By this chapter if you don't know that I don't own Invader Zim, you need to get yourself checked out. I would like to thank all of those who reviewed and read all these years giving me the courage to keep going through the writer's block. Well I hope you like this chapter. Anyway, enough of this A/N, on with the fic!
Tak stood outside the bedroom door, waiting for Dib to fall asleep. Dib was on the edge of pneumonia and Tak was not about to leave him until she knew that he was asleep. She leaned back along the door and sighed. Professor Membrane was going to need her help and she had to deliver her skills for his use. He needed to break the Irken's weakness and Tak, as an Irken in disguise herself, knew that all too well. Luckily I am so good at fooling humans... I mean Dib bought my disguise when I first came to Earth. Tak thought as she got up and dusted herself off and headed to the basement where Professor Membrane was working. "Time to help the man I had tortured only not so long ago." Tak said under her breath. "Have to make sure my voice is disguised…"
"Where are you going to Kat?" Frank asked hearing her footsteps.
"To talk to Professor Membrane." Tak said in her Kat voice. Thinking quickly, she added to her Kat backstory. "I found a few weaknesses of the Irkens that may help him."
"Yeah, what is that?" Frank asked as he put some oil on the shotgun he always carried with him.
"I found it out when I was on the run before I ran into Dib. I was running and this one Irken captured me and was holding me hostage. I was fighting but he was strong. I got free but not for long. I was running again and spilled my canteen on one of them when I was captured again." Tak said trying to make Kat seem like she knew what it was really like for the rebels out there.
"Ah, I see. So what did it do?" Frank asked. He had heard rumors of water hurting Irkens but he wasn't completely sure.
"It burned him bad." Tak said.
"What about those supposed paste suits they have?" Frank asked, intrigued even more.
"Oh this was on a sunny day. This guy must have been a real idiot anyway." Tak said.
"If only more were like that…" Frank mumbled.
"Anyway, this guy was alone so I was able to just run off. But I remembered what it did to him well. Then I saw those two dead Irkens you shot. They had to be high ranking officers. I could tell because the idiot I injured was actually shorter than me." Tak said.
Frank nodded. "I see. Professor Membrane should learn about this. He is pretty smart. Now he is working on shells for shotguns designed for use against Irkens. You see Kat, most rebels have just those. Many of them had one for home defense before the Invasion. However, most of the Irkens were too lazy to take the guns from us rural people."
"This I know…" Tak said. I told the Tallest that! But would they listen to me? Nooooooooooo. Oh well, that will be their downfall.
"Well, anyway, tell Professor Membrane what you told me." Frank said. "He's in the basement." Then Frank pointed down the hall to a flight of cement steps.
"Good." Tak said. She walked by the room Dib was in and she peeked in the door. He was still asleep, but he was curled up in the blankets with a smile on his face. That was a rare sight indeed. That probably has not been there for a long time… Tak thought. Then a guilty pang befell upon her. I removed that smile from his face… Looking at her feet, she strengthened her resolve. I have got to help his dad defeat the Empire. I have to help him beat my people… Tak sighed as she looked at the ceiling. She knew she had enough of the Irken Empire and all it did, all its politics and how it used her. Recalling her days before the Invader test she growled. She had talent, potential and was named one of the best of her class. Yet she was not given a retest just because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It would not be fair to the others, they said. So to be fair, she had to wait with all the flunk-outs. Yet somehow, Zim was made an Invader when he destroyed half the testing planet. For these reasons alone, she was willing to rebel. She should have rebelled a long time ago. Then Dib came into the picture and that complicated things even more. No matter what, she admired Dib and deep down, she did care for him. Because of that she drank so much while she was Head of Torture. She finished walking down the steps and knocked on the door of the basement.
"Who is it?" Professor Membrane asked.
"Kat." Tak said. "I have some valuable information for you." She explained.
Professor Membrane got up from his workbench and opened the door. "Yes, come on in Kat. You remind me of Dib and Ga-" He paused. Mentioning Gaz pained him too much. Knowing she hated him and sold him out was like an icicle to the heart. "Well, Dib's mother anyway."
"Well thanks I guess…" Tak said. "But I have to tell you about what I know. Frank says you are working on a special anti-Irken shotgun shell."
"Yes I am." Professor Membrane said as he sat down and motioned for Tak to sit by him. He opened a box of shotgun shells, pulled one out prying it open and spilling out the continents into a small dish in front of him. Then he took a pair of tweezers and examined the pellets that came from the shell. "I have heard Irkens have a water weakness. Frank also told me that if he shot at one from far away, even if the pellet did penetrate the body, it would do nothing and the Irken would heal."
"Paste suits prevent water from hurting them and they do have force fields." Tak explained. She also knew that as an Irken herself as long as a penetrating object didn't hit the PAK or damage the Squedleyspooch too much that an Irken could recover from almost any injury. However she could not tell anyone that. She was known as Kat Mann. Kat would not know that. At best she could pretend she was a science genius and help Professor Membrane to build the shells. Tak knew that her information on Irken physiology would be immensely helpful to the rebellion but it would not suit her disguise and she needed to keep up appearances.
"It's been hard working on this without all my lab tools. As I am sure you know, I was world renowned before the Invasion." Professor Membrane said.
"And they wanted you to help them?" Tak asked.
"But I wouldn't. And it meant choosing between my children too. Gaz wanted me to help Zim, but I remembered that my duty was to help improve MANKIND, so I refused. I refused right to Gaz's face too. I think it was that when she made me Undesirable Number 2 then as well…"Professor Membrane said, hiding his tears.
"I'm sorry." Tak said. She could see from what he was saying that Professor Membrane was having as much trouble with helping the rebellion as she was. He had even more of a right than she was to help the rebels. Being beaten, tortured and made wanted because you fathered the most wanted man who is only most wanted because the governor of the planet had a vendetta against him. However, he had to choose between his kids. Gaz was his only daughter and a reminder of the beloved wife he lost so long ago. Having to attack Gaz would be like attacking a memory of his dead wife.
"I have found from my research," Professor Membrane said motioning to a bunch of magazines about shotguns and books that were about guns, "that the shot is immensely hot. I would need to find a way to keep the shells cool so that the projectile is still liquid water."
"You need a capsule that can withstand the heat." Tak said.
"Yes. I need to find a material that would withstand that that I can easily get." Professor Membrane said. "Like I said, I do not have my lab equipment that would make this stuff so easy to do. I mean I did harness perpetual energy. Can't do that now."
"Come on, we can do something!" Tak said.
"If only I had my equipment." Professor Membrane said as he took each shell from the box and tossed them at the wall.
Tak went over and picked up each of the shells. It was amazing that a man with Professor Membrane's reputation would have such a break when he does not have the fancy tools he did before the Invasion. It seemed that the tools made this man more than the man made the tools. It reminded her of so many Irken scientists when she saw one of their tools break. She walked over to Professor Membrane, took the shotgun shell box from his hands and smacked him. "And here I thought you were brilliant. No scientist should look at things from all the angles, not just one. And so should the good tactician."
"What do you mean Kat?" Professor Membrane said as he rubbed where Tak smacked him.
"The shotgun would be only part of the plan. You have to think more of what is available and what you know the weaknesses of Irkens are!" Tak yelled. "Think!" She then grabbed the nearest item, an old water gun, and smacked him again.
"Wait a minute Kat; you may have given me a good idea." Professor Membrane said as he looked at the old water gun in Tak's hands. He grabbed it from her and looked upon it. Irkens were weak against water, the rebellion knew that. Why they could overlook the fact that a simple toy was beyond him. Maybe it was too small of a thing for someone to really think about. However, he looked at it and smiled. Professor Membrane smiled and then hugged Tak. "Kat you gave me a brilliant idea."
"You said that already." Tak said.
"Yeah well, you know, I am just so excited. Frank can keep his guns. This is brilliant. Ninjas did this in Japan and we can do this too! I can create a solvent for the Irken paste suits better than I can a shotgun shell that can defy the laws of physics. Well with what I got here anyway. I think we can do this." Professor Membrane said.
Tak smiled. This was her chance. She now saw where Dib got his brilliance and she could help. "We will need to get ahold of a paste suit" She said. "Irkens may have a special formula not like Earth glue."
"We'll tell Frank about this." Professor Membrane said. "He and maybe you can do that well."
"Wait, the dead Irkens he was in the pasture!" Tak yelled. They would have their utility belts and that is where the paste suits came from. "Be right back!" Running past Frank and Kathy, she headed into the pasture and took the belts off Uto and Larkz's bodies. So you two will be useful to me after all. Funny, I will never get away from you guys being my tools and pawns. Tak thought with a smirk on her face. She put the belts over her shoulder and walked back down the path she came up on. Then a rustle was heard in the bushes. "Who's there?" She asked.
"Get her!" A voice from the bushes said knocking Tak to the ground.
Well how was that? Good? Bad? Suspenseful? Makes you want to read more? Let me know in a review. Sorry it isn't as long as some of the other chapters but this was a short one. Anyway remember to read (well you just did) and to review. Ciao for now
Otherrealmwriter
Aka
Realm.
