Fireflies by Dib07
Summary:
The boys become hopelessly stuck together when they end up lost in the wilderness. Gift/trade/commission for Randomdragon2-0
Disclaimer:
I do not own the IZ characters. Cover art does not belong to me.
Dib07: Hi there all! This little oneshot came as a very welcome surprise! Randomdragon2-0 did something extraordinary, and drew amazing Saving Zim epilogue fan art that you can check out on her Tumblr account! You can also check out her other Invader Zim art on her Deviant art page which I highly recommend! She is a fantastic artist! And I honestly love what she did for me! It was the way she captured the character, and her soft use of colours and lines which so appealed to me! So I asked her if there was anything I could write for her to show my gratitude, and well, here it is! I just hope it's okay, Randomdragon!
'Cause they fill the open air
And leave teardrops everywhere
You'd think me rude but I would just stand and stare
I'd like to make myself believe that planet earth turns slowly
It's hard to say that I'd rather stay awake when I'm asleep
'Cause everything is never as it seems
Fireflies – Owl City
He drew his eyes upward at the bruising sky, measuring, or trying to measure how much daylight they had left. He lifted his wristwatch, only to rediscover that it was cracked. The second hand had ceased to tick. His phone had suffered a similar malfunction. Not only had that screen cracked as well, but there was a nice big dent in the middle.
Countless trees and foliage hemmed them in on every side. In fact the foliage seemed to shuffle forwards while they weren't looking. As the sun sailed downwards, the shadows lengthened, and the vegetation seemed to expand and grow. Spindly branches, dark leaves and overhanging twigs that looked like scaly fingers scratched at the earth in their myriad shadows. The thickest trunks that you had ever seen never ceased or broke up into a promising road or path. Every time there was a gap in the wall of towering trees, he'd hurry towards it, as eager as before, only to be set upon by the same disappointment. His ankles were rubbed raw by his boots, and his calf muscles were starting to cramp up.
Everywhere looked the same. He'd read about hikers getting lost in the wilderness, and watched such passing events in movies, but he'd never paid much attention to the concept. What were the chances of actually ending up in a similar situation? Especially when he never got too close to true wilderness. Humanity and its industrial conquest to cultivate the world had kind of made such possibilities redundant. Yet here he was, right in the middle of a forest without so much as a compass. He should have paid better attention to those wilderness survival programs after all.
Something small and sharp hit the back of his head. "Hey! Ow! Quit it!" He raised his hand and kneaded one of the many bruises he had going back there. The one thing to do when you were lost was to stay calm, which was hard to do when you had an Irken for company.
"No! I will not QUIT it!" His scratchy voice made some nesting birds suddenly fly out of the trees nearby and into the darkening sky. He gave them a brief, anxious look before setting vengeful eyes of shiny crimson back on Dib. He shortly came across another pebble, picked it up and tossed it at the human. His aim was always insufferably accurate, and though Dib tried to anticipate it this time and swerve to one side, he was still struck on the shoulder. It hurt.
"That's it!" Dib stomped his foot and turned to give Zim an equally snarly glare. "I am not going another step!"
Zim stopped too, tossing the newest stone up and down in the polished palm of his glove. "You seem to forget, worm, that it was YOU who got ME into this mess! I can hit you as much as I want!"
The fiery sunset dipped Dib's glasses in ember as he peered back at the Irken. The front of the Elite's usually pristine uniform was soiled in dirt all the way up to his pink collar. Dib's clothing hadn't faired any better. His entire right side was crumpled in mud, grass stains and oil. He'd picked out the twigs from his hair after a fashion. Another few hours out here and his father may even fail to recognize him.
Gingerly, Dib ran a hand up his arm. He'd scrapped a lot of skin, and his bruises had started to turn into lurid shades of dark red and purple. Zim's wounds had already healed some time ago. He'd looked ridiculous with one huge black eye, and every time Dib looked at it, it ignited his laughter anew until Zim was practically giving off steam. Soon however, when Dib happened to look his way again, the bug had healed, the black eye having miraculously faded.
Zim was flinging that stone up and down in his hand.
"Then you find your own way out! You're an alien! Don't you have a locator or a fantastical geographical compass to get you out of these irritating situations? The possibility of getting lost is kind of an occupational hazard for an invader, don't you think? So shouldn't you be a BIT more PREPARED?" He cocked his head at him, one eye slanting.
Zim threw the stone. It rocketed past his ear. The alien's actions spoke for him. He did not have an answer, at least, not one that he could just slip out of his sleeve, and Dib was prepared for the Irken's capsizing rage. Maybe it had been Dib's fault that they were stuck in this forest together, or maybe it was partly Zim's fault, or Zim's fault entirely. Like a dog covering up a bone, he covered up his blunders in the hopes that no one would notice. It had happened so fast. One minute he was reaching for a soda can, the next the Voot kinda went sideways. He went sideways too (served him right for not wearing the harness) and then Zim had blundered into him. The ground had reared upwards, they'd been travelling so low, and then they'd landed in a spectacularly violent fashion.
It didn't help that they had crawled out of the cockpit, concussed, neither of them remembering the events that had led to the crash.
Now they were lost. Dib was still trying to get his head around the math, and calculating how far they had gone, and for how long, and what forest they had winded up in. Was it a national woodland that was the size of several rugby fields, or did it go on and on...
It also didn't help that Zim apparently liked to journey around Earth without navigational gear that he could... you know, carry around with him. Or maybe it had all been in the Voot, and it had become catastrophically bent and broken like everything else. The wonders of a PAK when you didn't use it for half the things it was meant for, surely?
Torn from technology, and left to trudge through the wilderness, Dib was truly feeling the onset of complete frustration and bone-wearing fatigue. He was pretty sure they had landed somewhere along the east coast of America, perhaps in some enormous national park that was full of pine forests, oak trees and lonesome rough country. He was more than certain they'd come across a little cabin, a holiday resort set into the hills, or a river they could follow that might lead them to civilisation. But they'd been trudging for hours now, the sun was nothing but a burgundy flicker through the trees, and the air was turning cold. They had seen no signs of man, not even an old boot print, or a wooden post or shack. And as the sky turned from a silky friendly blue to a brooding, uninviting purple, he began to think of prowling bears (there was bears here, right?), skunks, and even mountain lions that might come along, and eat them. Well, he'd certainly be tasty, Zim, not so much.
As the light faded, and as the trees seemed to bustle forwards, their shadows creeping outwards like running ink, he grew more relieved to have an angry Irken close at his heels, even if all this Irken did was spew rocks and words at him. Nothing predatory would ever come close so long as the Elite kept cursing.
"This is your filthy planet! Finding a way back out through this prehistoric jungle should be easy for you!"
Dib stopped again, looking around. He thought he'd heard something up ahead, behind the wall of vegetation. He trained his senses towards the area, but he could hear nothing but the sunset serenade of birdsong and the angry huffing of the Irken.
"I have not the patience for you to be stopping like some witless beast at every step!" He stood abreast of him, clearly not picking up on any potential danger. At this, Dib relaxed a little, but when he addressed the space bug, new anger flew into his chest. They were good at this: going round and round in circles, Zim neither budging nor turning aside for Dib's rationality. It was more than likely that the alien did not wish to go near civilization or any signs of it for that matter, for that would mean being seen by humans. Zim had never been in the habit of caching his disguise in his Voot in the foolish belief that he'd never have need of it. His perceptions were narrowed, disallowing him to predict and prepare for any potential realities, which made him a very poor Invader indeed.
The pungency of the foliage seemed to transform with the sunset. The soil was suddenly that much sharper in his nose, and he could scent wildflowers he would otherwise not have noticed. "You wanna keep going, in the dark? Then be my guest! I'm going to find shelter for the night, because I am not walking blind! I could run into something worse than you!"
"There is nothing worse than me, Dib pig!"
"Oh I'd so love to see you encounter a bear! Then you'd think twice about those helpless Earth critters you keep going on about!" It was so easy to physically demonstrate his anger and push someone so small aside, but he didn't. He didn't want to encourage Zim to use that PAK on him. It was sometimes easy to forget it was there at all, for it wasn't very big, and was often left unaddressed and unused, kinda like a nice ornament that was simply there for display. But every once in a while, in a clean instant, that machine would spring loose limbs, gears, and weapons in shocking finality. Time and time again Dib admired it from afar; glad he was no longer on the receiving end of it, unless he did something that really irked the Irken, and that didn't take much effort to do.
"Shelter? In this place?" Zim found the idea excruciating. "No, no that won't do! We need to go back!"
"Back to what? A useless and broken ship? We're lucky it didn't just explode with us still trapped inside!"
Zim hung back, looking like he was about to turn around and go back on his own. Dib walked up to an array of trees, which could have been maples or beech trees, and started hunkering down to collect sticks. Zim watched, and started wringing his hands together. His eyes grew more shiny and luminescent as the world darkened.
It was strange to hear little else but birdsong, and the sly sounds of animals moving through the brush instead of honking cars, grumbling engines, and the babble of people. Here, the forest had its own tone, a melody not often heard or noticed. For Dib, the quiet was not one he was adapted to, and it made his neck prickle. Being lost in the American forests were no laughing matter. There were no walls of civilisation to guard him against the wilderness now, no familiarity to take for granted, no easy stopping stations for food or water.
"Zim, could you like, lend a hand?" He hefted up an armload of scraggly branches, some of which clattered to the ground. The Irken, who was perfectly capable of hauling space-age equipment, simply stared a moment before doubling over to laugh.
Anger split Dib's brow, and he was tempted to dump his precious load and trudge into the deep and dark, alone. He hated being the responsible one – the one who couldn't give in to the indulgency of contempt. If he did, they'd be stuck in one spot, arguing until one of them exploded.
Dib pointed around at this small clearing he had chosen without the Irken's consent. "I'm setting up camp here. You can either help me, or sulk. I don't care which. Soon it's gonna be too dark for me to see, and it'll get really, really cold. I don't know how well a heat-loving bug will do out here once the dark really sets in, so good luck."
A shadow passed over the Irken's countenance and his derisive laughter stopped short. As Dib predicted he might, he slung his arms together in front of his chest, standing like some dissatisfied superintendent. Dib could only shake his head as he dumped the small pile of twigs on the soil and grass. Then he trudged back, picked up some more and repeated the process. Zim would keep one eye on the Dib, and cast his sights around them, looking at the dark holes in the forest, and at the sky that was a deeper true violet as the last slither of sun melted. A cold string of stars took the place of light, the clouds scurried away, and a deep gloom took hold.
"Zim?"
He snapped round. "WHAT?"
"Can you make us a fire? Look, I've done all the hard work! I don't have a lighter, or anything to make a fire with, okay? You have all the gizmos!" He was trying to inspect his hands in the dark for splinters, but couldn't see for looking. He felt grubby, palms of his hands slathered in mud and leaf gristle. His skin crawled at the thought of bugs and other little critters that might have been crawling on the branches he hand-selected, but was unable to see. There was no time to make a real shelter, and he did not like the thought of sitting on the grass all night as centipedes and god-knows what else came a-crawling.
Zim took a reluctant moment to inspect the haphazard pile of sticks that the human had begrudgingly collected. "This is all you barbarians can do? Collect sticks and set fire to them?"
"Just point and shoot at the sticks or something, okay?" There was little the human could see now. Zim's profile was cut in pink thanks to his spherical ports from the PAK, and his eyes were suddenly cosmic nebulas, but everywhere else was black save for the starry sky.
Though he could barely see the snarl that the Elite made, he saw the contemptuous crease of his eyelids.
"You want warmth? Then have it, but don't ask me for anything else!" A tiny engineering tool, better suited for wielding, sprouted from an opening in the top mantle of his PAK like an emerging metal flower. It pivoted on something Dib could not see, and turned towards the stick pile, shooting out a tiny microscopic laser. It hit the crust of withered leaves and sticks, and before Zim had even mentally evicted the tool into his PAK as easily as a man sliding a coin back into a pocket, light began to gleam from within the leaf litter. A solitary flame, flickering amongst the wooden debris, split down the middle, creating twins before it split again. Soon the pile of sticks was rosy under the colour of a new fire, and the wood began to pop and crack beneath the heat, sending up colourful sparks of gold, amber and crimson.
Dib unconsciously felt himself pressing closer to the warmth, relishing these barbarism comforts. It was funny really, how far a man could go with his smarts and technological advancements, only to still fall for simple animalistic pleasures. A man was a man after all, given to basic needs that catered to baser principles.
But Zim, though a creature of warmth, huddled farther from the fire as if the light unsettled him.
The leaves blackened and crumbled, the fire eating away at the dry husks. Then the embers licked upwards, across the sticks and entangled branches. This hot, fiery red glow spread warmth into Dib as he knelt before it, hands opening to it as he basked in the heat. He had hoped that the day would never come when he would be hunched on the floor over a bit of tinder, trying to rub a piece of wood against another piece of wood to make fire until his hands bled. Irken soldiers had their uses, thank goodness.
Zim, his eyes as shiny as twin rubies, remained at a distance, his profile engulfed in the black silhouettes of the trees.
"Zim? Get over here already! Are you still pissy because of what happened?" He searched in the dark for a branch he knew he had dropped somewhere, found it, and sat before the fire with it, poking the branch into the embers every now and then to shift the sticks. The cold pressed at his back. There was a ghostly hoot from an owl. Dib was used to their hoots. He heard them from the church steeples or from the neighbouring tree line when he went in search of the paranormal close to the city, but to Zim the sound may have been something alien. He squealed, his eyes sailing a little closer to the fire in the dark.
Perhaps accepting the fire for what it was, or using it for warmth and protection insulted the Irken's pride, for again he hesitated. He had stepped into the boundary the light made, and the fire was reflected twice in his eyes, capsizing on the alien's fragility and misplacement in this wild place where technology was suddenly a limited prodigy.
"This is the worst day ever!" Zim's croaky voice had the same frequency of a megaphone in the quiet. "And that's the last time I'm ever having your smelly feet inside my ship again!"
"Zim, will you just let it go? I get it. You're angry. So am I. But whinging and whining all night isn't going to get anything done, so I suggest we save our energy and get out of this forest first thing tomorrow morning."
"Why should I have to wait just so that you can see again with those primitive eyes of yours? You know, I could get them fixed for you! Maybe then you won't cause so many disasters!"
Dib rolled his eyes. Like he was going to let an alien space monster mess with any part of him, even if Zim's offer was genuine.
"Does Zim really have to put up with you, all night?" Came more irritable whimpering from the soldier.
"Well, what do you suggest space jerk? You can't find your way out of a haystack, so I guess I have to put up with you, unless you want to get chewed up by a big grizzly bear!"
"There are no 'bears' here!" As he said this with weak conviction, he glanced suspiciously over his shoulder as if evoking the very word could summon them.
"Oh there are hundreds, but you'll never see them in time before they pounce!" He felt cruel as he said it, and a real dick, especially from the terrified reaction he got as a result, but Zim had been giving him such a hard time. How else was he to earn any payback?
The night deepened, and the sky was a velvety midnight black. The only way to tell the time was by the slow and sly turn of the constellations and the position of the fleeting half moon as it dived in and out of silver cloud cover. At least it wasn't raining.
Whether it was from fatigue, or from finally accepting the inevitable, Zim moved closer to the fire. He stiffly sat down, his PAK lights pulsing out these calming hypnotic pinks. They sat there awhile, neither saying anything to the other. Either way Dib tried to hide his smile, glad that Zim had finally come to join him.
It was also true that the invader didn't seem to know what to do with himself. He was the busy type, never stopping long enough to relax. His fingers and mind had to tinker with something, and this much peace and quiet was agitating him. Often he went to picking at his sleeve, huffing and fidgeting. Dib found it hard to strike up a conversation with him, which was never an easy endeavour even when they weren't lost. Zim was always waiting to offload another tirade, another string of curses, and would just go his own way at the slightest provocation.
Sighing, Dib leant back, enjoying the warmth the flames offered. He wished Zim could see the beauty in nature, and in life, but it was clear to him that the soldier was walled off from seeing such, like a machine that could only ever see numbers and statistics.
Even though he sat calmly, basking in the warmth, Zim retained that soldiery tension, eyes skimming over to the trees and bushes at every tiniest fraction of noise as though it was as loud as an explosion.
As they sat opposite each other in the awkward silence, tiny dots of colour began to appear in the dark. Zim's antennae lifted in one smooth motion, his eyes also lifting to the fiery dots. When his eyes widened, Dib could tell that he was nervous. It didn't take much to scare the soldier whenever he was out of his comfort zone.
"W-What are those?"
Dib looked over at the bobbing beads of soft, pulsing oranges. They floated, and left golden teardrops wherever they went as they darted and bounced in midair. Dib was drawn immediately to the bobbing golden teardrops. The sight of them was rare these days. "Fireflies." He said. He had not seen fireflies since he was a child when his father took him to see the sights of the Oregon Mountains one summer, back when they actually used to do things together as a family. Now, as cities expanded, and industrial gases filled the air, the fireflies had started to quietly disappear.
A certain ache filled his chest to see them again. There was always something magical about them, something serene, and they'd always captivated him. But he could not bring that magic back – not even in a jar. You couldn't cage magic and keep it for yourself. He had discovered that as a boy.
"F-Fireflies?" Zim repeated. He seemed stunned to see them magically appear as well, and was taken by their bobbing lights. Whether it was the mysticism these bugs evoked in him, or something else, Dib couldn't be too sure. "Are they... poisonous? W-Why do they glow like that?"
He shook his head, trying not to laugh at the Irken's expense. It was so, so cruelly tempting to say 'yes, they run on batteries, just like you.' "That glow is from some sort of chemical reaction in their abdomens. It's called bioluminescence or something."
"But from what?"
At that, Dib could only shrug. "It's what nature can do, Zim. There's no trickery involved. No circuits."
Zim moved to get up, which again surprised the human. He turned towards the cluster of bobbing, weaving lights, and as he did so, Dib was caught with a sudden correlation. The soldier's PAK was pulsing in almost the same way: a light not quite explained, yet emitting the same rhythmic intonation that could always be seen in the darkest of places. Many a time that same glow had comforted Dib from certain perils that only life could give, in the same way a nightlight soothed a child at night.
More fireflies began to appear: the nocturnal bugs of the forest gathering in the chilly dark. Strangely, the fireflies bobbed and floated towards Zim as if he was attracting them somehow, and before long the Irken was standing amongst them. Were they attracted by the fantastical lights he was producing? Or was it just a strange coincidence?
Who knows what aliens extruded through their pores, right?
The Irken seemed baffled too, blinking and looking round at them with notable anxiety.
Zim then brought out a hand, and for a moment Dib thought he was about to claw out at them as he helplessly stared, watching the spectacle with an open mouth.
Zim was a destroyer. He was incapable of being gentle.
They flittered over his slender claws, one landing on his palm. The firefly that had landed on his palm wasn't as bright as the others. Its luminance was pale. Many others circled the Irken: filling his eyes with golden stars. Dib had never seen the Elite stand so still.
He closed both hands over the pale firefly, and when he opened those claws again some five seconds later, the firefly was as bright as the others. It lifted back into the air, and was soon dancing with the others.
Dib blinked, unsure of what he had seen, if he had seen anything at all.
The alien started back, leaving the foray of fiery gold bugs who seemed tempted to follow him, but as soon as he entered the firelight, they stayed away but never went far.
"They're pretty neat, aren't they?" Dib started lamely, still dismayed and bemused by what he had seen. Maybe he had knocked his head really bad in the Voot, and was still concussed, and as such, was prone to hallucinations.
"Eh? Yes. Yes they are." Zim encircled his arms around his knees, and glanced over at the dreamy string of fireflies. Since their appearance he had stopped looking up at the sky so much and was now inclined to watch them instead. He did not comment on the moment with the fireflies as Dib waited, expecting him to say...something on the matter.
Frowning, Dib went to stand, intending to do as his nemesis had done. Maybe he could act like a magnet to these bugs too? But the moment he stepped towards them, they dispersed, heading deeper into the velvet black to get away.
"You must have frightened them off with your smelliness." Zim said with one of his patented sly smiles. Dib came back into the firelight, disappointed.
"Well, you must secrete some kind of alien ooze to attract them."
Zim's smile was thin, and didn't last.
The fire began to dwindle. Dib's eyelids began to drop. They must have been sitting out here for hours, and there was no sign of daylight. Luckily the place was mostly peaceful, with there was no crafty approach from a suspected bear or mountain lion. The fireflies seemed to encircle them protectively, and so Dib eventually dropped his guard, and sat with his head resting on his arms and knees.
Zim had inched a little closer during the hours, and a little closer until he was sitting next to Dib as if the surrounding woodland was a different kind of loneliness he did not especially like.
The leaves rustled, producing strange sounds neither of them were used to. The chill seemed to get into everything; the grass, the trees, the late blooming flowers. Frosty starlight gleamed from leaf and blade. The cold soon even chased the fireflies away, and a heavier darkness seemed to clasp them tight, the little fire their only source of warmth and hope.
A frenzy of shivers would clutch Zim mercilessly, and he was forced to bear them with his arms wrapped around his chest. His antennae sagged against his neck as he tried to shuffle as close to the fire as possible. The warmth was a different kind of heat not that of his technology, or thermal heaters. It was too primal for that. But he admired the way the embers moved or their own accord, wild, free and untamed. He stretched out a gloved hand, tempted to press those claws closer, but he knew he would get hurt if he did.
The fire...
...it was something beautiful.
He was drawn to its destructibility. It's wild chaos. But as it grew smaller, and weakened, his shivering returned.
In frustration, he saw that Dib seemed to be faring better. He was snoozing in fits and starts, his head resting on his arms, and seemed hardly bothered by the encroaching cold.
That boy was strong. He could have been killed by the crash.
Zim was angry that it had happened at all, angry that he'd risked Dib life.
Fearing he'd freeze to death long before the sun rose, he stood up and walked around the dying fire, rubbing at his arms to try and keep warm. His cursing was soft, but constant. At least Irk was kept to a steady and constant temperature, but this infernal planet had too many variables. His inflexibility to things changeable and capricious had always held him back.
The dark of the forest looked back. Several times he could have stalked off, choosing a direction and taking it, but then he realized that Dib was his fire, and that he was utterly drawn to the human as the fireflies had been drawn to him.
Dib opened watery eyes to see Zim sauntering about, arms tight about him. The dying flames made the Irken look yellowish in the glow.
"Here. It's okay." Shaking off fatigue, Dib came over and put an arm around him. He could never quite weigh up what Zim would do whenever he touched him. The Irken snarled, his lips peeling. He encouraged him back towards the fire. "Best way of getting you warm, stupid." He muttered with a tired smile.