"Hold on, hold everything," interrupted Purple from everyone's thoughts and following comments. "How do we know that she's the real deal? No offense but it's a wild story."
"Yeah, I mean...it's a lot to believe without any proof," Red agreed, but watched the girl wearily.
Gaz turned to them both with an incredulous look while Zim snarled at his once called leaders. "You know many humans that can summon the energy of the cosmos?" She snapped her fingers summoning a small hot white fire that turned into a star right in the plam of her hand. She didn't even know she could just up and make stars like that but she just did it, without thinking. It did explain why she didn't have her hands entirely burned off when she touched the star matter. No amount of protective gloves could have truly saved a human hand from at least 3rd degree burns. "However, if this isn't enough for you I'm all too happy to summon a black hole to swallow you both up."
Well that put Purple and Red right in their place. They didn't know much about humans, afterall they only had Dib for comparison, but even they knew they weren't able to do such awestriking feats like creating cosmic anomalies. That wasn't something most if not all creatures could do, only something a true goddess, such as the Mother of Irk could do. Not only that but they could not deny that royal atmosphere she exuded, that upright posture, that defiant demanding of respectful shine to her golden eyes, and her aura it was downright chillingly regal as well as frightening. Purple gulped and Red shivered, even his own Pak made a weird noise as if his chill was a menchanical malfunction. In hindsight it most likely was, it was intense fear but it might have been him subconsciously internally reincoding himself to be lower than her. Purple's did the same at the same time causing two strange high frequency bleeps. Their antennas went entirely subserveiant and they both boweed their heads to her.
"Uh no that's um fine...we believe you," Purple admitted, raising his hands like a white flag. He was no coward but Gaz was more dominating and scarier than anything they had seen. Gaz nodded her approval but did not desire to see them groveling, they hadn't done anything wrong save for being cruel to Zim so long ago. No the people that needed to be licking the bottom of her boots were standing dumb founded behind her.
To be fair everyone was dumbfounded and no one really knew what to do, what was the first move. Should they try to start a war again? Should they just arrest Dib? Should they all start bowing to Gaz? Should Louie reveal everything and when? What should be done with Tak? The first step, it apperead was bravely taken by the one person who set this all in motion. Dib. He dropped his guns noisily to the floor not because he wanted to be obnoxious or even dramatic, he wanted to show them he meant to give up.
It was all over now, he would no longer let his reign of tyranny go on. He almost lost his only sister, the one he was told to protect, he almost lost it all just because of how ignorant he was. He also thought, no he knew, he needed to be judged for what he had done. All of it. Ignorance is not innocence, and he needed some sort of punishment, especially for being the sole reason Gaz's life was, for a moment, gone. Everyone turned to him at the sound of the metal crashing to the floor to see what he was going to do or say.
Gaz was interested to hear his pleading for she could tell right away he would plead. She could tell he cried too, his eyes were so bloodshot they looked almost as red as Zim's and his nose was red from him rubbing it raw. As he spoke his voice sounded so wheezy and broken from the bawling he did earlier, he might have even roughly scratched up the tissue of his throat from the screams. Regardless of all of that Gaz's pity for him was minimal. Why should she feel bad for the person who let Matthew tag along when he so clearly was an asshole bigger than Dib could ever amount to be? Why feel bad for an insane person who ravaged nation after nation, slaughtering innocents and treating Irkens, like the innocent Krit and Skoodge? Why feel bad for someone who could have almost killed their own mother? Still she would let him speak, let him state his claims or his case as it were. As it stood Gaz was now the judge, jury, and executioner and no one would argue that nor stand in her way.
"Gaz I... I don't know if there are words to express how I feel...or if I could apologize, I think sorry no matter how deeply said would not cover it. I have screwed up, majorly. What have I ever done right? I can't even think of a single thing, at least not by you or by these people especially Zim. I didn't want to see how much he meant to you or how much you meant to him because I had hated him just purely based off what he was and what he was going to do. Am I any better? I took over worlds, I invaded, and I killed, made people worship me. Judge me the way I judged him, with bias, without acusation, without compassion or sympathy or mercy. I deserve worse than that. What kind of man, human or not, does what I did and then calls himself a hero...? What kind of brother is almost responsible for his family's end? I won't ask for you not to kill me, I'm sure you want to anyways. I can't ask for anything conscering my life or what you do with it. No I don't want to die, of course not, but it would be what I deserve. If I could ask for anything it's...don't kill Tak. If you have to jail her, then do so, but she shouldn't die. I'm certain she is...well in the same condition as you are."
Tak couldn't help but blush a deep green all over not knowing he knew about her current state because she never gave any hint to it but he was always incredibly suspicious and curious. Those two things combined could have led him to thinking that as many times as they had done "it" without protection that she must be. It was a guess but an educated one. She was also blushing because he was being so protective of her while laying his own life down. He had said he was no kind of man but right now, at least to her, he truly was one. He was owning up to his problems, his sins, and he was admitting his faults, as well as taking full responsibility. She didn't want him to die either, it would hurt her.
Not how Zim had been hurt he was a singulaurly feely Irken but she would hurt a lot and since they were life mates she could not move on. This was IF Gaz was feeling merciful and spared her and lord knows the last thing Gaz is, is merciful. Gaz shot a look at Tak but if the alien female thought it would be a harsh, cruel, disappointed look she was wrong. It was a firm, focused look for sure but there was a sincerity there, a sincerity that only two women who are going to be mothers would understand and feel. Gaz also did not loathe Tak nearly as much as anyone else, she was at the bottom of the list for sure especially since she had nothing to gain in avenging her and yet still tried to. Besides which those smeets or whatever they are called were kind of still part of her family, even if Dib kind of wasn't and it would be unfair to harm them just because of what their parents had done.
"Children should not suffer the sins of the father," Gaz finally stated, speaking low enough for the four of them to hear but it was still very soft as if she was coming to some sort of realization. She was mostly thinking about Louie who still stood there unsure of what to do. That's when she thought up a good punishment for Dib. Killing Dib would feel good, wringing his neck even better, stabbing him would calm her, but she imagined her mother. Her mother didn't seem mad at Dib, she was at odds with him at best.
That was still her son, no matter what, and she had lost her one true love in a heated argument over ethics for him. She had already been heartbroken to lose her family once and Gaz was not going to do that to her again. Somehow she knew that even though all this time she wanted to end his life, gut him like a fish, feed him to the buzzards, that something would stop her but she never knew it would be her own mother...or was it her conscious? After all her more humanitarian conscious did always have her mothers' voice. Either way she really could care less about Dib, but however he did feel like a worthless piece of scum and he should LIVE with that feeling. It was letting him off easy just killing him. No this was much better. She preferred this kind of torture anyways.
"At least most should...but you, you will endure them as well as your own. Jail is so basic, murder is fun but come on that would be letting you off scott free. Hurting you would placate me enough and as you so clearly said you deserve it but you know what... it just isn't enough to cover all you've done. So, here's what I'm going to do, I'll let you two live, but not in peace and harmony, no. You have to come to grips with the darkness every day that you've spread, live in guilt and despair, remember my body everday, remember my screams, remember the blood shed, remember everything. Hell is what you make of it anyways, so Dib this will be the hell you are condemned to. First things first, you have to confront a dark secret. Louie, ready or not, you are going to tell him...and I mean tell him everything."
Dib felt cold all over as the person who looked like him broke through the crowd, head slightly down as if he was sheepish or ashamed and came closer. Gaz's words should have given him some relief, they were not going to die or be harmed physically in any way but what did she mean she would have to confront a dark secret? And what did this have to do with his father? And how was this punishment at all? It almost seemed like she was being extremlly and bizarrely rarely considerate. But no, that wasn't Gaz's m.o. She was calculating like a true hunter, a tactition, a planner, a schemer, and she was an expert at all types of torture methods. Her revenge would not be physical, it would be psychological.
Dib was getting fearful of what this lookalike had to say and his mind started coming up with things, things too disturbed to even think about. There was a sinking feleing in his gut, as if his tummy was an anchor hitting the sea floor, and it only grew and grew. He didn't wanna say he knew what this Louie had to say, what he vould potentially reveal, he didn't want to assume anything. He didn't want to jump the gun but he felt like he did know and the dread of reaffirming that was taking over. Tak wasn't exactly sure how to feel but she had come to know Gaz, she was not kind or merciful, as she might have mentioned. This was not her being loving towards her brother because she just couldn't bring herself to do it. No she could and has and would be aggressive but this was more sadisitic girl had plans that only she was privy to, well she and Zim.
Zim didn't get it until he gave it some thought. He thought at first she was letting them off with a gentle slap to the wrist. He was about to exclaim that she must be a lunatic if after all this time she was going to let them live but he could tell from the way her pupils widened with enthrallment from the sick pleasure one like her gets, that this was going to be better than any sort of pain or death. She was going to strip Dib of everything and humiliate him, bring him lower than low then let him rot, mentaphorically without any sense of hope or leaving his brain intact. Funny how his last name was membrane, because his brain was the thing that would be put into the blender. This is what he had done to Zim, so in his mind though he wanted to perform a labotmy while Dib was still alive, revenge would be had at last. There were more parts to it, more than he wasn't aware of but he could count on his evil little queen, his devilish deity, to dish out something harsh and yet entirely fair to these two vermin.
Louie had been preparing and preparing for the moment he would face him and now he was looking directly into his eyes, those eyes that looked like his own, like the Professor's. Those brown reflective pools with just a drop of a gold dust as if the mother who didn't even birth either of them had donated some of hers. He breathed in and let his fury, his hatred, his negative emotions flow out of him. Dib was led astray, in a way it was his own father's fault he ended up like this. It might have still happened anyways but if Dib was truly loved, provided for, cared for, nutured like a human being all the time and given attention then maybe he wouldn't be so crazy.
It's possible he only chased after fake things because that's all he had were fairytales. Dracula was more real than any love he'd get from his own dad. Not that his dad never did love him, he always did, he just couldn't properly show it, and even when he called him insane, he was proud of him in a way. Perhaps it was the way a scientist is proud of their achievements, that's what Louie not only assumed but felt. It could be he truly truly did love and appreciate Dib but what he was about to drop, that bit of info he kept even from his own family, would put all of that into question.
Louie took off those large rounded glasses he was forced to wear and placed them into the front pocket of his shirt then removed the silly wig he was wearing showing off his shortened hair. Now he looked didn't look entirely identical but still Dib and Tak could clearly see the startling facial resemblance. He then rolled up his sleeve all the way up to his shoulder and on his shoulder there was something that made Dib gasp. It was the membrane logo but almost faded like a...birthmark. Dib gulped hard enough to be heard and his heart was dancing like a crazy ballerina in his chest. It was the exact same without any regularity to his and it wasn't a tattoo, Dib knew that without being told. It would mean nothing if it was a simple dot but to be on someone who looked like him and for it to be exactly like his. Dib didn't want to say it but Tak did.
"Oh my Irk...are you...his...?"
"If you are going to say brother then the answer is complicated but inevitably...yes, I suppose I am. My name is Louie Neuron and to be clear I'm actually just... well I am you and you are me. There is nothing genetically different from us. Our thumbprints, dental, blood type, bone marrow, plasma. It's all the same. Did you ever wonder at all why you had this?" Louie questioned, pointing to the mark. "I'm sure your father just shoved it off as if it didn't matter but that's because if he told you what it was, you'd do what I did...you'd run away and if you knew everything you'd never return. You see...it's not a birthmark as you might think but we were born with it and we are marked with it. However its not like puppy spots it's like the branding on a cereal box. We are merchandise of the Memebrane corps but only one man knows that. Whenever your dad says you are the best thing he created he means it... literally. Your father couldn't have kids so he made them, excluding Gaz she was...a happy accident. You have no mother and really you have no father. Your just cell matter that looks like him and so am I."
Dib wanted to almost cry now faced with the reality that he was just as human as Zim. They were both created in labs so to speak, clumps of genetic material formed into a person. Dib never questioned his humanity before, never. He knew what he was and he knew that this was his father and that Gaz's mother was his own but he just didn't look much like her. He gave it no thought. He was always told he was different and he felt different sometimes, called a freak and believed it when it was late at night but now he knew they were all telling the truth. He was a freak. All the terms he had called Zim and his kind were the same terms that could be applied to himself. He wanted to feel bad for his father, he kind of did, the guy couldn't procreate but why not just adopt?
Suppose it was male and human arrogance to have someone continue the legacy and actually be related to you. Problem was that Dib wasn't just related to him, he pretty much WAS him, just him as a kid. Sure there were differences, but only just. Genetically speaking they were the same person. His father, himself, and Louie were all the same person and that was somehow freakier than being told Gaz was a space queen of a race of people he had enslaved. The information brought about a million questions though, why did he make two and why didn't Dib know about him? The Professor was rich enough to house three children, if not a whole orphanage, so why...Then Dib remembered what Louie said, if he knew everything he would have run away and not looked back. What more could possibly be said that would damn both Professor Membrane and Dib's fragile psyche? Tak wasn't as shocked as Dib but certainly very surprised, I mean who wouldn't be?
The man she trusted and cared about was no more than a clone of his own father and his father was a scientist first, always, father maybe second if he had time for it. It was a twist for sure but for her it wasn't a huge thing. Dib was still Dib to her, his own person entirely even if a dna test might accidently come up and call him someone else. He would always be Dib, not anyone else. He had his own thoughts, personality, laugh, and tastes all of which were very different from his "father" but Tak knew there was more.
Dib was shook, to put it lightly, sort of like when you get off one of those gyrating rides and you still feel like you are moving when you aren't at all. He felt almost nauseous but was trying to tell himself it wasn't that big of a deal. The biggest issue with this was that he was never told but would he want to know? Maybe his dad was just shielding him from the truth, and he was ashamed to admit he, the world renound man of science, could not do the most basic human male function and have a baby. While that might be true, remember what was said about that reveal putting that into question?
"There's something else you need to know and I've kept this with me inside and let it just sit there. I never told a single soul...until today. I figure you need to know...you and Gaz both need to know what kind of man has raised you. While I don't ever truly think Gaz would have been in any danger, she wasn't his creation in any terms and she could easily defend herself... you on the other hand. You see I found out early in my life what I was, too early in my life, I was just barely four maybe five at best and I couldn't wrap my head around it. I could understand some of the big words because I was very educated, basically injected with the dictionary since my conception. I knew of two things, one I was not his son but...that's not enough of a reason to run away...no I ran because of what he intended to do to me. I'm not the first and there might have been more before you even but I knew why. They didn't make it, they were too sickly or deformed or died young. He wrote that I was displaying some traits that were not...sufficient. I have a mental disability, you see, and he realized this, thought it might get to the point of retardation even. Instead of treating me he thought he would...put me out of my misery."
Gaz felt her jaw go slack in total outrage at what new information was just brought to light, kept in the dark for over twenty years or more. Her father, well not really, but that man who tried in vain to raise them both was a killer. It didn't matter if he thought it was a mercy killing, he was not god. If it were Gaz, she would have rather her own child die from illness than do that to them. They'd have to be literally writhing, begging for death for her to pull any kind of plug but that wasn't even the case. It was built on assumption and asinine logic. So he had mental issues...so? Doesn't everyone have something wrong with their noggin? Gaz herself might be considered a sociopath or psychopath or both.
Zim was a megalomaniac with narcissistic tendacies and talked weirdly enough for someone to think his upstairs wasn't all there. Dib was all the levels of mind boggled you could be and hypocrisy of hypocrisy was that the professor had something seriously wrong with his own mind if he thought killing his own son was the right thing to do. Tak was stunned entirely now. She had respected that guy, even at one point toyed with the idea of ugh doing things with him and he had the nerve to think he could attempt murder and then just shrug it off? No Irken had ever heard of such a thing, killing your own young. Even the weakest amongst them were kept alive and served some sort of purpose, maybe they weren't invaders or doctors or engineers but they were alive and well.
Red and Purple didn't care for humans much but they were both horrified to hear that something like that was possible. It really wasn't Irken code of conduct or law to kill another even if some still did that. Krit couldn't grasp the idea and even after seeing all the madness of Dib he felt sorry for him. Zim only blinked a little and grimaced a bit. He didn't like Dib at all, not even a tiny bit, but he was mostly indifferent to Mr. Membrane. It was a cruelty even someone like he could not get behind. If there was one rule that stood the test of time was that if you never NEVER bring any harm to any smeet what so ever since they are the future.
He hadn't asked yet if his own were even okay yet and the thought still ran like Usain Bolt around his head but right now he couldn't ask. Regardless he thought of them and imagined one of them being disabled in any way. He'd love them still, teach them, train them to push past that, to not care about it or let people insult them. He could never...Zim touched his face because it felt both hot and wet. He was crying again but silently. He wished he wasn't, he looked so soft, but it upset him.
The one the most thrown for a loop was Dib. He had a mile long stare into the abyss, looking through everyone and seeing nothing. He looked like a soldier from those wars long ago, he was shell shocked. His father thought nothing of trying to attempt to end a small childs life. It didn't matter how or why but he didn't even think twice about it. What Dib wasn't privy to was that he had wrote that he wished his "son", Louie, would find happiness right after he ran away knowing he narrowly escaped death from his own parent. It was unsettling.
Then he went right back to his experimenting until he got perfection, which supposedly was Dib. A cold shiver went down his spine recalling how upset his father got when he would talk about "crazy things" Did he ever assume he too had mental issues? Would he have casually silenced him? And was Dib's own life graciously spared thanks to his father finding a wife? Those things would have to be answered by the man himself, which seemed unlikely. For now all questions had to be answered with a shaky yes, most likely. In a strange way, if this was all true anyhow, Gaz had saved his own life.
The man could not do anything to him as long as Gaz was around because she'd be a witness, that is if he planned to do anything at all. Perhaps he dropped it all anyways, even if he did think Dib truly insane, because his craziness was proven to be all true anyway, at least as far as aliens went. Whatever the case it didn't really matter. He had loved his family but how can you love a father who keeps such a dirty lie under wraps? How can you still love a man who already wasn't there for you much but add to that he had a long record of genetic clones that had died under his care and some of which he might have ended himself because they were... "flawed" in some way? And how dare any father say he loved their son or cared about him at all while remembering he did such things? Dib didn't need to ask and didn't want to, he didn't want to face that man ever again and look at him knowing what he had done and knowing the reason why, without even asking he knew.
"For the greater good," Dib darkly recited, a sliver of a laugh escaped him. "That's what he always says, isn't it? And I started to say it too...I was becoming like him...No I became him, which is what he wanted. He could have cloned anyone, someone phsycially strong and gifted but he cloned himself because he wanted another him, a little protégé, a little membrane junior." Dib carefully looked at his hands seeing all the lines in them knowing those were the same lines on Professor Membrane's hands, those hands that had ended lives...and Dib was no better. "but even at my lowest point I would never do something so...inhuman."
"Not to your OWN kid anyways," Gaz sourly shot at him, "but you'd gladly take the lives of others. It's so easy to do when you don't know them, isn't it? He let Louie go and you live because he got attached, simple as that. Same as your reason why you love Tak but hate Zim, you got to know one and had feelings., makes it a lot harder to treat that person like you treat the others."
Dib swallowed again, rubbing his arm and hissing a bit as if he got punched there. The words she shot were like an arrow of truth and the truth hurt. Hurt like a bitch. She could lie and had to recently but usually Gaz was blunt and honest, much like Tak was. She'd give you the straight truth and saved her sugar coating for her pastries, rarely if not ever using it on people. He had made Tak an exception to his rules because she had gotten close to him and he to her. He never really knew Zim. He couldn't say, even now after all these years, what he disliked, what his music preferences were, what he ate if he ate, and what he liked other than Gaz. All Dib needed to know to convict him eternally was his species and his hard encoded goals which Zim felt he had to do to prove himself.
Just like Dib had to do what he did because he felt he needed to prove himself, even if what he did was unlawful, immoral, and awful. They were not that different at all, if anything they had a lot in common, they could have been, if Dib had tried, good friends. If they had become friends Zim might have even given up on invading and just tried to have a normal life. Just another thing to add to his list of mistakes that kept growing by the second. Before Dib could even open his mouth to reply he noticed something staring at him in the face and it wasn't Louie like it was previously but a photograph held up so close to his eyes the image almost blurred. It was being held up by the person he had wronged just as much as Gaz, no much more than her. The photgraph showed what looked like an Irken, a young one no older than the one that was with Zim but on closer inspection it had to be a Gallkin, he wasn't green.
"You've met his aunt. His name was Rift and he was a Gallkin soldier. He wanted to be an invader one day, even though he couldn't be and now never will all because of you."
Zim never spoke so spitefully, directly, and with so much more ice than he ever did but his voice and wording were also laced with remorse and even regret. Zim usually regretted nothing, and he would often spourt that line out all the time, but he did regret having to lose this boy. The boy did look like him, surprisingly, just a different skin color, and it was as if Zim lost his own son or something. He wasn't entirely fond of Aunt Cazzma's coddling but understood why she did it to him specifically, it was like her nephew was back from the dead and having the life he should have had if he was alive. Gaz has glad Zim did that, Dib needed to see up and personal the faces of those he did away with. He loked at the photograph of that determined smiling youthful face and something inside him broke.
What made that boy different than a human boy? That boy shouldn't have even been in war, Gallkins don't even really fight but he felt like he needed to. Dib had forced him into battle and instead of soldiers they all became numbers, not faces. All the great wars were fought over petty crap and when in history class he would turn up his nose at that, especially seeing all the bodies. His big headed bigotry had warped him into this, this person who as a child could not fathom such travesties and now as an adult was doing them. Aunt Cazzma had looked into his eyes, dead in his eyes, right into his soul that day he saw her. She showed him no respect and he knew he didn't deserve it but also she showed him something he pretended not to see but was familiar with. Aching loss as if even to her last breath she would mourn Rift and whoever else from her family he might have taken from her.
"What do you want from me?! I can't turn back the clock, I wish I could! I can't apologize, there isn't any point!"
"I don't want your fucking apologies, Dib," Zim sharply jeered, his eyes nearly glowing with hellish rage that he'd been holding back until now. Sad as this situation and subject matter were, Gaz couldn't help but be aroused by that look he had, sincere fury radiating off of him so much that if you touched him, he'd burn you. "I want you and that...well you know what word I'd use, off my damn planet and far away from me and Gaz. You used to aggravate me, mildly amuse me, but you put her through a hell even she couldn't stand and myself. If it were up to me I'd banish you both to Saturn but that planet is too beautiful for you and you have a reputation of destroying beautiful things."
Gaz bit her lip to contain the spontaneous giddy laugh that was trying to come from her. He wasn't a speech maker by design or by nature but that was a hell of one and it was so badass. She loved that man! A long time ago Dib might have argued his tongue off with Zim, argued until his face turned bluer than his favorite shirt but not anymore. He only nodded in agreement, slowly breathing out, but never looked away from him or the picture. Tak could see the picture from where she was standing and though Irkens felt very little kinship with Gallkins they were still related and she did not like losing anyone, especially young ones. She touched her stomach. If this had continued her own young would be put into battle very early and they would die. She couldn't stand that at all. Gaz was right, it was different when you knew them. She didn't know her little ones personally but she knew them. Everyone else stayed silent, even Gir, and just waited and watched to see how this would all unravel. No one dared speak especially because Gaz might punish them.
"I think for now you and Louie should have a nice long chat with pops," Gaz affirmed, "and then we can banish you two to another planet. I'm going to banish you to earth so you can live there while Zim and I invade it and take it over in the name of Irk."
Just like that the quiet room burst with cheers from every Irken in their alliance, all of them liked this plan and in a couple of words and snaps Dib and Tak were hauled off on the first ship out of there along with Louie who exchanged his farewells. Gaz told him they would meet again and hopefully very soon and to give the wife her regaurds. Now while that was being taken care of there was something that had to be done first and foremost according to Zim anyways.
"We need to hold a coronation for you so everyone can know who is the true leader and once your crowned we can get started on the invasion plans."
"Oooh a crown...I like the sound of that."
All the sudden Gir burst out of the crowd and hugged Gaz's leg tightly, finally able to show her just how happy he was that she was okay and through his joyful noises and cries he said something about children. This reminded Zim of the pressing issue he had but he didn't need to even ask, Gaz already knew he was about to and smiled at him.
"They are just fine, all four of them."
Zim's eyes went so wide she thought they might pop like balloons before he fainted entirely from hearing that number. Gir found this high-larious while Pixi just rolled her eyes comedically. Krit went to fan him, worriedly, and their small Irken army gave their congradultations. Purple and Red, Purple specifically, came up to her and told her that the Mother of Irk did leave her crown and a dress there and that Gaz could have them, if she wanted to. I mean afterall they did belong to her by all regards so really, she was just reclaiming what was hers. That statement fit with everything. Yes. It made sense. Gaz was reclaiming what was rightfully always hers; the planet, the people, the throne, and soon with her Zim, they would reclaim what was his- Earth.