EarthPup: Te-he, thank you (-^.^-) I had forgotten there was another election in the comics (I even have a physical copy of those issues), that probably would have made things a little easier, but oh well. I'm glad you enjoyed the changes I made though, especially with Skoodge's part, I imagine him as being a bit like Neville, from Harry Potter; he ends up in a lot of situations he never asked to be in, but he ultimately steps up when he needs to and is more capable than he gives himself credit for. As for having more focus on alien stuff, we'll be getting a little of that this time, and a couple of really big things in the next chapter, including more time with Gaz. And I've started, this past month has been a little weird, but I'm glad I was able to leave a comment before this update.
Guest 1: Well, the Tak episode is still a little ways off (about 4 months in-story, next chapter is Halloween and she still shows up around Valentines day), but she is, and there's a lot of things I'm looking forward to doing with this one. (^.^-)
Scarecrow345: Thank you as always. And don't worry about it, admittedly part of it's from the other upload getting bumped down really quickly the last two times, but everything seems to be going back to normal, so I'm happy (-^.^-) And I'm glad you enjoyed the changes I made, since the original conflict couldn't be translated at all, I just had fun making something new with it, I'd been wanting to give Skoodge a nice moment to shine and a few friends besides Zim & Dib for a while, so it worked out really well (and to address what happened to the school president). But yes I imagine Zim just not being the type to handle the unexpected well, and is more comfortable being frustrated than sad or anxious.
Guest 2: Oh! Thank you (^.^) Also perfect timing, right before the update
So, before we start, I want to send some encouragement to my friend RissyNicole: You can finish your chapter, I know you can. The latest one I finished spent months in progress before everything clicked and I managed to almost double what I had written out in just one day, everything will click eventually.
The past, goodness it's been about a month, has been alright, but a little odd. Basically, I'm supposed to film and edit a couple of videos, we had originally planned to film weeks ago but things keep happening to delay it between bad weather (we're filming outside) to one of the people in the video having to deal with a family crisis and self-isolate afterwards. Fortunately we own the equipment, so we haven't had to keep renting it, but it's a little frustrating and for a while I've felt like I was in some sort weird holding pattern (and honestly a little stressed since one of the videos needs to be finished by the time school starts).
On a happier note, this chapter and next are a bit longer than usual, so hopefully that makes up for this one taking a bit longer than planned, it's a combination chapter too, and has one of my favourite chapter titles. It does have the dubious honor of being the first one to be worked on after the month long hiatus I had to take from writing during the end of my classes, but I gave it a little extra attention and I'm happy with how it turned out.
Enjoy everyone (-^.^-)
The evening had started out relatively calmly, at least, as much as they could with Zim & Gir involved.
After school, the two had gone to Dib's house to have dinner and work on a history project, or rather, Zim had while Gir 'helped' by producing a handful of unrelated crayon drawings. Arguably Gir was having the more productive evening, as history assignments tended to be a stumbling point for both Zim & Dib, the latter because it was not his planet and, while he was eager to learn, he had several years of catching up to do.
Meanwhile the former had trouble keeping his opinions to himself; in Zim's eyes there were at least '40 schmillion' mistakes that the men and women of antiquity made and he did not hesitate to point them out when given the opportunity. Fortunately, Miss Bitters did not dock marks for this, but her claims to have been there and thought as much at the time was rather unsettling, especially since no matter how far back in history the event was you couldn't bring yourself to doubt it was true.
It was then, in the middle of researching a paper about Guy Fawkes, that things first went wrong as the voice commands to Dib's home computer network stopped yielding results. A few more tries and an attempt at using the remote input keys later nothing had changed, the house's research feature simply wasn't responding.
"Seriously? It breaks down now?" Dib sighed in frustration, fortunately the paper wasn't due for another week or so, but it was still inconvenient "The compatibility drive probably burnt out, you two wait here while I replace it"
"Do you really expect that to work?" Zim scoffed "This is the first time you've mentioned your house having this 'compatibility drive' and you expect us to just sit here quietly while you change it?"
Dib sighed again "Not really, but I can at least try" he already expected his instructions to be argued against, though he supposed it was better than ignored outright and the two wandering after him without his knowing.
"Then you'll let us watch?"
"Alright, you two can watch, but be very careful not to touch anything" Dib said "Installing one of these can be dangerous if you're in the wrong spot at the wrong time" After a hastily given agreement Dib could already tell he'd have to enforce, the three of them made their way downstairs.
Zim lit up upon seeing the control room, he'd never been to this part of the house before and it was full of all kinds of enticing alien devices he was eager to explore. Everywhere he looked there were display screens with large blocks of text, charts, and video feeds; he excitedly noted that he was able to read the odd word of the alien language, apparently universal grammar really was universal. There were control panels too: he always loved standing at control panels! Surely it would be fine if he just stood by one and had a quick look-
"Don't touch that"
The older boy made the same face Gir did when he was caught sneaking out of bed, if somewhat more indignant, while his brother giggled "Uh-oh!" beside him. Zim gave an annoyed huff at this, how did Dib even see that? His eyesight was bad enough to need glasses! And he hadn't even turned around! Did his species just have a second pair of eyes in the back? Maybe the ones in front were nearsighted because the back ones were so keen; it couldn't be that he'd already learnt Zim's pattern of…creatively interpreting instructions.
"If you want to look at something, this is where the drive goes" Dib said as he gestured to a largely empty panel with a glass dome containing what looked like a grey, burnt out crystal brain inside with a couple of buttons beside it.
"Is that a real brain?" Zim asked excitedly as he peered over Dib's shoulder, already having joined him by the panel.
"What? No! No it's not, that would be weird" Dib answered, more than a little disturbed by the image "No, it's just modeled off one to improve compatibility"
The answer seemed to satisfy Zim, who went back to watching the installation, Dib did a quick spot check for Gir who was currently playing with a plush…possibly a moose? It had antlers anyway, but looked flat as if it had been built over a frisbee.
The Vortian turned his attention back to Zim and guided him back a few steps with one arm "I'm about to plug it in, you don't want to stand too close" he explained. Really the control panel was the safest connection point, given it was the one the user interacted with, but with the boy's tendency to turn everything he touched into a safety hazard, Dib chose to err on the side of caution. Unfortunately, he didn't notice that Gir had dropped the toy he was playing with, and that it bounced into a corner of the room moments before he installed the drive just as Gir reached to grab it.
What he did notice was the blinding flash of light that filled the room.
"Zim is unscathed!" the child in question shouted far too loudly for how close he was standing "Was that supposed to happen?" he added after a brief pause and at a more reasonable volume.
"It wasn't, something must have gone wrong" Dib replied as he looked down at the panel; it was lit up, so the drive wasn't simply non-functional, but it didn't look right, the drive was glowing with a bright turquoise light "You might want to go back upstairs, this could take a while"
Zim sulked and kicked at the floor at this before calling Gir over, only to find himself being ignored in favour of watching a stream of flickering lights. Typical. He took a few steps closer and called a little louder, that never failed to get his attention when he was engrossed watching TV.
"Gir! Come on! Gir, it's time to go!" Still no response, now Zim was getting worried, he walked over to Gir and set a hand on his holder, gently shaking it to try and get his attention, instead he flopped over into Zim's arms.
Instantly, panic set in as Zim held the unconscious child "Dib! Dib, get over here!" It only took a moment for the Vortain to cross the room, but in that time Zim had already set Gir down and was looking him over: his breathing and pulse were normal, so was his temperature. He tried shaking his brother again, slightly harder this time "Gir, wake up! This isn't funny anymore! Gir! GIR!"
This time he got an answer, simultaneously Gir sprang up and gave Zim a crisp salute, while his voice replied "I'm OK, don't worry" However, his mouth wasn't moving, and for some reason his voice seemed to be coming from overhead. "I'm in the ceiling!" For once it didn't seem to be one of Gir's usual non-sequiturs.
Both Zim and Dib breathed a sigh of relief before confusion took over.
"Dib Goat, explain!"
"It's the house's compatibility drive, it's what allows the computers to interface with human technology and access Earth's internet for research" he said, piecing together what happened as he spoke "It's designed to be able to interface with anything, since some planets have organic data storage systems, that includes living things. Which is why I said it was dangerous and that I didn't want you two coming down here"
"Nevermind that! Will you be able to fix him?" Zim asked, dodging the next logical step in this: that none of this would have happened if he hadn't insisted on watching the installation process. Really, Dib wasn't terribly surprised by this; Zim seemed to see being responsible for something going wrong as a personal failing, a mind set that didn't seem too uncommon here, given the way mistakes were stigmatised.
However the mental gymnastics Zim automatically went through to shift the blame anywhere else but him were in a league of their own. It was like pulling teeth to get him to acknowledge he'd bought the wrong flavour of candy; there was no way he'd let himself admit to being responsible for something like this, where someone he cared about was put in jeopardy.
"I should be able to" Dib answered as he looked at Gir and the equipment "It looks like just Gir switched places with the drive; it doesn't have a personality like an A.I. would, but it's programmed to be an assistant, which is probably why Gir's body is conscious right now" He added gesturing to the child standing at attention beside Zim, as he did, he noticed the lights from the conduits Gir had been standing between were dimmer than they should be, apparently they had been damaged as a result.
"It's going to take a while to fix the machine, but we should be able to just repeat the process to switch them back in a few hours"
Zim sighed in a relief Dib shared with him, it was a stressful situation after all and if Dib were to be completely honest, one he felt partially responsible for. He had been so focused on making sure Zim stayed where he was supposed to, he'd barely even thought to keep track of Gir. Though now that he thought about it, it was a little discouraging that the 4 year old wasn't the one he immediately thought of needing to keep an eye on.
"Are you going to be alright up there that long?" Dib called towards the ceiling.
"Yep! It's really neat in here!" Gir chirped "I can see all over the house, there's Gaz on her computer! Hi Gaz!" He was quiet for a few moments, presumably listening to the other half of a conversation happening in another room, before answering "Okie dokie, I won't look! Good luck with your splodey guy!"
"Splodey guy?" Dib asked, concerned.
"Uh-huh, Gaz said she needs to test her CG rig of a guy exploding, and I shouldn't look because you'll freak out" Gir replied far too casually, another pause "Now she says she's going to garage to test it in the ship where she can get some peace and quiet. Bye bye Gaz!" A mechanical arm came down and waved, evidently Gir didn't have full control of his new body yet if his hand was dropping into the wrong room.
"Alright….The TV should still work. Zim, why don't you go upstairs and try to relax a little with Gir while I take care of this?" Dib suggested, there was no point in everyone sitting around feeling stressed, even if one of them wouldn't admit to being such.
"I'll go work on the assignment" Zim countered "Come on Gir"
"I'm pretty sure I'm in the living room already" Gir said while his body stayed put with a stoic expression on its face, Zim groaned in annoyance as he dragged a hand down his face before walking up to the child.
"You're, uh…You're CompuGir now. Follow me" he said before leading him down the hall and into the living room while Gir's voice giggled overhead that the footsteps tickled.
Zim scowled at the half finished report layed out in front of him, despite his plan to work on it while he waited for Dib to fix the machine and return things to normal, he just couldn't manage to focus. Perhaps because Gir was watching him from overhead. Yes, that was it; never mind that Gir's face wasn't even visible, and that being watched never bothered him before, or that with what happened earlier he had plenty to worry about and keep him from focusing. Dib had assured him it would be fine, so it was. Really.
His thoughts were interrupted by a hand tapping his shoulder "What should I do now?" CompuGir asked, holding Zim's history textbook.
"Eh? Just keep reading the book I gave you" he answered with a dismissive wave of the hand.
"I've already finished reading this book" CompuGir replied, prompting Zim to raise an eyebrow.
"You've already finished it" he half stated half asked, it had barely been over 5 minutes and a few quick questions confirmed he had, indeed, read the whole thing. "Why don't you, uh" his eyes darted to the television set "Why don't you monitor some broadcasts until I have another job for you?" He suggested as he handed off the remote, missing the glare the child shot him as the wheels in his head started turning; it was a questionable thought, given the circumstances, but this was potential silver lining.
Zim loved his little brother, he really did, but Gir was a bit…lacking as far as henchmen went. As sweet as he was, he didn't really contribute very much to Zim's goals of world domination, and there were more than a few times where Gir's 'help' was anything but. However, CompuGir was essentially a mechanical secretary in a human body, and an efficient one at that, capable of plowing through a decently sized schoolbook in a matter of minutes. And Dib did say it would take a while to get everything sorted, surely he could map out a plan and perhaps set it in motion in the time he had, especially since finishing the report clearly wasn't going to happen.
"Gir!" he called towards the ceiling "Tell Dib we're going out for a while!"
"Okie Dokie!" Gir replied, a minute later he relayed the Vortian's response "He wants to know where you're going first" The older boy groaned in irritation at this; he had been traveling around town by himself long before Dib showed up, he didn't need to be supervised.
"Tell him, we're going to the library!"
Once again Gir agreed to relay the message, and once again there was a pause before the answer came "He says it's OK, just try not to stay out too late"
"Of course it is" Zim replied smugly as he lead CompuGir out the door "And I wasn't asking permission" he added before shutting the door behind himself.
"Well, it look like it's just you and me, Gir" Dib said looking up at the ceiling "It's not as bad as I thought it was, I should have everything ready by the time Zim gets back" It complicated things a little bit that he'd apparently taken 'CompuGir' with him, but he could understand it; he'd long since realised Zim did not have the best method of coping with stress and often had to distract himself with a project. At least going to the library was a step in the right direction.
"Can I help?" Gir asked, dropping a mechanical arm into the room.
"Thank you for offering, but I think it's better if I work on this by myself" Dib answered, hoping he could prevent Gir from accidentally damaging something without hurting his feelings in the process "Why don't you try practising moving as the house? That way if I do need help, you'll be ready"
"Ookie!" Gir cheered before going quiet to practise. This gleaned Dib a solid 10 minutes of working time before Gir resurfaced and complained he was bored.
"Okay then. Gir, do you remember those cartoons I showed you a while back? Why don't you watch some of those while I try and fix this?"
"Okey Dokey" Gir chirped "How do I do that?"
"There should be a playlist called 'Gir's cartoons' in the databanks" Dib replied, he got an uncharacteristic silence in response.
"I can't read that much" Gir finally answered.
Dib took a deep breath in and let it out, right, Gir wasn't very old yet "Sorry, I forgot" he paused to think for a moment "Alright, Gir. Do you know how to write your name?"
"Uh-huh"
"OK, try finding the playlist that starts with your name, there's only one" A minute of silence followed, presumably as the child looked for his name, before a few noises of distress began sounding overhead. Worried, Dib asked "Are you alright Gir?"
"No~!" Gir's voice replied, sounding on the verge of tears "I can't find it, there's one that has my name, but there's a flicky thing and an S at the end and then a word I can't read and I don't know what the S is for!"
"Shh, shh calm down Gir, it's OK" Dib soothed, trying to diffuse the distraught preschooler "That's the right playlist, the flick and s after your name means it belongs to you"
"You mean I found it?" Gir asked, his voice instantly brightening.
"Yep, good job, Gir" Dib smiled with a awkward thumbs up.
"Yaaay!" Gir cheered, sounding very proud of himself before starting up the videos.
With Gir once again placated, Dib turned back to the machine and continued his work; hopefully he'd finish before the cartoons ceased to be entertaining.
"Alright" Zim nodded, his hands planted firmly on his hips as he stood dramatically in front of a large building "Tonight we take the first steps towards our future" he took Gir's hand "Come Gir, the secret to world conquest awaits"
He lead the smaller child inside and up to the front desk "Do you have the materials I requested?" He asked the worker at the front, who nodded in reply "Good, bring them to the usual table" The worker followed Zim & Gir to the table and set down a large stack of books and CDs.
"Studying hard, aren't you? Have fun kids" the librarian said before returning to the front.
Zim took two books from the pile and set one in front of CompuGir who gave him a doubtful look "What is the point of this?"
"Research, I have an idea I want to try, but I need to check a few things first" he stated as he set the other book down and opened it. "Normally I'd have to do this by myself since Gir can't read well enough, but you're made to gather information, so you can take some of the books"
The sour expression on CompuGir's face hadn't changed "I don't believe you're using my abilities to their full potential"
"That's because I'm not finished yet" Zim grinned, confident in his own brilliance, before taking out the disk player and slipping it on Gir's head "You're a computer, meaning you can read and listen at the same time, so I set aside some audio books as well"
"I'm good for more than this" CompuGir stated "I can download information directly from any digital sources at a rate of 600 Terrabites per second. Besides that, I come preprogrammed with the necessary defensive and offensive techniques to defend the building I'm connected to"
Zim looked up from his seat across from Gir's, with the distance between them short enough for both to take books from the pile; it was a tempting offer, but…
"After everything's back to normal, you're not doing any of that while you're still in Gir's body" He finally said with a tone that there was no room for negotiation; taking advantage of CompuGir's processing power was one thing, but letting him put Gir's body jeopardy was another matter altogether. "I'll build you a robot one when we get back, or something" He added before flipping his book back up, in doing so he missed the withering glare CompuGir was shooting at him before aggressively raising his own book.
Dib smiled in satisfaction at a job well done, wiping the sweat from his brow before closing everything up. Since Zim still had CompuGir, there was nothing more he could do for the process until they returned, so he decided to take advantage of having his tools out to work on a few projects in the meantime. No sooner had he brought everything to the workbench than he looked up to find a screen showing a hysterical man in a strange yellow costume just inches away from his face, evidently Gir had switched to Earth television at some point.
"Look! The Taco Man's on TV, can we go?"
"No, Gir. There's not really any point in us going" Dib calmly replied.
"Why not?" Gir asked, his face now filling the screen. Dib pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed: deep breaths Dib, think back to when you were his stage, you still had a good example for parenting then.
"Why do you want to go to the taco place?" Dib asked in what he hoped was at least close to the tone he remembered from early childhood.
"To get some tacos" Gir smiled.
"And how are you going to eat the tacos once you have them?"
"That's silly!" Gir giggled at the question "I'd just put them my mouth and- oh" He cut his own thought short as he realised that he had no mouth to eat tacos with. "I guess we should wait a little"
Dib nodded in agreement "Still, you figured it out by yourself. Good job Gir"
"Yaaay!" Gir cheered, earning himself a fond smile from Dib as the latter pulled open the drawer. This whole ordeal was going surprisingly smoothly, and he had to give credit to Gir for managing to stay fairly calm throughout all of it, especially for someone his age.
As he reached into the drawer Dib noticed something missing; normally the laser welder would be here, he pulled the drawer out to check and make sure he hadn't just missed it, nothing. Next he searched the neighbouring drawers on the off chance that he had put it in the wrong spot, still no.
"Gir" he called towards the ceiling
"Yes?"
"Can you see the laser welder anywhere? It looks like a big, blue metal pen" He didn't think it would be somewhere else, he always put it away since it was one of the few dangerous objects he owned, but it didn't hurt to check.
"Nope! No big metal pens!" Gir chirped.
Alright, now this was just weird, it being left outside it's drawer was odd enough, but the entire house? Unless….But Zim hadn't tried running off with anything since the Megadoomer incident. Still, it was probably better to check, he got the communicator and pulled up Zim's number, after a moment of waiting the boy answered.
"What is it Dib? I'm in the middle of working on my latest plan for world conquest"
"Did you see my welder earlier? It's steel blue and looks like a big, metal pen; I can't find it anywhere and I was wondering if maybe you noticed something" He was careful not to sound accusatory; he didn't know if Zim had it or not, and if he did the boy would either boast of how he'd managed to get it, or dig his heels in and refuse to give him any answers, and he'd rather not risk the latter.
"No, I haven't seen your welder, why would I-" His answer was cut short as he turned to see his new underling holding something that was a fairly close match to the description, pointing it at his face to be exact. "Dib, I've found it" his expression shifted from startled to stern "Put that down"
CompuGir's face stayed fixed in an expression that seemed very out of place on Gir "I don't want to" he said in a cold monotone that felt equally unnatural.
"Gi-CompuGir" Zim warned in his big brother voice "Put that down, now"
The child's posture shifted as if he were preparing to lunge at Zim as he switched the welder on "Make me"
The two of them stood frozen for a second before Zim fully registered what was happening and, in a rare moment of doing the sensible thing, he turned and ran. He couldn't be completely certain, but he was sure he felt a spot of hot air coming from where he had been standing a minute ago, which was all he needed to push him to run faster and look for a place to strategise.
"Zim? What's happening? Are you alright?"
His eyes darted to the phone, still in his hand, still connected to Dib's, he'd completely forgotten the call was still going.
"CompuGir took your welder, he's attacking me with it"
"What!? Ok, where are you right now?"
"At the library. Why do y-" Before he could finish the crunching sound of the security camera being smashed came from behind him and he ducked behind a shelf to shield himself from the debris, pressing the off button and ending the call in the process.
"My brother's in trouble, isn't he?" Gir said more than asked, even with the screen off and no visible face, Dib could tell he was staring at the communicator screen just as he was.
"Yeah…I'd say he's in trouble" Dib nodded. Frankly 'in trouble' was a huge understatement; the welder was made for metal work and could do considerable damage to unprotected skin and likely burn through whatever Zim's clothes were made from. The fact that it was Gir's body chasing after him might reduce the risk, given the limits of somebody his age, though that also raised the risk of Gir being injured if the A.I. didn't improve his coordination.
Either way there was a very real possibility of one of them getting hurt, Dib supposed he could use the ship to step in, but that would mean leaving Gir alone-
"Ok, let's go" Gir declared.
Dib's attempt to voice the questions this raised were cut off by the sensation of the floor shaking beneath him and the realisation that the house was slowly rising up. A quick glance out the window confirmed that Gir was standing up as his line of sight passed by the roof of the garage, he didn't even know the house could do that, looking down he could see the house being supported by four mechanical limbs that looked a little familiar….
"Why a dog?" Dib asked.
"I like doggies, it's easier like this too" Gir replied in a tone that Dib could tell was probably accompanied by a shrug.
It made sense, keeping your balance as a quadruped was much easier than as a biped, so Gir would have an easier time moving as one; especially since he wasn't used to being a house and the stability of his gait wasn't very consistent even in his usual body.
The Vortian's train of thought was once again interrupted as the house leapt forward around him and he had to grab the window sill to keep himself from being sent flying. He cautiously opened an eye, expecting the living room to be a complete disaster and to potentially have to dodge a piece of furniture, but amazingly everything was mostly staying in place. The sofa was shifting from side to side a little but nowhere near as much as you'd expect under the circumstances and everything in the cabinets mostly stayed in place as well.
With the length of Gir's steps it would only take a couple of minutes to reach the library. However, about halfway there Gir came to a sudden stop with no visible reason why; none of the stop lights were preventing him from going forward, nor were there any people or animals crossing.
"Why did you stop?" Dib asked as he scrambled to catch a few items that were falling off the shelves, apparently Gir had somehow been keeping them in place.
"It's the toy store!" Gir cheered "They gots furbies there, hi furbies!" The balance shifted slightly as he waved at the window.
"Gir, don't forget why we're out"
"Oh, right!" Gir presumably nodded before continuing his sprint to the library.
Meanwhile, Zim had managed to avoid being injured, but CompuGir was keeping him on the defensive; both because he was far more coordinated than Gir, and because of Zim's reluctance to risk injuring Gir's body. To make matters worse, CompuGir had destroyed the security cameras and the other people in the main area either had been knocked out or simply couldn't be bothered with anything that didn't break their concentration.
Currently he was perched in one of the bookshelves, attempting to form a strategy; there had to be something he could do that would incapacitate CompuGir, while leaving Gir's body in good enough shape for him to return to in a few hours. Then it clicked: Gir was only about four years old, his usual bedtime wasn't that far away, he just had to wait for him to get tired. Yes, he could outlast him.
He could hear the footsteps now as CompuGir came closer to his hiding place, but Zim had another level of protection. From his...strategising corner (not a hiding place, never a hiding place) he found the perfect thing to use: a large number of thick volumes with flexible softcovers, ones that nobody would care if they got damaged and likely wouldn't notice had been for a long time.
When his opponent came close enough he stepped out in a set of makeshift armour, made up of books on tax law.
At this point he hadn't decided if he would lead CompuGir on a chase through the library in an effort to exhaust him, or use the protection offered by the book armour to try and disarm him; the decision was made for him as he took his first step forward and one of the books slid off. Fine chasing it was. Actually this worked perfectly as his pursuer would be slowed down as he had to dodge the books as they fell off...not to mention armour made of paper offered rather poor protection against a welder.
A salty ocean breeze teased at long blonde hair as a young woman strolled along the beach, the small waves lapped at the shore, softening the footprints she left behind as she walked. Her pace quickened upon spotting him; her beloved was here, rugged, tanned, and sleeveless. The flowing skirt she wore fluttered as she was swept into his strong arms, their embrace pleasantly silhouetted by the pink of the sunlight skirting the horizon while they professed their undying love for each other.
While this was going on the somewhat younger would-be couple watching blushed as they realised their hands were touching. Both in their early teens, they had come here under the pretense of studying and proceeded to borrow the most romantic movie the librarian would lend them in hopes of enjoying their first kiss.
They were close now, just a few inches more...
"SERIOUSLY!? There's nothing in this one either!?"
Both whipped around to see a tiny boy standing in the doorway, sporting a frustrated scowl and a backpack he could probably empty out to use as a sleeping bag. At roughly four foot nothing neither of them thought he could be more than eight years old.
"Do you mind!?" One half of the pair objected.
"Not really" the boy replied without a hint of sarcasm, completely straight faced; as if the couple's anger, or any part of this situation for that matter, didn't register at all.
"Get out of here!" The other teenager shouted
"Fine! My little brother can have you! See if I care!" The boy yelled in frustration as he stormed off, leaving the couple to try and pick up where they left off. Only to be interrupted by another child throwing the door open.
"Geez! What do you have to do to get a little privacy around here!?"
The exclamation was accompanied by one of the cushions being thrown at the intruder, which he effortlessly caught, like a programmed machine, before setting what looked to them like a giant laser pointer aside and stoically ripping the cushion in half, dropping the pieces on the floor. He shot both of them a look that said 'destruction is too good for you' as he picked up the device and left.
It took a minute for both of them to realise that they were clinging to each other in fear, at least they were touching. That counted as a success, right?
Meanwhile, Zim was busy searching for an exit; forget longer term strategies like keeping CompuGir in the library and away from the general populace, he had already lost too much ground in the video lounge, at this point he just needed to keep away from him long enough for him to get tired. Something Gir's body, unfortunately, took a long time to do.
He felt a slight twinge of relief as he saw the carpet flooring give way to tile, that meant he was likely in the staff area, and more importantly, close to an emergency exit.
Instead he was met with a washed out reflection of his face in the vending machine.
"Curse you, snacks! Curse you!" He shouted as he delivered a swift kick to the window; to make things worse there wasn't even anything particularly good in the machine. In a brief moment between blows to the machine he heard the sound of wheels squeaking, and narrowly managed to avoid the book trolley CompuGir rode towards him before it crashed where he had been standing a moment before, causing the tempered glass to crumble into little clear pebbles.
Amazingly, both children were unharmed by the impact and as CompuGir stood, Zim spotted something he quickly hid behind his back as he inched towards the carpet. The only doors he knew for certain were there were the ones way at the front of the library, while there was likely an emergency exit nearby, looking for it wasn't worth the risk of potentially running into another dead end trying to find it. While the collision bought him some time, it didn't take long for CompuGir to climb down off the trolley and start making up the distance, a little over halfway to the door he drew close enough that Zim decided it was time to use his back up plan.
"Look what I have" he called before tossing a sealed packet, he grinned as CompuGir ran to grab it, while exclaiming in confusion; it had been a bit of a gamble relying on Gir's fondness for gummies and hoping instinct would win out and make him go after them, but evidently it had paid off.
The doors weren't far ahead now, just a little more and he'd make it through. As he drew closer he noticed what he saw through the glass wasn't a starry sky, but a very familiar paint job. He took one step on the pavement after making it through the library doors before stumbling into Dib's living room, not even bothering to wonder how he was there as the Vortian closed the door behind him with one hand and hugged him with the other.
"Zim! Are you alright?"
"Yes, yes, I'm fine" The boy replied with a tone of agitation "CompuGir's right behind me"
"You hold the door closed, I'll go in the kitchen and lock up anything sharp" Dib instructed, and for once Zim wasn't inclined to argue. Less than a minute after he took over the door, Zim could feel somebody trying to force it open from the other side; with Dib still locking up the kitchen, he briefly considered calling for assistance. However, he didn't even have time for his usual mental gymnastics to debate it before the door opened just wide enough for CompuGir to use tools and physics to quickly pry open the door and knock him over.
"I'm willing to overlook this" the older boy said from the floor "Just put the welder down and we can go back to doing our research as if none of this happened"
"You don't even realise this is why I must do this, do you? You're too much of a sentimental twit to be the ruler of anything" CompuGir stated as Zim scrambled to his feet "You've been basing the way you treat me on the fact that I'm walking around in your little brother's body, it doesn't matter that I'm clearly not him, or that his consciousness is in a computer mainframe, you still treat me like a human child. Despite getting annoyed if someone does the same to you, you little hypocrite"
"Little!? I'm taller than you!" Zim retorted, standing up as straight as possible to emphasise it, CompuGir briefly shot him an unimpressed look before taking advantage of the opening and lunging at him.
It happened too quickly for Zim to dodge, and definitely too fast for Dib to stop him as he came in from the kitchen. Zim flinched as CompuGir pressed the welder against his cheek.
Only to be underwhelmed as he realised it was barely warm.
Dib let out a sigh of relief; for years he'd been told it was a bad habit on his part that he never remembered to charge his devices after using them and just connected them when he had to, but he felt this proved them wrong. The battery must have run down while the children were in the library, the light had a separate power source so it had seemed to be on this entire time when, in fact, it had nearly cooled down completely.
CompuGir growled in frustration before swinging it at Zim, who managed to dodge the worst of it. He'd have a nasty bruise on his arm for the next little while, even with the layer of fabric softening the blow, but it was still far less severe than he could have received. Before the smaller child could take another swing, he found his feet were no longer touching the ground, he glanced back and saw that Dib had his arms hooked around his. He kicked his feet uselessly in the air and he flailed the welder around, despite being impeded by half of each arm being immobilised, and screamed at both of them.
"Zim, run!" Dib urged as he tried to hold CompuGir back. Even though Gir was still considerably smaller than him, he struggled to restrain him as he made a genuine effort to break free. He managed to last a minute or so before Gir succeeded in kicking his knee, forcing it to bend and allowing CompuGir to get his own feet on the ground again.
He tried to chase after Zim, but Dib was annoyingly persistent and continued to hold onto his arm. CompuGir tried yanking it away, but Dib's hand only slipped towards his wrist, he brought his other hand around to try and pry the Vortian's hand away, eventually succeeding, but at the cost of disarming himself as Dib managed to wrestle the welder away from him.
It didn't matter, even without it there was plenty he could do.
Elsewhere, Zim may have gotten away, but it was only a band-aid solution. He looked around for something he could use to defend himself, but once again was unable to find something that wouldn't hurt Gir's body. Even worse, he could hear what was happening in the living room and that CompuGir was after him again.
As the footsteps drew closer Zim hastily grabbed a rubber spatula from the kitchen and darted into the hall before his pursuer could see where he was going.
"This way" Gir's voice urged from overhead "I opened the e- es? Ele? The box thingy for you!" In the time it had taken him to say this, CompuGir had joined him in the hall, the open elevator could be seen at the end, just a few feet away, but CompuGir was catching up. Zim had almost made it when he felt a hand tugging on one side of his backpack and swatted it with the spatula before sprinting through the elevator doors which shut behind him, just a few seconds later the pounding on the door and angry screaming started.
However the doors held, and Gir's body was nowhere near strong enough to pry them open, an attempt to find a tool to open the doors was cut short as Gir dropped a metal wall from the fire proofing system in the way, leaving CompuGir with nothing to do and no threats he could follow through on. That didn't stop him from screaming and pounding at the door while Zim stayed pressed against the back of the elevator.
"Aww! Don't worry big brother, I'll keep you safe" Gir said in a voice you could hear the smile in as a smaller mechanical arm dropped from the ceiling and nudged Zim "Or I guess I'm the bigger one now, like the guys in the phone book Skoodge showed me!"
"Don't get used to it" Zim replied with a small frown "And I'm not worried! The pounding on the door is just getting on my nerves!" he added defensively.
"Ok" Gir replied before lowering another door by the elevator, making the noise travel through another layer "There we go, all fixed. Wanna watch a movie while we wait?"
Zim agreed and after contacting Dib and confirming everyone was alright, they arranged for everyone to meet on a lower level and watch a movie together. By the time it had ended CompuGir had realised Zim was no longer there, gone back to planning to escape, and eventually fallen asleep from a combination of exertion and the late hour.
"Is this about right?" Dib asked as he and Zim positioned Gir so he could go back in his body, a task made difficult by the fact that his head had to be in a specific place, but they were advised against holding him themselves and being close to the data stream. Asleep with his hands zip tied behind his back, just in case, he wasn't able to hold himself up and instead was leaning against a short chair surrounded by cushions in case he flopped over.
"That's fine, now get out of the way" Gaz replied from her place by the panel, once the house had returned to its proper place, she had eventually returned indoors in time to see the end of the movie. After that she had been recruited to be the one to return Gir to normal as it was unanimously decided this called for the more practised hands of the resident programming expert. Once they were out of the way, Gaz switched the machine on which filled the room with the same blinding light as before.
As soon as it cleared, Zim ran over to Gir with Dib close behind him, he nudged Gir's shoulder until his eyes opened and urged him to respond, anxious to see if he'd been restored to normal.
"Aww, I wanted to sleep on the floor" Gir replied groggily, prompting Zim to let out a sigh of relief; yep, he was back to normal. As the two of them fussed over the child and freed his hands, Gaz turned her attention to the cause of all this.
The drive was visibly burnt out, the once clear crystal now cloudy and grey inside, even without her technological expertise Gaz could have told at a glance that there would be no salvaging it. As she removed it from the console something caught her attention, something that made even her unflappable demeanor falter.
"You're lucky nobody died" she stated, holding the drive up and gesturing to the model number "This model is part of a massive recall issued a few weeks ago after one shut off its house's A.I. and started tampering with the thermal controls. The owner had acute hypothermia when the rescue team finally got there, apparently it got mad at him for using it to look up animal videos" A heavy silence hung in the air before Gaz shooed everyone else upstairs so she could check the remaining drives and install a suitable replacement 'Without anyone getting underfoot'.
Once upstairs Gir was set on the sofa as Zim and Dib once again tried and failed to make any progress on the assignment, not that either had genuinely expected to, before Zim picked up Gir to return home, turning down Dib's offer to carry the smaller child for him before leaving for the night.
When he arrived home a few minutes later, Zim was already beginning to deeply regret not taking Dib's offer to carry Gir for him; he was fine before, but just the short trip to his house was enough for the evening to catch up to him and leave him completely exhausted. Even more so after hauling Gir up the stairs.
As he stood in the upstairs hall he found himself hesitating; he'd originally planned to put Gir to bed in his own room, but now he found himself remembering when all of this started and the panic he felt when Gir collapsed. At the same time there was also the image of that faulty drive chasing after him in Gir's body, but….
While he was standing there he felt Gir grip a fistful of his tunic and nuzzle against him. Fine, you've made your point. "Gir" he whispered "Are you awake enough to put your pajamas on & brush your teeth?"
The only response he got was a little bit of mumbling, typical, Gir just had to make this difficult, didn't he? Fine. He brought Gir into his room and worked his shoes off before setting him down on the bed and going to get himself ready, just because Gir was going to let himself sleep in dirty clothes and without cleaning his teeth didn't mean he had to as well.
Once he returned and slipped into bed, Gir immediately cuddled against him, as if he intuitively knew Zim was back, and Zim wrapped an arm around Gir. It had been a tough, stressful night for both of them, and both felt a little more at ease knowing the other was safe nearby. Zim had expected to feel on edge after what happened at the library and to spend an hour or so calming down, but between his physical exhaustion and emotional relief, both of them were asleep in just a few minutes.
The next morning was Saturday, which was just as well since both of them ended up sleeping later than normal and likely would have slept through any alarm that had been set. Under normal circumstances Zim liked to spend this time working away on a project, but these weren't normal circumstances; thus the two of them were spending an afternoon downtown, going to the park and an eclectic variety of stores for a nice afternoon of togetherness.
After a few hours a familiar garish facade caught Zim's attention, the much dreaded Krazy Taco. As much as he hated the chain, the events of the past night were still fresh in his mind; namely the moment of panic when Gir collapsed and the tension around whether they could successfully restore him to normal….and admittedly there was a small part of him buried deep down that acknowledged he probably should have taken a moment from getting excited over seeing the control room to make sure Gir wasn't near anything he shouldn't have been.
And this place was Gir's favourite, he could endure being there just this once.
"Gir, do you want to go get some of the taco filth you like so much?" he said in unison with Gir's pulling on his hand and saying "I wanna go here!"
A silent pause followed as he realised where Gir was pointing: one of Zim's favourite bakeries. Granted, Gir liked it well enough too, but he always wanted to go to the Krazy Taco when he saw it, often enough that Zim had actually planned alternate routes when Gir was with him specifically to avoid the child spotting it. There was no way he hadn't seen this one, so why would he ask to go to the bakery instead? The younger sibling was the first to break the silence.
"You don't like the Krazy Taco" Gir said "I remember. Are you taking me because of last night?"
"Perhaps" Zim replied, taken off guard by Gir's perceptiveness and trying to save face "What about you?"
"Uh-huh" Gir nodded "You really like that place, and CompuGir tried to hurt you. There wouldn't of been a CompuGir if I'd waited to get my toy back"
This got a small, but warm smile from Zim before the two agreed to each get something they wanted from their preferred place to eat together on a nearby bench. It took a bit of shooing a guy away from the cleaner one, but soon the two of them were able to sit down and enjoy both their chosen treats and a pleasant afternoon together.
Alright, here's an odd bit of trivia: the show itself started airing in 2001, so while I've tried to keep what shows up on the page fairly neutral, none of the references to show up thus far have actually been to anything that existed after the point in time this would be if it were taking place when the show aired (about mid October 2001, for this chapter), so you can decide for yourself if it's (sort of) modern times or if it's 2001. I mention this now since this chapter actually contains a reference that just slipped under the wire; when Gir talks about the "Story from the phone book Skoodge showed him", he's actually referring to Fullmetal Alchemist, which has a running gag of people thinking the younger brother is older because he's a huge suit of armour and because the actual older brother is really short.
The series started in the July 2001 issue of Shounen Gangan Monthly, which would have actually released in June; just enough time for somebody to buy a few copies and sell them at a convention during the summer. Whether Skoodge can read Japanese and knows enough to tell which sibling is which, or the person at the booth just gave him the summary is up to you, but if you've ever seen a manga magazine, you'll know why Gir calls it a phone book. (Really though, if you look back you'll notice things like only Pokemon from the first two generations being referenced, the new one that was announced was Ruby & Sapphire, which had it's first publicly shown images in 2001)
Besides that, the scene where Gir's looking for the playlist was the first part I physically wrote out and was actually based off an incident when I was about the same age where my parents were buying me one of those pamphlets with stickers that attached using static, and I ended up being terribly frustrated that I could recognise the word 'cat', and the S that followed it, but wasn't piecing together what it meant and that I was reading the word 'Cats' and that most of them had the same thing.
Next time we're going to have the first holiday chapter. It's a bit funny though, I remember posting a preview of it in one of the earlier chapters because I was expecting it to be posted a while away from the actual holiday, but now it's going to be fairly close, mid to late September. This one I'm really excited for, so I'm looking forward to finally sharing it with everyone; stay safe everyone, I'll see you soon (-^.^-)/