I do not own Invader Zim okay? I am hoping to get this story finished by the end of the year this year and if I do not, then it will be pretty close to being wrapped up. Other than that I don't have much to say here, so enough of this A/N, on with the fic!
Gaz stared at the TV as a daytime game show she had remembered growing up was playing. Apparently, even though the Irkens had taken over and ruled everything, they still wanted to have the humans have some hope that they could get something. Many where left destitute and working in the sweatshops for a few hours then sent home to leave on the meagar rations they were issued to 'suppliment' their income. It was an idea that the Tallest had. Rather than work the force to death, break their will so they won't have anything to fight for and would be easier to reprogram with PAKs. The phrases 'bread and circuses' and 'enough rope to hang themselves' was used a lot. As she stared at the host, who had a PAK installed when Irk had taken over, she noticed the old repetive music soothed Zib and caused him to fall asleep quicker. "You sure you are my child, not some sort of embryo that was implanted in me?" Gaz said as she looked at the TV and plotted her next move. "One thing is for certain, I have to find Seamus. He helped to get me free with his trick of the security system." But what about Zib? She thought to herself. He'll be fine if I fail. He's young enough they won't punish him for my crimes because there would be no way in hell he would know about them in the first place, he's only days old. If I die, and somehow Zim dies and Dib gets killed, the Irkens will take good care of him. Gaz thought with a sour disdain as she tried to cement her will for the worst that could happen.
Christie came up and sat down beside Gaz, staring intently on the television. "So, they still have 'The Cost is Correct' on at the same time it has been for nearly 40 years now huh?" Gaz looked over at her and blinked, ignoring her. "You know I used to watch this all the time when I was little or sick from school." She contiuned as Gaz focused on Zib. "See, I really liked the host before but the guy they got now, well he's good but it's been 4 years and things just don't seem like that they would have progressed like they should..."
"Can we just cut the bullshit and get to the point? You want something from me and you don't have the balls to just say it." Gaz said as she stared Christie down while holding Zim and placing a bottle in his mouth.
"Fine, I'll cut the crap. I don't want you to be a suicide bomber to the Tallest. It won't help anyone at all. You will leave poor little Zib without a mother, and what will Dib do? He cares so much about you he risked rescuing you in the first place. I think after Zim, he loves you most of all on this planet!" Christie pleaded.
"See, this may be the reason the Elieson family is still a newsance to the Irken Empire. They think they need to be alive to do something. Well, I should stand corrected, the youngest didn't learn from her parents' and brother's deaths." Gaz said as she placed Zib in a bassonet and turned to Christie. "Yeah, look at me with that hate and disdain but I am older than you and been through worse shit."
"Oh yeah? Like what?" Christie said. She had just had her own honor insulted and what struggles she did have to go through brushed aside. "You didn't see your parents die while locked in a closet only to have the soldiers who did it laugh at the small amount of monies they would get for you. You didn't have to live in dumpsters for years until you nearly got run over by a general and scientist and then have to live in secret while working a day job at a club where you get felt up by so many creepos you can never love again."
Gaz actually cracked a psychopathic smile and laughed. "Oh that's it? I thought you suffered more."
"Oh you don't fight the desire to kill your brother because he killed my brother each day. You don't feel the shame I do for being alive when my family died in more noble ways." Christie said, tears of shame, sorrow and rage welling up in her eyes.
"Look, you may need a little perspective to get your shit together upstairs." Gaz said as she looked into Christie's eyes. "Before this even started, before Zim even came to Earth, my mother was killed. On her way home from work in a shooting because as an ER doctor she saved the life of a gang leader. Well the rival gang couldn't have that. They thought that they had taken care of that scum. But my mother lived up to her duty as a doctor and saved him. Cause no harm. Hippocratic oath kind of thing. It was her core belief. All this I found out from secondary sources. Her diaries and records kept. And what a fellow doctor who knew her told me when I was 15 and broke my leg after falling off Zim's Voot Cruiser when Dib was still trying to stop him. You see they were rivals when Zim thought his mission was real. It was a farce for a while but then the Tallest simply changed their minds. It was when Zim found out the truth they formed a truce and fell in love. I found it kind of sweet and saw it coming a mile away knowing how those two acted. But no, we'll start with my dead mother on my own suck salad and then you will see that maybe I just might know what you are going though even though I didn't go through exactly what you did. My father spent literally all of his time at his labs working. Yes, he did make sure that we were fed and clothed but he didn't pay much attention to use outside of prerecorded messages on his little hover screen. Bastard couldn't even be bothered to do it in real time." Gaz said as Chrisite looked at her with horror. "Starting to see how things add up? Well soon after I graduated high school, he's made a top human scientist in the Irken empire and going from calling Dib insane and kicking him out because he was gay, he then gets Dib that job he hates and has to keep up to keep down trouble and I am going through college because no one quite knew what the fuck to do with me. I wasn't stupid, far from it. But just what to do with the great Professor Membrane's daughter. They couldn't just stick me as an apprentence to what my dad was doing, that was Dib's role as the firstborn son." Gaz said with an angered look on her face. "So when I graduated college, they put me in the hybridization projects as the only place they could really find to stick me. And instead of caring for newborn hybrids, I am examined, strapped on a table and injected with Irken jizz. Then I am locked in a room for 9 months with little to no contact with anyone but a guard or doctor while a fetus grows in me, feeling the forced thing move around in your body, using you to grow and develop. You didn't want it there, and you can't get rid of it. And you're stopped from taking your own life because it pretty much isn't your own at this point." Gaz said. "Getting a little better feel of why I am the way I am and why I really don't care if I die?"
"But you still want someone to care for Zib right?" Christie said looking at the sleeping hybrid child in the bassonet beside the couch.
"I'm not worried about that." Gaz said. "He is wanted in this world even if the worst happens and we all fail. He won't have to worry about a thing. If I had my way, he'd have a chance to make his own way in the world to what he wants. God knows he's going to be pretty damn smart. I don't have stupid in my genes."
"But I was wanted because I was my parent's kids and brother's sister." Christie said. "So why won't they do the same to Zib."
"Because you were old enough to comprehend a lot. Zib doesn't know more than eat, cry and poop." Gaz said. "He's still young enough that if I died, he could be reprogramed to what the Empire wants."
"But wouldn't that be a horrible existance?" Christie said.
"He wouldn't know what it was like before. To have that freedom to do whatever you want, to choose your own fate. You cannot miss what you never had." Gaz said. "Your parents were killed when you were only 14. But at that age, many of your ideas and convections were set. Zib is a clean slate and I am looking to make this world the best for him to grow up in. But if I can't, I can go down knowing I tried."
Christie looked at Gaz and understood why she was fighting. It wasn't just some revenge campaign that it could easily become. She would be well justified in it. She wanted her son, even if his conception and growth was a violation, to have a good life that was his own, not one that was a cog in a machine. And as much as it pained her to admit it, she wasn't thinking that Gaz had suffered too. "Okay, if you will take my offer, we can go see Seamus tonight. I know a few routes and I am sure Zim will take good care of Zib while we are gone. Seamus may be able to get us a good way to get Dib out, something like we did for you." Christie said.
"Yes, I want to talk to that Seamus as soon as you can get me to him." Gaz said. "We'll leave around midnight."
"Good, be ready for some out of the way walking. The hideout is only about a mile from here directly, but I always take long ways and turn arounds in case I am followed." Christie said.
"Well, you aren't completely retarded." Gaz said. At this point, Christie brushed off the insult, knowing that if Gaz was willing to take the help she was offering, there was some progress being made. "But if he can't get us a good plan in 5 days and impliment it in 6, then on the 7th, I am going to be a marytr suicide bomber on the Tallest. No arguments."
"Fine." Christie said. I wish there was a better option than that... She thought.
"Hey, if this works then I would have taken out the Tallest and maybe force them away. I may die but Earth would be free, and if Dib lives, then Zib has his uncles who will treat him well to explain what Mommy did for him." Gaz said. "And take the fact that I haven't done that already to show that I trust you guys might come up with something good." Gaz said as she watched the ending of the game show. "That guy's an idiot. That TV is nowhere near 5000 monies."
"Some things never change." Christie said as the value was revealed and the guy lost by overbidding.
Professor Membrane walked through the halls of the hybridization labs, busy making sure the order was kept. The other incubators were starting to find out that Gaz was missing. Many had bought the story that complications had arisen and the reason they thought they heard something in the night was just doctors taking Gaz to a more intensive care ward. However, many of the other girls who were incubators showed subtle hints they didn't quite buy the story. The guards wouldn't kill them for their disident, they were much too valuable. And they knew this. That was the only reason they were speaking so loud in the first place. Yet hearing the words that Gaz had spoken so many times before out of other girl's mouths started to work on his mind. He was not improving humanity. He was just a tool of the Irken Empire to oppress it and just make humanity take the conquest easier. "Maybe I have become more like Mengele than I want to admit." He said as he closed the door to his office. "And I have dedicated my life to helping humanity."
"Oh, that is just the kind of thinking that holds a scientist back from helping humans in the first place. And that's why your son is in trouble." Floogoo said.
"Dib!" Professor Membrane said. He had been growing more and more worried about both his children since the Tallest informed him of Gaz's escape.
"Yes, he's in interrogation until 7 days, the amount of time that you have to turn over Gaz. We think he might have some information on her whereabouts. So one of you is going to give her to us in the end or you'll all die. But don't waste that brain of yours. I did some research on that Mengele guy. I don't see how you can call his experiments horrendous, but I guess that is just the difference between human and Irken standards. But what did his research lead to? Heart transplants that saved innocent lives for one. And do you think they'd ever have gotten that idea without him doing what he did? No. You humans would never have thought of that because of your moral taboos." Floogoo said.
"And your point?" Professor Membrane said, unable to stand comparisons to Mengele, even if there may have been some good done with his research.
"Fine, I'll stop sugarcoating it. Stop thinking of human morals and being compassionate with the subjects. You know we need this research and if humans benefit, bonus. If not, so what. You already sold out to us. Don't start feeling guilty now. We need you too much to have to kill you. Now here's some of my departments reports that you requested." Floogoo said as he walked out of Professor Membrane's office and shut the door behind him.
"Am I a sell out monster or am I am man?" He asked himself as he sat in the chair and began to read over the reports.
So how was that? Good? Long? Short? Bad? Talky? Let me know in a review. I think you can figure out I was referencing "The Price is Right" as the gameshow that was on. I mean I only used synonyms for the name. I am hoping to get this fic and Taboo done by the end of the year, and if I don't they will only be a few chapters from being done. From there, who knows, I do have other fics I want to finish too. So all in all, remember to read (well you just did) and to review. Ciao for now,
otherrealmwriter
aka
Realm