what I said!" she turned to the human, purple eyes glaring at him angrily. "Weren't you listening?"
Before Dib could reply, the ship was struck violently and spun out of control. The ship's occupants shrieked and were thrown to the ground. Tak quickly regained control of her ship, using all of her might to pull it back on course. She looked out the window and gawked at the oncoming fleet of metal D.R.O.I.D Units flying towards them.
"I thought we shook them!" Dib exclaimed, face pressed against the window.
"Relentless, those robots," Tak commented. She pressed a few buttons on the control panel and fastened the harness on her seat. "Dib, how well are you with a gun?"
"I've never touched a gun in my life!" Dib explained.
Tak pressed a button, activating the ship's weapon system. Outside, a Gatling gun looking cannon emerged from the bottom of the ship. Inside, a separate seat with handles emerged from the floor. "Never too late to learn." Before she could explain the controls of the cannon, the ship was struck again.
The blast had caused Gaz to drop her Game Slave. The red gaming console fell to the floor and shattered, its screws and components scattering across the floor. Gaz's eyes were wide, showing a hint of remorse and sadness in her hazzle eyes. Then her eyes closed shut. Her mouth opened, revealing her gritting teeth. An aura of dark purple smoke radiated from her body.
Gaz leapt from her chair. She stormed up to empty seat, pushing Dib out of the way. She jumped into the seat, holding the handles firmly. Without any explanation from Tak, Gaz started firing at the D.R.O. behind them. Every shot she fired Gaz blasted a robot into nothing but gears and springs.
Tak kept herself focused on diverting the D.R.O. . She maneuvered the ship in any way possible to shake them, but the advanced robots kept coming at them.
She then heard a strange static in the ship. It was faint at first, but it quickly escalated into a high pitched whine. It was so onerous that she had to cover the sides of her head. The whining affected MiMi as well. The small S.I.R Unit's eyes shifted from static to her default red eyes in and out. Dib covered his ears in pain. The whine didn't affect Gaz however; she was still in the mood of avenging her fallen gaming device.
Suddenly, from the D.R.O.I.D's perspective, the Spittle Runner vanished in a flash of blue light. Awestruck, the units stopped with their eyes scanning the area of nothingness. It would seem that they have disappeared. One unit said.
Oh well, another said. Who wants sandwiches!?
The Spittle Runner found itself in a metal room. Tak was baffled, confused. How did this happen? They were just teleported out of the battle in space to this metal circular room. What kind of device could've done this? Tak has some experience in teleporting; she modified her PAK with a teleportation upgrade. But she didn't know of a device that could pluck her ship out of space.
"What happened?" Dib asked, getting up on his feet. He looked over to Gaz. She was still fastened into the seat that controlled the gun, rapidly pressing the fire button. The gun, unbeknownst to her, was disconnected from the ship when it was teleported.
"I don't know," Tak replied. "Someone must have saw us in trouble and decided to rescue us."
"That seems very unlikely." Dib remarked.
"Well," Tak unbuckled her harness and opened the glass dome. She hopped out and inspected the surroundings. "I would like to believe that."
Dib turned away from Tak and turned his attention back at Gaz. She was gritting her teeth angrily, still pressing the fire button. "Gaz," Dib slowly inched towards her. He jumped in fright when Gaz looked at him; her eyes staring deep into his soul.
"They will all rot in the deep bowels of all that is evil for what they have committed!" Gaz declared. "They have released a scourge upon them they cannot hope to escape!"
"Gaz, it's just a Game Slave," Dib explained.
Grabbing Dib's coat and yanking him towards her, Gaz opened her eyes at him with a malignant stare. "It's not just a Game Slave, you lousy sack of meat!" she screamed. "It's MY Game Slave!"
"Will you two shut up!?" Tak demanded. She called her SIR Unit over, and MiMi came, waiting for her orders. "See if you can map out where we are." Tak instructed.
MiMi saluted her master. The feminine SIR went to the nearest vent she could find, breaking through the opening, and scurrying away.
"The sooner MiMi maps out the area," Tak said. "The sooner we can find out where we're at."
"Now why would you send your menacing SIR to do that?" said a voice. Tak, Dib, and Gaz stopped and scanned their surroundings. Gaz looked up. She nudged to Dib, pointing to the ceiling. There was a large speaker in the top of the room. "I would be more than happy to show you my home." The voice emerged from the speaker.
From the opposite end of the room a door opened with the clanking of gears and cogs. Obviously this was an invitation. Tak was cautious; this could be a trap of some sort. But she figured it could be better than dealing with those DROIDs. Tak stood tall and with purpose as she walked towards the door.
"You're not serious, are you?" Dib asked.
"You got a better plan, bighead?" Tak said. She continued towards the door.
Reluctantly, and out of fear of staying in this room alone with his homicidal sister, Dib sprinted after her.
Gaz followed them, leaving a trail of despair and hatred behind her.
As soon as they left the circular room, they were greeted with a long corridor made of metal. The walls however were made of metal. The walls were solid rock. Dib inspected the walls, chipping away at the rock. "Interesting, no?" said the voice.
"Yeah," Dib replied. "Well—it's nothing more than rock. Are we underground or something?"
"Dib, you moron," Gaz said. "We we're just in space. Why would the annoying voice teleport us back to Earth?"
"Smart girl," replied the voice. "Equally rude, but smart… no, Dib, you are not underground. You're in an asteroid."
"An asteroid?" Tak asked.
"Yes, well, more of my home, precisely. I made my home in this asteroid circling in the Asteroid Belt." The voice explained. "Make your way to the end of the corridor. You'll find me in the room there."
Tak and the others walked to the end of the corridor meeting with a closed door. The door slid open. The open door revealed a large lab; there were test tubes filled with a strange organic matter; screens broadcasted pictures and Irken writing. Tak knew this equipment. They were used in the labs beneath Irk's surface. What was it doing inside of an asteroid?
Then she saw a figure at a table. He was tall, incredibly thin, and his feet, which looked like little stubs, were levitating off the ground. His back was to them. Tak was in gape when she spotted something on the figure's back. It was a PAK, covered in black dots.
"An Irken?" Dib asked.
"Not just any Irken…" Tak said shakily.
The Irken finally turned around, facing them. Indeed he was Irken, but, as Tak had said, he wasn't just any Irken. He was a Tallest.
Tak fell to her knees, groveling at the tall Irken. "Okay, so who is this guy?" Gaz asked rudely.
"Show respect, you human slabs!" Tak yelled. "This is my Almighty Tallest Vas-Quez!"
Vas-Quez stepped forward, gesturing with his hand. Dib noticed that the tall Irken only had two fingers, or claws as he would think, instead of three, like Zim and Tak. "In the flesh." Vas-Quez said.
"But, forgive the allegations," Tak said. "You're supposed to be dead."
Vas-Quez chuckled. "That is true, in a sense… you see, I made up that canard so Irk can go on to live."
"Meaning?" Dib asked.
"Meaning, little earthling, that an empire shouldn't have just one leader." Vas-Quez continued, "As Irk grew, I saw the potential in the Irkens I saved from extinction. I even encouraged one little smeet to dream about being the next Tallest; Miyuki."
"Well, sir, it is an honor to meet the creator of a vile invading race." Dib said sarcastically, holding out his hand.
Tak wasn't going to take that kind of insolence. Spider legs emerged from her PAK and pinned Dib to the ground. Tak snarled at Dib. "How dare you speak to my Tallest like that!" she yelled.
Vas-Quez held up his claws, commanding Tak to stop. Tak did as she was told. "I completely agree with you, Dib." Vas-Quez told him. "I am ashamed of the race that I saved. I had hoped that my dear Irkens would prosper. Instead they got greedy and turned into a corporate monopoly."
"But…" Tak was confused. "The role of Invader is encoded into our PAKs. How can that be a mistake?"
It was clear that Vas-Quez didn't have a complete answer. Before the Tallest could speak, he was interrupted by Gaz. "That's super and all… but why did you bring us here. There's no video games."
Vas-Quez rolled his insect like eyes. He reached into his pockets and pulled out a Game Slave. "I got it one day when I was surveying your planet. Confusing to work, but I couldn't bring myself to dispose of it." he handed it to Gaz. "Perhaps you will find some use for it." he winked.
Gaz's eyes opened wide. Her face was alit with happiness. She took the Game Slave and instantly started playing it.
"Now, as to why you are here." Vas-Quez began. "I like Earth. It is quiet, peaceful, idiotic; everything you would expect from a cancelled cartoon show. I want to help you save it."
"And how would you suppose we save Earth?" Dib asked, curious.
"Well, Zim, of course." Vas-Quez answered.
"You know it was him trying to take over the Earth." Dib explained, lifting his brow.
Vas-Quez chuckled again. "His PAK… it's defective."
"Everyone on Irk knows that." Tak claimed.
"Ah, but you forget, little smeet," Vas-Quez lowered himself to Tak's eye level. "Our defects are the best attributes."
Tak was struck with awe. Sometimes she wondered if Zim's purpose in life was to upset the way Irk was. Every disaster in Irk's history was caused by Zim. Everything: two planet power outages, the events on Devastis, single handily destroying the plans for Operation: Impending Doom I, and killing two Tallests. Was this Zim's purpose?
"However, Zim is going to need help." Vas-Quez mentioned. "And I know the perfect solution—for both the Miz specimen and Tallest Red and Purple." He signaled Tak over to him. He brought his lips to her ear and whispered his plan.
Tak was wide eyed, shocked. "You seriously don't mean to get that thing?" she said.
"It worked before." Vas-Quez said. "Return to Irk, retrieve it, and put an end to an empire of incompetence and disgusting snacks."
Tak bowed her head. She couldn't say that she agreed with the plan, but it was there best shot to defeat Miz and the Tallest. "Yes, my Tallest." Tak turned and began to walk towards the door.
Dib followed after her. "Wait, Tak, what is the plan?" he asked. Gaz followed her brother.
"Hold on," Vas-Quez halted Tak. Vas-Quez returned to the table, grabbing something and then setting it on the floor. It was MiMi. Vas-Quez had been working on her. "I saw your SIR Unit was scrapped together. Impressive," he commended Tak's genius. "But you forgot one thing," Vas-Quez fiddled with something behind MiMi's neck, triggering something. "A voice."
MiMi turned to Vas-Quez. "Thank you, my Tallest." She said with a newfound girly voice. She turned to Tak. "Do you like my voice, master?"
"I—I love it." Tak responded. All those years on planet Dirt, when she fashioned her equipment out of junk, MiMi was the only companion she had. She was fueled with so much rage that she forgot to give MiMi a personality, a voice of her own. At least she could've talked to her.
MiMi joined Tak, Dib, and Gaz at the door. They bid Tallest Vas-Quez farewell before leaving.
Vas-Quez waved his claws. "Good luck." He encouraged.
A/N: Alright… I hope this newly updated chapter has given you dedicated fans some satisfaction… if not, I do apologize. Thank you—so very much! The readers, reviewers, and followers of this story… you guys are awesome! You're the reason why I got back into this. Now… this story is dedicated to you guys! I don't know when the next chapter will be, but I won't be on another hiatus for a while, but bear with me.
On another note, I offer a challenge! To any artists, make some kind of movie poster so I can make it the cover of this fanfic. You will be credited for the artwork in one of the chapters, and you will be recommended. Just PM me and I'll give you directions.
Thank you all again, so very, very much!