Happy Saturday again everyone!
Thank you all for leaving your kind reviews. I'm glad to see you guys are enjoying the changes and updates to the story. As we get further into the story, I'm super excited to see your reactions. And oh boy, this is a long doozy of a chapter.
CH 4
Metal Parasite
Gaz had done little more than grimace at the sight of the two massive cables that Zim had yanked out of his console nearly the moment they'd arrived in the bowels of his labs.
She was unfamiliar with this area of it. For one thing, it seemed much deeper than the ones she was in yesterday. For another, it seemed to have an actual security system in place.
The elevator opened into a hallway rather than directly into the room. Another thing she noticed was the numerous weapons that trailed their path. Gaz eyed them warily, following closely behind Zim. If she got shot at, she was going to make sure she pushed him in front. Thankfully, the eerie alien devices remained dormant while the door scanned him.
"Access granted," his AI monotoned.
"Grant access to Invader Larb's PAK and its host," Zim ordered.
"Processing . . . Updated."
The doors finally slid open with a hydraulic hiss, allowing them access. Gaz noted the weapons trained on her finally looked away, replacing themselves in their default position towards the elevator doors. Gaz's brow rose, but she otherwise didn't comment.
She only winced slightly at the feeling of the cables being jammed into the control panels of the PAK. Zim was just as careless as ever, offering her no warning or bracing words before slamming them into place. She offered him a simmering scowl over her shoulder that he remained entirely oblivious to.
He wandered away nearly immediately, leaving Gaz to stand awkwardly in the center of the room. She looked around for anything to sit on. Normally, Zim's base was a cluttered miss filled with a seemingly endless supply of junk. Weirdly, this floor seemed to be the opposite. There were no convenient cardboard boxes for her to take a load off on. Everything radiated importance and technological grandeur.
Stranger still was the fact that Zim had never looked so . . . completely suited to his surroundings. The way the monitors reflected off his face gave him an unearthly silhouette, the jagged edges of his uniform morphing into something more militaristic than absurd. It was creepy. She'd never noticed his eyes glowed in the dark, but sure enough, the darkness of the room brought attention to the unnatural ruby luminescence of his eyes. His antennae pulled taut against his skull, two twitching scythes cutting through the shadow.
His hands flew over various devices, tweaking and fiddling with the various ominous-looking machines. It was awfully quiet in here, she noticed. Only the simmering hum of the electrical currents could be heard beneath Zim's mumbling and fiddling.
Gaz's knees were beginning to ache from standing on the unforgiving metal. "Computer?"
Zim swung around, two red eyes narrowed on her. "Hey! Don't talk to my base, filthy human!"
"Can I get a chair?" She continued, ignoring him.
"Sure," it mumbled.
One of the panels on the floor slid away.
The chair that rose from it looked ridiculous. It looked more like a curved saddle than a chair, its crescent shape looking about as comfortable as a misshapen bean bag. Furthermore, it looked like it had once been alive, or at least based off of something that was alive. It arced upwards, ending in a sharp, spiked tail. Its sides had a foot-like blob at every corner. And it was floating. I It looked like the alien-lizard equivalent of a bear skin rug. It was sick. The panels on the floor turned into a magnetic conveyor belt, bringing the 'chair' closer and closer until it was settled right in front of her.
Gaz's face twisted. "How . . .? Is this what you sit on?"
"HA!" Zim threw his head back and scoffed before shooting Gaz a condescending sneer. "Pitiful worm baby. Even our chairs are above your comprehension!'
"It looks stupid," Gaz replied, poking at it with her boot. "How is that comfortable?"
"Figure it out, worm-baby," Zim huffed, turning away.
Gaz eyed it a few moments longer. After a bit she awkwardly pushed it towards the floor until it was low enough for her to hook her leg over.
The moment she'd done so, it floated back up. Gaz shifted her hips in place, grunting. All in all, it wasn't uncomfortable. The weird worm-lizard saddle was strangely soft, almost like memory foam.
"It's okay I guess," she mumbled. It was better than standing.
Zim made a contemplative noise in his throat, recapturing Gaz's attention.
"You're in luck, worm-baby," he announced. "According to my readings, the PAK is still as broken as ever."
"It's awfully active for something broken," she pointed out, leaning towards the monitors. To her surprise, the chair's strange gravity followed, rocking her slightly forward. Huh.
"It doesn't make sense," Zim hissed, flipping quickly through various projected data slides.
Leaning backwards produced a similar gravitational shift. Hmm.
"It's entirely unresponsive to any sort of override prompting. It's clearly deactivated. Your filthy human emotions shouldn't be able to—what are you doing?!"
Gaz kept her face as expressionless as ever.
"What?" She replied flatly.
All the while, she continued to rock the chair forward and backwards. Comfortable rocking chairs were hard to come by, after all, and this one had the advantage of having good odds of annoying the shit out of Zim.
Turns out the odds were in her favor today.
He growled at her, teeth bared in irritation at the sight of her using magnificent Irken technology as a toy. "Stop at once! That is no child plaything, wretched creature! If you want a see-see, go to a park!"
". . . Do you mean a seesaw?"
Gaz wished she could capture Zim's furious expression and hang it above her desk. She was beginning to understand her brother's obsession with antagonizing the alien. It was like having a wind-up toy that came with the added bonus of knowing you had genuinely upset someone. Refreshing. She wished she'd brought something to occupy her hands with to make a point of annoying him further by ignoring him. Unfortunately, the obstructive PAK left little room for her actual things in her fake backpack. Gaz's jacket was actually the thing holding her cell phone. Her backpack only held a bent folder, her most flexible notebook, and a few pens and pencils.
"We don't have time for this!" Zim finally burst out, hands grasping his hips. "This is your spine on the line, worm-baby. The least you could do is be less of a nuisance!"
Gaz rolled her eyes, drawing her rocking movements to a halt. She didn't know what else she could possibly be doing to 'help.' She'd gotten another blemish on her already 'stellar' academic record for this by ditching. She let him hook the big cords up to the metal parasite without complaint. From her perspective, the least he could do was let her play with his stupid lizard tail chair while he took data from her.
The two of them scowled at one another for several long beats. Realizing he was going to receive none of the apologetic groveling he so rightly deserved from the insolent teenager, he snarled under his breath again before turning around once more.
"The PAK should be deactivated," he began, fingers rapidly flying over the digital controls of his keyboard. "Its power source is critically damaged, and yet it still is maintaining a steady power signal."
Gaz's brow rose. "Meaning . . .?"
He huffed at her impatience. "I suspect you have become its power source."
Oh. Well. That didn't sound so good.
Gaz's attention went inwards, slowly beginning to evaluate herself. She didn't feel tired, but maybe it was too subtle for her to notice. She was vaguely sore from getting the shit beat out of her by an alien yesterday, but all things considering, she actually felt pretty good.
. . . Maybe too good.
Her gaze flicked towards Zim's enormous monitor once more, trying to discern any sort of coherency from the jumble of symbols and twitching animations that flew across the screen. Unfortunately, it was just as illegible as ever.
"Computer," Zim called out. "Analyze these readings from Larb's PAK."
"Analyzing . . . Data retrieved. It appears the damage done unto the PAK has enabled a dormant, underlying emergency protocol. The PAK is non-functional and unresponsive to any but the most urgent instincts of its organic host."
"Can we exploit that protocol?" Gaz cut in. "If I can still trigger its emergency functions, then shouldn't I be able to get it to react in other ways?"
"Evaluating hypothesis . . . Negative," the base replied.
A schematic appeared with an accompanying helpful animation. It separated the PAK silhouette from the human one, animating several different stimuli. The PAK only reacted to the dangerous-looking ones, ignoring things like bees and other unobtrusive humans.
"It's not really responding to you, per se," the base began. "The PAK is operating under a protocol that prioritizes self-preservation. Disengaging itself and shutting down would be against its own self-interest."
Gaz leaned backwards, nodding slowly. "But protecting the host its borrowing energy from isn't."
"Exactly," the computer agreed.
"Stop talking to my glorious base!" Zim ordered again. "You're going to, eh . . . make it dumber with your . . . dumbness."
Gaz's brow rose at his lame insult wordlessly.
". . . Right," the base cut in again. ". . . Anyways, theoretically, there's no telling how this symbiotic relationship will affect the human subject. The energy draining could go entirely unnoticed, or progressively worsen, sucking the life force right out of her."
Gaz frowned. "But I feel fine."
"A pity," Zim sneered, earning a glare from the purple-haired demon. "You may feel fine for now, human, but the need for ongoing monitoring is now more important than ever if you intended on preserving your wretched life."
He pulled away from his monitors, approaching until he was close enough to touch. He glared at the sight of the hovering chair once again, but held out a hand.
"Give me your communicator," he demanded.
"You mean my phone?" She corrected, but removed it from her pocket.
Zim snatched it away nearly immediately, ignoring her own sharp rebuke. He held it up as a strange device emerged from his own PAK, scanning the phone with a pink projection. Only when his PAK beeped did he stop and hand it back to her carelessly.
"My base's contact has been uploaded to your 'phone,'" he explained. "Should you need to contact it, you'll be able to do so easily. My own direct line has also been included."
Huh. "Do you get text messages?"
His gaze turned flat, "My technology is perfectly capable of receiving digital messages, dirt-child."
She rolled her eyes, pocketing her cell phone. "Great. So, is that all, or are we done here for the day?"
Zim waved her off, heading back towards the elevator. "Your presence is no longer needed here. Just learn to control your temper, worm-baby, before you risk exposing the might of the Irken Empire to the simple minds of your species. Their puny minds couldn't possibly hand the revelation that would accompany the exposure to mighty alien technology. It would surely make their heads go all explodey, or something."
Gaz made a suspiciously contemplative noise that had Zim scowling warningly at her.
"Don't even think about it, human," he warned. "Remember our deal."
She grunted, waving him off, "Yeah, yeah. I was just thinking about my tournament."
His antennae perked, pausing in front of the elevator. "Tournament?"
Her brow rose. "You haven't noticed the billboards and ads all over town?"
Zim sneered, "Your town is filthy and unworthy of the glorious notice of Zim. What tournament do you speak of?"
Gaz removed her phone, pulling up an ad. Zim squinted at its tiny screen for a moment before huffing in irritation. "Computer," he demanded. "Stream the signal from the human's cellular device onto the monitor!"
At once the video reloaded itself.
An ominous hum played over a black screen. Several of what Zim assumed were some sort of monies-sponsors or company-affiliates had their logos fade in and out slowly. In the background, the hum disappeared in a quiet gasp.
Suddenly, a neon blue flame cut across the screen, alighting the entirety of it in blue flame that quickly faded into a fuschia. The flame dissipated to reveal a horde of mutated, animated pigs ravaging a village, squealing with blood thirsty glee. It made Zim grimace, disgusted at the sight of their grotesque bodies writhing over the corpses of cattle and fallen human alike.
The camera panned into a group of lazier, satiated swine. They seemed on the verge of dozing, one opening his mouth in a large yawn to reveal a dimmed blue flame breathing within.
A diagonal white flash across the screen had it freezing. The next moment, bright fuschia blood dripped along the same path as the flash. Its entire upper half slid off before it and its nearest companions disappeared in a black puff of fast-dissolving smoke.
The view changed to reveal all the pigs now looking at an approaching figure. Zim squinted at it as it came through the fog.
Several more figures were approaching from its side, each silhouette boasting some strange form of armor or weaponry. In the center stood a green figure, eyes glowing red, with two large fangs protruding from its upper lip. It wore an absurd amount of buckles interwoven between its armor, a large cape, and a strangely pointy hat. In its hand stood a flaming pink sword, which it slowly pointed towards the tense, rustling pigs.
Its companions suddenly roared, charging forward.
To Zim's surprise, lightning flashed, and the scene changed.
Perfectly normal humans in headsets and draped in strange technology now stood in place of the warriors, slicing imaginary weapons through the air while a screen in front of them had their characters mimicking their actions. The scene continued to weave in between the human and what Zim was beginning to understand was their simulated avatars, decimating the pigs as arbitrary glowing numbers continued to spiral ever higher above their heads.
Finally, the music grew in pitch and fever, the pink-sword wielding green creature looking directly at the camera. It charged, leaping into the air and bringing its sword crashing towards the camera. The screen went black for several long moments.
A date flared across the screen, flaming pink, before fading out.
Zim hummed, trying to process the information he'd seen. "I see. And you intend to participate in this simulated battle?"
"I'm the two-time winner," she replied, unable to repress her smirk.
"Ah," Zim nodded decisively. "If you have won twice, then there is no need for your participation again. You will not be going."
"I will be going," Gaz corrected firmly.
"Your ears must be as broken as ever," Zim replied haughtily. "This simulated battle poses too much of a risk in inciting Larb's PAK. Your participation cannot be tolerated!"
"This stupid pod only reacts if it thinks I'm in danger," Gaz retorted, pushing passed him towards the elevator. "It's just a video game."
"And the conversation with the horrid principal was merely a conversation, worm-baby," Zim hissed. "And look how that turned out."
The look Gaz sent him would have turned lesser creatures to ash where they stood. As it was, Zim only trembled a little. But he mostly managed to keep his face stern.
Gaz made an aggravated noise, "I've been training for this tournament for months. I'm not missing it."
"Do your tournament next year, human!"
"That's not going to work for me."
"No one asked if it worked for you, little human," he pointed out. Frustrated, Zim yanked on his antennae, an aggravated noise escaping his mouth.
Suddenly, he perked.
"Come, human. An amazing idea has occurred in my brain," he said, gesturing into the elevator. "Computer! Take us up to Simulation Floor."
The elevator rose immediately, shooting their platform upwards.
A short while later, it opened up into an enormous half-domed room. Gaz's neck strained trying to see the top of the ceiling. The walls and ceilings were covered in green panels with circular, illuminated openings in the center of each. Large cables separated each panel.
"Your electrical bill must be insane," she commented dryly.
Zim's antennae perked. "Bill?"
"You . . . where do you get electricity from?"
"All power is drawn from the surrounding homes," the base butted in.
". . . And no one's ever noticed?" Gaz asked, disbelievingly.
". . . Not really, no."
"Computer," Zim began. "Run simulation X9-23."
"Running."
The room lit up, each circular opening connecting in an emerald diamond pattern. She only got a glimpse of it before the room shifted out of view.
Gaz's eyes widened with curiosity as the scene around them suddenly changed to a neighborhood.
A very familiar neighborhood.
Gaz jumped at the screechy synthetic noise of a voice coming just over her shoulder.
An even more familiar voice.
"I will make YOOOOUUUuuuuuuUUU suffer laAAAarge alieeennNNn!"
"No!" Zim shrieked, waving his arms wildly. "Two-THREE, not two-G! TWO-THREE!"
Gaz choked on a laugh, hands flying up to stifle the uncharacteristic noise. "You have a battle program of my brother?"
"YOU'RE LYING!"
"What is he holding?" She asked, circling the hologram. It looked like a black, spiked baseball bat. Dib had definitely wielded some strange weapons against Zim over the years, but this one she was unfamiliar with.
The scene flickered out of view before she could get a further look.
She froze.
". . . Rats," she said slowly, surveying the room.
Granted, they were really big rats, and a strange dark indigo color.
"Feast your eyes upon Slaughtering Rat people of planet Blorch." Zim boasted, sweeping his arms about.
Zim watched the human begin a slow rotation. Hmph. Stinking humans. So easily impressed by the glorious technology of the Irken Empire. He preened, crossing his arms smugly and awaiting the heaps of praise his people—and therefore he—so rightly deserved.
". . . This is what aliens look like?" She scoffed.
Zim's mood soured near immediately. Humans were most assuredly the most wretched creatures in the galaxy, second perhaps only to those Shmoopsies of Gelatine and their horrible slime. The stench of their defeat had taken months to wear off.
The human should be grateful that he hadn't just locked her in his labs and foregone the formality of her cooperation altogether! He was Zim! He would not tolerate this human's insolence . . .!
. . . Except he had to, lest her horrible brother launch a siege on his glorious base and more glorious person for the crime of her stupidity. It certainly wasn't Zim's fault that the human girl chose to incite an Invader, but somehow it had still become his problem. Why must it be that bad things always happened to Zim?
He snarled at her under his breath. "Yes. I have chosen the simulation most suited to your pathetic comprehension of the species that lie outside of this disgusting rock you call a home."
Gaz rolled her eyes. He was such a condescending idiot.
"Here," he continued, heading towards the control panel in the center of the room.
From the floor rose a table with a variety of alien guns. Reluctant as she was to admit it, while the rat people had looked pretty stupid, the guns were another story. Gaz joined him at the table where he hefted one of the weapons.
"None of these actually shoot," he said, shooting her a warning look. Gaz returned it with a flat, disinterested look of her own.
"I'm not Dib," she reminded him. "I'm not going to shoot you."
Well, that wasn't entirely true. She absolutely would shoot him if he got too much on her nerves. Judging by the expression on Zim's face, he was thinking along a similar line of thought. Regardless, he forewent pointing out the obvious (for once) in favor of giving a weapons handling instruction.
He handed her the gun—which looked like something straight out of a space video game, with its sleek maroon metal and glowing wiring throughout. Vaguely reminded her of a massive water gun, with a glowing energy source instead of a water capsule.
"Hold if firmly, worm-baby," he said, adjusting her grip on it. Gaz made a point of keeping it pointed towards the floor, refusing to give Zim a reason to start shrieking about the sanctity of their deal again.
To her growing unease, Zim shifted himself beside her, one hand steadying himself on her shoulder while the other guided her arms upwards.
In spite of her determination to continue to ignore his proximity, Gaz was bitter to note just how much her skin crawled having him this close. She felt itchy and uncomfortable, her shoulders stiff with resisting the urging to shrug him off or step away from his reach.
"You have no concept of personal space," she huffed, remembering the phantom sensation of his earlier grip on her sides.
Zim either didn't register the comment or was deliberately ignoring it. Both seemed equally likely. "The gun is activated by the trigger, located here."
Gaz stiffened further as his hand slid over hers, goosebumps breaking out over the trail her made up over her wrist and against her hand. It wasn't any lingering, teasing pursuit, but firm and professional. Regardless, she was still much too distracted by it.
Zim's pointermost finger pressed hers down, and a neon glow that matched the color of the energy core shot out.
The simulated rat screeched and flailed on its side, the shot having melted like acid clear through to its rib cage. It dissolved in seconds.
Zim released her nearly immediately, which was good on his part, because if he made any move to linger, he would've gotten an elbow to his rib cage.
Gaz frowned down at the gun, flicking back to the simulated pile of violet goo and back. "That takes awhile to kill it."
Zim shrugged, gesturing to the tray of remaining weapons. "Take your pick, worm-baby. In case your miserably overworked brain meats haven't figured it out, we'll be running a training simulation."
Gaz nodded slowly. Ah. She got it. "You want to see if the PAK can discern between real threats and simulated ones."
"Precisely," Zim agreed.
Thankfully, he made no further move to assist her as she tested out the various weapons. Gaz couldn't quite shake the crawly, itchy feeling until she forced herself to stop thinking about it. It wasn't hard to distract herself.
It was just like the VR tournament, but without any of the burden of the equipment. The unmoving rats she used as target practice to test out the guns screeched and died with vivid realism, so much so she could almost imagine the smell of their bubbling intestines.
"These ones," she said, deciding on the partnered pair of smaller weapons. They cut through
Zim nodded. At least the human girl had taste. The weapons she chose were one of his favorites as well.
He returned his attention to the control panel. With the press of a few buttons, both the control panel and the tray slid into the floor.
"Where are you going to be?" Gaz asked, fidgeting with her grip. The weapons were clearly designed for a four-fingered hand rather than a five-fingered one. Someone with meatier fingers never would've been able to hold it. Fortunately, Gaz's fingers were just as narrow and petite as the rest of her. A slight adjustment on the way she held her pinky seemed to fix the problem well enough.
Zim frowned, not seeming to have considered the question.
Regardless of how large the projection made the room seem, it wasn't really all that big. And there didn't seem to be an observing area.
Or so she thought.
Zim walked off in a seemingly random direction, passing through the rat projections until a panel rose from its place, breaking the illusion.
"There's an observation area on the exterior of the dome," he said.
The panel slid shut.
A few moments later, Zim's voice radiated from some unseen speakers.
"Computer," his voice said. "Begin the simulation at level one."
The rats phased out for a moment before reformatting themselves.
"You've got to be kidding me," she said, disbelievingly.
The rats now moved.
Barely.
They screeched, lifting themselves on their back legs and clawing slowly at the air.
A single one scurried slowly closer, weaving left and right so painfully slowly that it might as well have stood still.
Gaz lifted her gun, shooting it clear in the middle of the skull.
"This sucks, Zim," she called out. She didn't even move, pivoting slowly on her heels. Even that seemed to overwhelm the slowly moving horde of projections.
"Well what setting do you want it on, human?" Zim snapped back.
Gaz smirked.
Dib had spent the entirety of lunch break searching for his sister and his arch-nemesis. Initially, he had been convinced that their continued absence was just a coincidence. Dib knew from personal experience how grating Mr. Cult was on the nerves. Given his sister's temper, he wouldn't be surprised to find out that Gaz had done something to earn her an extra-long talking to, or some other form of punishment.
His brief conversation with Torque had dispelled that hopeful thinking completely.
"The janitor caught Zim and your sister in the utility closet together."
No matter how many times he twisted it around in his perfectly normally proportioned head, it didn't make sense.
The utility closet wasn't exactly known for anything. It wasn't like they'd been found under the bleacher's, or in the yearbook darkroom. Nothing so . . . scandalous. But the way Torque said it certainly made it sound made it seem scandalous. But that was stupid. This was Gaz, after all. If it were any other student, Dib would've been more worried for their organs than their . . . chastity. But Gaz? What could Zim want with his sister, aside from the obvious?
Dib wasn't always the best brother, but she was his little sister. Dib would do anything to keep her (and the Earth) safe from Zim's creepy alien hands. If Zim had somehow kidnapped her, she'd be the perfect bait to lure him into some evil trap!
Except, again, this was Gaz. Even if Zim offered her all the Bloaty's in the world, she had zero interest in participating in their epic battle of good versus evil. As far as she was concerned, the life that happened outside of the narrow window of her Game Slave just didn't exist. Unless Dib was in mortal danger, she left them entirely to their own devices. Zim had more than once attempted to enlist her assistance, or use his devices on her to little avail. If anything, it only irritated her and delayed or ended their battle early when her brutal wrath made an appearance. They both now actively avoided her.
Which made it make even less sense that Zim would corner his sister in a utility closet. Had he finally succeeded in making an actually effective mind control device? What if he'd swapped Gaz's brain with something? What if it was something stupid, like Gir?! What if his crazy little robot minion was stuck inside his sister's body, and, and—!
No, that was stupid. If Gir's brain was in Gaz's body, someone definitely would've mentioned her acting weird. And yet no such rumor was floating around. The only weird thing was that the two of them were seen together. Several times.
Dib's attempt to follow their trail off campus had resulted in an embarrassing, pathetic attempt to escape the clutches of campus security. He'd been marched straight to his next class period. No amount of pleading, begging, or arguing had swayed their stern, broad-jawed frowns.
It was ridiculous. His sister and Zim were who knows where doing who knows what, and he was expected to work on calculus! Calculus. Did they even know who he was? Why not just hand him a coloring book, too?
There was no helping it. For his crime of trying to ditch his horrid campus early, a security guard had been assigned to escort him to and from any suddenly urgent 'bathroom trips.'
Geez, he blew up one car and suddenly the whole school wanted to treat him like some kind of criminal!
Zim had never seen anything like this.
Not in the entire history of Irk that he currently had downloaded into his PAK. Not in his entire existence as an Irken soldier, invading wartorn planets and hurling himself into the heart of the slaughter, had he ever seen anything like her.
He'd been upgrading the leveling system erratically since her obnoxious complaints, upgrading the dial anywhere between 1 and 10 levels at a time. No matter the degree of the jumps, the human seamlessly flowed across the room, blasting holes in horrifying numbers of Blorchians without ever receiving a simulated scratch on her.
She spun and twisted with a grace that Zim was entirely unfamiliar with. It reminded him vaguely of the war dances of ancient Irk, when Irkens prepared for battle with ceremony and pomp rather than hollow brutality. Zim would watch a vicious horde of rat aliens surge into the air, forming one hulking mass, as they were prone to do in battle, and be completely sure she was about to finally be overwhelmed.
She'd move like a Earthen snake, or some sort of equally deadly viper.
The human moved like the battle was choreographed, though Zim himself could attest otherwise. He was the one messing with the controls, after all.
She moved like she was born for combat. It was striking. It was like watching a wildfire raze an entire forest to the ground with nothing but the force of its rage. She slaughtered creatures like it was her birthright to take the lives of creatures lesser than her. It was entrancing.
Zim was completely fixated. He felt strange. His squeedily-spooch was twisting uncomfortably. His skin felt too hot, although he barely noticed. Anything outside of the perimeter of the female's twisting figure seemed dull and fuzzy.
No human should've been capable of this level of brutality. The PAK had nothing to do with it; Larb may have been an Invader, but he had never been an impressive fighter. Zim more than once had the pleasure of grinding the little bookworms face into the unforgiving dirt of Irk's battle arenas.
The thought startled Zim from the daze he was in. The PAK. He wasn't supposed to be gawking at the sinewy figure of the female in a blood haze. He had other things to be thinking about!
According to the much more attentive readings of his base, the PAK hadn't so much as twitched since this morning. Whether it was the female's own feedback or some residual intelligence of the PAK, it was detecting no threat.
Gaz knocked aside an enormous rat, all but beheading the companion that nearly immediately followed with the force of her well-placed blast. She planted her boot on another, shoving the weapon directly down its throat, her other hand aiming behind her at the anticipated surprise attack.
But the scene in front of her froze. No satisfying, meaty explosions followed the pulling of the trigger.
Gaz suddenly became aware of the sound of her own breathing. She blinked several times, taking in her surroundings. Some of the rats flickered.
Right. Holograms. Just holograms.
Whoa. Talk about an out of body experience. She'd lost track of herself for a bit there.
"What's up?" She called out. She stretched upwards, rolling her neck to dispel some of the lingering tension.
He didn't immediately reply, which Gaz found a bit odd. Had something happened?
"The PAK," he said. Gaz's brows furrowed at the sound of his voice. It sounded a little strained. "There's been no reaction. If it hasn't happened yet, human, I don't anticipate it occurring ever."
She nodded, finally regaining some of her breath. Right. She'd forgotten about the PAK completely. Aside from occasionally obstructing her own flexibility, it'd gone largely unnoticed during the simulation.
"Hey," she said suddenly. "Does your base keep track of any of the stats for these simulations?"
"Yessss," he said slowly. "Why?"
She gestured with her now useless gun to the rat that had been seconds from death. "How many of these things did I get?"
The computer hummed its acknowledgement. A few seconds later, bright green digital numbers appeared in the air.
Total Kills: 446
Shots Fired: 501
Accuracy: 89.02195608782435%
Gaz scowled.
"Hey Zim," she said, rolling her neck out again. "Wanna bet I can get to a thousand?"
Each second was another moment spent in anxious agony worrying over the fate of his sister. By the time school actually got out, he was sweating bullets and squirming in his seat. His peers were even complaining about the lamenting, panicking noises he was beginning to make as the clock ticked closer to the end of the day.
Finally, mercifully, the bell rang. Dib burst from his seat like a shot from a bullet, barely remembering to grab his backpack as he fled.
"I'm coming, Gaz!" He shrieked into the wind.
Gaz raked her hand through her hair, panting heavily.
She did it.
She got them all.
1,000 weird, alien mega-rats.
She was too exhausted to even feel victorious about it. She lifted the hem of her shirt, bending slightly at the middle to wipe at her face off on the foreign cloth. She'd never been so physically tested before.
Begrudgingly, Gaz had to admit she was a little awed.
The simulation had been flawless. There'd been no need for heavy, weighted technology to track her movements. There were no periphery issues or improperly calculated depth perception messing up her attacks. It had felt so real.
It was incredible.
Wide-eyed and still breathless, Gaz gratefully accepted the can offered by the base's robot arm. She popped the lid and took a swig.
In the next moment, she nearly spit it back out.
"Blech," she gagged, wiping at the small amount of dribble that had come out. It was nauseatingly sweet with a strange, unfamiliar aftertaste that she swore was making her brain fizzy just to think about. Gaz handed the can back to the hovering robot arm. "Pass."
Zim, meanwhile, was scrambling to compose himself.
The psychotic human had actually done it. She'd insisted on starting over, only taking a small break before having the simulation restart itself. Zim had set the leveling to be in the base's control, increasing gradually rather than with his own erraticism. Without even that distraction to occupy his mind, he'd been entirely consumed by the sight of the human's waging war against Blorch.
Were she Irken, she would've been hailed a hero. They might as well have dismantled the Sweeper Canon. What was the point in wasting resources when they could just drop the female in their midst and watch the show on the screens back on the Armada.
But she was no Irken. Zim wasn't entirely convinced the little thing was as human as she appeared.
That thought in mind, Zim pushed passed the strange coiling in his spooch and the tingling of his skin as he made his way into the interior room.
The human was radiating smugness in a way he was unfamiliar with. Zim normally only saw the human satisfied when she had successfully caused her brother some form of torment. This was new. Although perhaps not all that new.
Besides, Zim could understand the sentiment. Slaughtering simulated Blorchians always put him in a good mood, too.
"Told ya I could do it," she said, smirking.
Zim crossed his arms. Well, she had done well. For a human, anyways. He supposed he could depart with some mild praise for the pathetic little creature.
"I'll admit you did well. For a human," he said. His antennae twitched, catching the scent of the human. It was especially pungent at the moment. His hands immediately clasped over his mouth. "Eugh, what is that smell? You think more than usual-worm-baby."
She flipped him off but she doubted he knew what it meant. However, he seemed to understand the implied insult in her movements and scowled further. "It's called 'perspiration', Zim. You've been on Earth how long and you still don't know what sweat is?"
"It's disgusting." Zim retorted, leaning a bit away from her. "You're getting your icky human smell all over my simulation room. Out! Out with you!" He commanded with a firm point towards the door.
She rolled her eyes, but allowed him the small concession. He was so dramatic. She didn't understand how he didn't exhaust himself.
"Where's you little egg thing?" She asked, following him into the elevator. He leaned pointedly on the opposing side, still clasping his hands over his mouth and looking very unhappy to be stuck in such a small space with her.
"It'll meet us on the ground floor," was his nasally reply.
Gaz's temple throbbed with irritation, but she chose not to comment. The less the two of them spoke, the better. She suspected she would save herself quite a few migraines with that strategy.
The elevator brought them up to the ground floor. Zim made a point to close the flimsy curtains before directing her into the center of the room.
The pod was just as uncomfortable as it had been the first time. Gaz flinched at the sound of its metal shell slamming together, encasing her inside. At least this time she knew what to expect. Watching the dancing Irken head grin grow increasingly wider was still just as creepy as ever, though.
When it was finished, Zim was still exactly where he'd been the first time.
"Better?" She asked sarcastically.
He didn't seem to pick up on the sarcasm, nodding. "Much. Although no amount of Irken cleansing liquids is going to mask the human in you, dirt-child."
"I'm devastated," she deadpanned.
Zim flashed a wicked grin her way, offering no comment.
"So, that's settled then right," she continued, scrubbing the circulation back into her chilled arms. "This stupid thing isn't going to get in the way of my tournament?"
"Fine, fine," he agreed. "But Zim will accompany you to this event, and we will leave if there is any trouble. Agreed?"
"Fine," she said between her teeth. God, he was such a stubborn, paranid asshole. "But you better not embarrass me, Zim, or I'll make sure you end up wishing I had died in the park."
"I already wish that, huuuuman," he sneered, although the words were hollow.
The human female confused him. Zim had spent less than 48 hours in her presence, and something about her made him more uneasy than usual. Of course the girl was terrifying; anyone with eyes could see that plainly. She was an anomaly of human evolution. No human should have been able so easily withstand a PAK, regardless of its state of disrepair. It reacting to her stimuli in any way was largely an inconvenience, but also fascinating. What was wrong with this creature of pale meat and shiny hair? What made her different from even her own genetic kin?
Evidently he was looking too long at the source of his strange squeedily-spooch tremblings. The girl raised a brow, eyes remaining as narrowed as ever.
"What?" She demanded.
"There's something peculiar about you, human," he hummed, narrowing his own gaze critically. "You fight like a soldier, but I recall no training in your file."
Gaz's brows rose, "You . . . have a file on me?"
"Not at all," he said far too quickly, turning on his heel.
Gaz realized fairly quickly that he was circling her. She growled under her breath—every bit the cornered predator—but Zim ignored her aggravation. He hazarded a guess that the little thing was likely too exhausted to enact the full force of the vengeance she was so well-known for. Fortunately for him, he was right.
"But if I did possess such a file," he began anew, leaning over his shoulder to peer at her face for any hint of deception. "There would be a suspicious lack of such combat training."
"That's because I never did any combat training, idiot," Gaz affirmed. "I just play video games."
Zim darted towards her front, pointing one accusing finger towards her chin as he loomed over her. "You cannot hide behind these flimsy lies! Who trained you? Hmm? Was it the Dib?"
She scoffed, batting his hand away. "As if. I've been pummeling Dib up since I was born."
The human had a point. The human's filthy sibling-unit had feared Gaz long before the birth of their rivalry. She ruled their relationship with an iron fist and steel-toed boots. Begrudgingly, Zim had to admit that the Dib was wise to fear her.
Gaz tolerated his invasion of her personal space for all of about 2 seconds. By the third, she reached up, pressing her palm against chest and shoving backwards. She was vaguely surprised by how solid he felt beneath her palm in the brief moment of contact. Zim was a scrawny little weirdo who lost fist fights to her brother. And last time she checked, her brother was a dork. He must've been wearing some kind of armor or padding underneath his clothes. That had to be it.
She resisted the impulse to comment on the oddity. "The next time I have to remind you about personal space, Zim, is the last time you have thumbs."
Zim clutched his hands towards his chest protectively, scowling at her. She shot him a disparaging look for his cowardice before heading towards the door.
"I'm going home," she said. "I have to explain to my dad why I got suspended. Probably." She really needed to figure out if she was included in that sweeping punishment, or if Mr. Cult's ire had solely been directed at Zim. Way too confusing to tell. She shook her head.
She jerked the door open.
And froze.
She was nearly nose-to-nose with the red, heaving face of none other than her brother.
Oh . . . shit.
"Uhh," she said, uncharacteristically speechless.
"Y . . . YOU!" Her winded brother shouted—or tried to. It was more of an explosive wheeze, followed by a reedy inhale.
Gaz peered over his shoulder to see his car parked haphazardly in the middle of the cul de sac. "Uh, Dib, look—."
"What . . . are you doing . . . with my . . . sister . . . ZIM?"
Gaz backpedaled, taking several large steps away from her brother.
Both of them were reeling. They met one another's eyes, finding their own scrambling panic in the other's and becoming all the more panicked for it. Neither of them had a plan. Neither of them had a lie ready. Which was stupid, because Gaz had known since their very public summons to the principal's office that Dib probably knew there was something going on. Her brother was a moron, but you'd have to be far beyond exceptionally stupid to miss that.
"Uhhhhh," Zim began, picking up where the human female had left off. ". . . Zim is doing . . . nothing . . .? YES!" He shouted, regaining his bravado. "Zim has done nothing with your scary little sister, Dib-monkey! Nothing of the sort!"
"Then why . . . is she in . . . your BASE?" Dib demanded as viciously as he was physically able. Gaz frowned. Not that she was her brother's keeper, but he looked pretty sick. Was he going to throw up? How had he even managed to drive here in one piece?
"Well, you see, uhh," Zim's eyes darted between the two Membrane siblings quickly. "I don't answer to you, filthy human! . . . Get out of my house!"
In a burst of panicked energy, Zim lunged for her brother. Unprepared as he was, Dib was unable to do much but shriek as the psychotic little alien came flying his way. The two of them went tumbling out of the door, struggling to get the upper hand.
Gaz's hand dragged down the center of her face, her aggravation building. Were she in any other situation, she simply would've marched home alone. Unfortunately, her present circumstances didn't allow for that sort of traditional disengagement.
She marched down the steps towards where the two idiots had bypassed the lawn and were now wrestling on the sidewalk, only inches from the asphalt.
Without so much as a warning, the two boys found themselves suddenly without air, the collars of their respective clothing now hanging them. They separated instantly, scrambling away from the harsh grip of the insane purple female. Zim hissed furiously at her while her brother merely did his best to look betrayed and wounded.
"Knock it off," Gaz snapped. "Dib, what are you doing here?"
"Me?" He replied, jumping to his feet. "What are you doing here, Gaz?"
Zim quickly followed, becoming wide-eyed with fear once more. "NOTH—!"
Gaz's hand slapped over his mouth, much to the irritation of the green male.
"Nothings going on," Gaz insisted.
"You're lying!"
"I am not!"
"Okay, well, maybe I can't tell when you're lying, but I know when he is!" He shouted, pointing an accusing finger at his arch-nemesis.
Zim strained to look as casual as possible, stiff as a board, smile wide and unnatural, "Who, me?"
Gaz did her best not to physically react to his stupidity.
"Dib, seriously," she began, using her more disinterested tone of voice. "We're just—!"
"We are FRIENDS!" Zim burst out.
"WHAT?!" Both Membrane children shrieked in unison, their voices unusually shrill.
Gaz quickly composed herself, "Er, I mean, I," unusually flustered, Gaz quickly bit down on the inside of her cheeks, trying to jolt herself out of the shock of Zim's completely moronic, panic-ridden excuse. "Zim . . . buddy . . ." she gripped him by the arm, dragging him slightly towards her, face rigged with her best approximation of a smile. It looked every bit as disturbing as it felt. "I thought we weren't going to tell Dib, right?"
He did his best not to wince at the feeling of her sharp nails digging into his arm, feeling very much in danger of destruction. Judging from the look in her purposefully widened eyes, the fear wasn't unwarranted. "Ehe, of course, Gaz-creature, only . . . Zim was so . . . eh, excited, yes! Yes, so much excitement!" He threw his arms in the air with 'joy,' using the most immediate excuse he could think of to keep Gaz from continuing to penetrate his poor, innocent skin-layer. "Victory for . . . friendship!"
"This is a joke," Dib said, wide, manic eyes flicking between the two of them. "This is . . . Gaz, this isn't funny. Seriously. Jokes over. Haha, everyone laugh at Dib and his panic."
"Well, if you insist—oof!" Zim complained, rubbing at the rib Gaz had buried her elbow into. That violent, horrible little gremlin!
"Oops," Gaz said, mouth tight. Her eyes promised further pain to come, and Zim took a large step sideways to remove himself from her personal bubble.
The gesture went entirely unnoticed by her babbling sibling, who was now pacing and talking animatedly to himself in high-pitched, squeaky tones. It was difficult to follow, but Zim got the gist that he was both arguing with himself and reassuring himself at the same time.
"I think we have broken your sibling," he muttered to the human girl, watching Dib's movements grow more and more erratic with every passing step. He had begun fisting his hair in one hand, gnawing on the folded knuckles of the other.
"You think?" Gaz hissed back, shooting him another venomous look.
Dib suddenly threw his head back, cackling madly. Even Gaz's eyes widened, sharing a sideways look with the idiotic Irken beside her. Both wore matching wary, disbelieving looks at the sight of her brother becoming completely unhinged before them.
"Hilarious!" Dib shrieked, voice cracking in a way it hadn't since pubescence. "So funny guys! Hahaha! I'm laughing, see? LAUGHTER!"
Gaz's mouth twisted downwards, slowly edging towards him. "Um, wow. Okay. Dib, let's just," she laid her hands on his wrists, removing them from his hair and his mouth. "Calm down a little, okay—?"
"CALM DOWN!?"
He seized her by the arms, jerking her once. Gaz's eyes flashed with new revulsion as he leaned towards her, wild-eyed, spittle flying from his mouth.
"YOU WANT ME TO CALM DOWN?!" He shrieked. "YOU'RE IN CAHOOTS WITH MY ARCH-NEMESIS AND YOU WANT ME TO CALM DOWN?!"
Gaz's hands fisted at her sides. She wasn't going to hit him. This was stupid Zim's fault, and when this was over, she was going to hit him for coming up with an excuse that had the literal maximum amount of fallout possible. Dib was having a mental breakdown. She was in control. Deep breaths.
Anger is temporary, Gaz, her counselor's voice chimed in her head. Physical trauma can be lasting. It's difficult to forget when someone has put their hands on you.
I certainly hope so, she remembered replying.
Ah, good times.
"Dib," she warned through her teeth. "Let go of me. Now."
Some monkey-instinct inside her brother caused him to release her, though he was still twitching.
"Good," she said, releasing another slow breath. Calm. Breathe in. Breathe out. Letting the anger go. Regaining some control, she unclenched her fists, rolling her eyes at his dramatics. "Now stop freaking out before something in that big head of yours pops. Zim and I are just . . . hanging out for a while. It's not a big deal. I'm sure we'll be sick of each other within . . ." she gave Zim a look, though he seemed lost at what she was asking for. ". . . a couple months . . .?"
He shrugged.
"Yeah . . ." She trailed off. "I don't keep friends long, you know? Remember what happened to Dizzy? Or that online gaming group I joined?"
"Dizzy moved continents," Dib said softly.
"That's right," she encouraged flatly, patting him on his bulbous head. "And that gaming group?"
"What gaming group?"
"Exactly," she agreed, offering him one last pat before retracting her hand. "So you have nothing to worry about, right?"
"Nothing to . . . yeah . . . yeah, I . . . I guess . . ."
"That'a boy," she edged away from him. "So, that being said, Zim and I are going to hang out after school sometimes. Okay?"
"School . . . Zim . . . hang . . . yeah," he murmured, seeming to recede into his own mind.
"Why don't you head home, Dib? Take a nap, or something," she coaxed, gently pushing him in the direction of their house. The road was a straight shot home, only about a fifteen minute walk. Dib could make the walk in his sleep (and provably had, on the sleepless nights he'd stayed up scheming). She was confident he could make it back.
"O-Okay . . . I'm just gonna . . . bye." He said weakly, flapping a weak hand no higher than his hip. He began ambling off in the direction his sister had pushed him, wobbling ever so slightly side to side, bumping into fellow pedestrians. He remained oblivious to their irritated looks and scowling.
A thought occurred to Zim, "Is that not his automobile in front of my base?"
Gaz gave him a look from the corner of her eye, "You really want him to drive in that state?"
"Mmm," he hummed, nodding slowly.
He shrieked as his cheek exploded with pain, slamming into the asphalt with the force of it.
"That," she snarled, storming over to him. "Is for being so stupid. What were you thinking, telling him we were friends?"
"I didn't see you coming up with any plans, human!" Zim's sentence trailed off into a pained moan, rubbing at the blooming ache in his jaw. The wretched, insolent creature! How dare she strike Zim!
"Ugh!" She began pacing aggressively across his sidewalk, finally coming to a stop by bracing herself against his fence. "You realize I'm going to have to doom you for this?"
"The Dib-monkey is gone, is he not?" He snarled, dragging himself upright. "Zim has solved the problem! You should be giving me praise!"
"I live with him, moron!"
"So?"
"So," she stressed. "The second he recovers from his shock, he's going to come marching right back over here. Daily—hourly—until he inevitably figures out what's going on." She kicked at his foot, which he retracted with another feral hiss. "Was that in your plan, genius?"
"All of my plans are ingenious," Zim insisted, pushing himself to his feet. "The ingeniousness of this one is that the Dib is now your problem."
Gaz bristled, eyes widening at his audacity. "You—!"
"See you tomorrow human!" Zim called over his shoulder. He flashed her one wicked grin over his shoulder before slamming the door shut behind him.
Gaz stood rooted to the spot, absolutely seething in place.
The second this PAK is off, she thought, seeing red. I'm going to murder him.
With that last thought, she turned away, eying Dib's abandoned car briefly before beginning her own walk home.
Inside his own home, Zim marched over to his couch, slumping over with exhaustion. His antennae drooped, buzzing uncomfortably against his skull.
He felt . . . uncomfortable.
He was relieved to finally have the eerie little human thrown from his home.
It was undeniably that he had . . . admired her battle prowess. Such demonstrations of power were admirable, impressive even—for a human, of course. She hadn't come anywhere near Zim's score, her own personal goal falling a long ways short. Still, a part of Zim was undeniably curious to see her try.
He shook himself. This was wrong. Something was wrong. He was just depleted. That had to be it. The lingering strange, itchy, not-quite-anxious feeling curling his insides and tingling along strange patches of his skin was surely a side-effect of chasing the insufferable human around. Yes, he was surely just in need of a brief hibernation.
Zim was normally opposed to wasting time in such an inarguably useless way, but these strange curdling feelings could not be abided. He kept seeing the human female's figure twisting and bending as she slaughtered dozens upon hundreds of holographic Blorchians in his mind's eye. Surely his PAK was short-circuiting, stuck in some strange feedback loop. It was affecting him negatively. He felt distracted and unproductive.
Gah, that human female was going to drive him mad.
He hopped off his couch, muttering curses as he stomped his way into the safer recesses of his base He would rest. He would recharge. When he was done, this strangeness would be banished, and the human girl's deliciously vicious battle prowess would no longer linger in his mind.
Gaz felt her dread growing thicker as she drew closer to her home. She'd already taken the most roundabout route she could to get home. Elderly people with walkers had outpaced her speed.
Regardless, the inevitable had to happen eventually. Her house was growing closer in the distance. With every step forward, she took one mental step further away from the approaching situation. This was ridiculous. She'd barely been dealing with Zim for two days and already he'd managed to get her into several progressively stupider situations. The PAK itself was bad enough, but the disruption to the rest of her life she could've done without. It figures. Any situation involving the stupid alien seemed to spin wildly out of control no matter what precautions were in place.
It was incredibly weird to be spending so much time with him. Gaz had probably talked to Zim more in the past few days than she had since he landed on Earth. She hated it, and it only made her glad that she'd never seen fit to involve herself in her brother's 'mission' sooner than this.
She groaned internally at the idea that this may change something between them. Zim was clearly gaining a paranoid awareness of her. Gaz shuddered to think of what his fixation could lead to. Sometimes it seemed like Dib's entire life revolved around their mutual antagonism. Not only did Gaz have zero desire to insert herself in their weird obsession in general, but she'd feel . . . bad about getting in the way of his 'hobby,' or whatever.
Besides which, she was pretty sure Zim hated her too. Not in the same all-consuming way he hated her brother, but enough for him to continue to throw her out of the base the moment her presence was 'no longer needed.' Her face twisted at the memory of his strangeness throughout this incredibly long day.
That thing with Mr. Cult had been really weird, even for him. She still remembered the snarling vitriol in Zim's voice. Gaz trusted her instincts enough to recognize that there had been something . . . personal about it. Did ZIm really hate their principal that much, or . . .?
Gaz shook herself firmly. She didn't care, she reminded herself. She was going to let Zim poke and prod at her until this dented tin can un-suctioned itself from her spine, and then she was going to forget any of this nonsense had ever happened. Zim and his weird speeches and repeated invasion of her personal space included.
All thoughts of peace flew out the door as soon as she saw her brother on their armchair, arms firmly crossed in his best approximation of their father. Or a father, considering Membrane's lectures were generally done digitally rather than physically. Neither of them were familiar enough with parental body language enough to have a good reference point. A fact which was very apparent as her brother leaned comically far backwards, chest puffed up like an angry pigeon.
Gaz's brow rose, shutting the door wordlessly.
Neither of them spoke for several long moments. Gaz eyed her brother much more critically than he eyed her. While he seemed to be trying to do something weird and disappointed, Gaz was doing her best to express only one word: Seriously?
He deflated first, naturally. "Gaz, we need to talk."
"I gathered that," she replied, leaning against the back of the couch. She gestured vaguely towards his person, a reference to his strange posturing. "What was all that?"
"I . . . I don't know. I'm your big brother, I figured I'd try out some brotherly disapproval."
"Didn't work," she pointed out.
Dib sighed, scrubbing his hands across his face. "Gaz—."
"Look, Dib," she began. "Before you start, don't. It's not what you think."
Dib opened his arms in a wordless gesture of exasperation.
Gaz hopped over the back of the couch, seating herself on the backrest. "Zim and I got suspended."
"WHAT?!"
Gaz's snarl silenced his shrieking, but the tide could not be stopped with glares alone.
"You got suspended? When?" He demanded.
"This morning," she replied. "I got called to the office for ditching the end of detention 'together.'" She made the air quotes with an eye roll for emphasis. "He just followed me out, but they called us both in over it. Between that and the car thing—."
"Wait," he interrupted. "They gave you a suspension for that and not me? I'm the one who helped blow the car up."
"No," Gaz placated. "Zim blew the car up."
"Oh yeah, huh," he mumbled. He shook himself quickly, pulling himself out of his musings. "But you definitely weren't involved. What'd you get suspended for?"
Gaz's eyes darted away, Zim's weird speech ringing in her ears, along with the disappointed face of their absent father. "I dunno. Wrong place wrong time, I guess. You know how Zim is."
It was such a vague, sweeping statement. On anyone else, and about anyone else, it wouldn't have made sense in the least.
For Dib, it was more than enough. Zim had a way of attracting and redistributing trouble. It was incredibly easy to get caught up in that mess.
"But that doesn't make sense," Dib insisted. "Why does Zim think you're friends?'
"We got assigned a report together on why we're the worst kids ever and deserve more punishment," she said flatly. "Look, it's stupid, but so is Zim. He's clearly misunderstood the meaning of the word 'truce.' You know how he escalates things."
God, and didn't she know, too? Stupid, brain-dead little . . .
"It's easier to let him be delusional than argue with him," she added.
Dib carded a hand through his hair, clearly struggling to process the new information. He'd been prepared to convince his sister to let him scan her brain for any sort of mind control device or unusual brain waves.
There was no way she was being mind-controlled. Dib had way too much familiarity with Zim's influence over other organic creatures to not recognize the alien's words coming through someone else's mouth. This was definitely his sister. Zim never would've allowed Gaz to imply that he was anything but glorious and amazing. This was just . . . dumb. It made perfect sense, in its way. Usually no one bothered Gaz about leaving early for detention; that staff were way too scared of her to even mention it, usually. But if Zim had also decided to take the opportunity to leave, they wouldn't have been able to let it slide. Especially with the vendetta Mr. Cult currently had going about his stupid car.
"Look," she began firmly. "The last thing I need is for you to go around making this whole thing more difficult than it already is. Zim and I are stuck working on this stupid 'we're sorry for being the worst kids ever' project until the end of our suspension, or until the stupid principal is satisfied with torturing us. After that, we're done with. So all I need is for you to keep it together until this whole stupid mess is over with. Got it?"
"Oh man," he said, rubbing his neck. "Gaz, I—I'm sorry. I should've known you'd never actually hang out with Zim." Or anyone, really, but especially not his arch-nemesis. Zim and Dib were firmly the stars of their rivalry, but his sister absolutely loathed the green idiot. Maybe not as much or in the same way as Dib, but there was certainly no camaraderie between them. "And you only were in that detention because of me. Oh man, I really screwed this one up."
Yes Dib, she thought. And the Tooth Fairy is real, too.
"It's whatever," she said, shrugging. Better to play the merciful sister than the vengeful one. Dib would be far too grateful for her good mood to pry further. "I get a week off of school, and all I have to do is meet up with Zim every day or so to do some project. Winter Break is next week anyways. My vacation is just starting early is all."
"Well, I already owe you Bloaty's, but let me see what I can do about getting your console up and running. Give you something to do while you're stuck at the house. How did Dad take the news?"
She shrugged. "I dunno. He might not have been called yet."
Dib's brows furrowed. Rather familiar with suspensions, he recognized the procedural oddity. "They should've called him in front of you."
"Zim gave Mr. Cult a heart attack," she replied, remembering the way the older man had clutched at his chest. "They threw us out to get medical help."
Dib's moral compass had a brief battle. On the one hand, Zim was firmly either, and his arch-nemesis. On the other hand, Mr. Cult was also evil. And a vindictive asshole. Evil vs. evil, where one hand triumphed over the other. He decided to dismiss any performative outrage; Mr. Cult had it coming. He could let Zim slide on this one, just this once.
"Wow," he said. "That's something. Well, either way, I'm sorry about all that stuff at Zim's house."
"Whatever, Dib," she dismissed, brushing past him. "I'll be upstairs. Call me when Bloaty's gets here."
"Sure thing, Gaz!" He called up after her. ". . . Glad you're not being mind-controlled! Love you!"
Gaz merely grunted in reply. The second she made it into the safety of her room, she locked her door and exhaled slowly.
Day 2 was in the bag. Things had just got a lot more complicated, what with her brother's involvement, but this was manageable. She'd managed, as always, to alleviate the sharpest, most dangerous edges of the situation. This was fine. She could deal with this.
She had to.
(Completed 4.08.21)
(Posted 05.08.21)