A/N: Ok. Sorry for the name change, but it was REALLY getting on my nerves. There was a point to that name, and it'll show up later in the story. There's more ZAGR here... but you were warned. Oh! Thank you to DanniB, for being my 200th overall review. Yay! And thank to you Steve, for telling me what that stupid 'sucky thingy with the tube on the end and the small little holding... cup-like thing at the top that they use in science class to suck up water and chemicals and stuff' was. ^.^
Part Two: This Was The Moment
He was with her again.
She pressed her body forward into his, wrapping her arms around him, softly nibbling his lower lip. Then she moved her hands in a way that sent a tremor up his spine, and Zim could not help but smile.
"Gaz..."
Shaking her head, she put a finger to his lips and commenced in connecting their mouths again, stroking her tongue softly against his. He wrapped his hands around her waist and moved them up and down, returning the kiss as he did so. He inhaled deeply and his kissing moved from her mouth to her check, then down to the neck area. She playfully rubbed her fingers through his two antennae and then gently massaging his shoulders.
"Zim," she said, but the voice seemed so far away. He continued kissing her neck but Gaz smoothly pushed him in the shoulder, "Zim," she murmured again, and this time he stopped and their eyes met.
She blushed and smiled, and then grasped his hand. "It is getting late. You should go before Dib gets home."
Zim shook his head, exasperated. "We really shouldn't be tiptoeing around your brother."
She uttered a laugh and rolled her eyes. "Oh, and you think that making out right in front of him will solve our problem? He still hates you, you know. The way he talks about defeating you... the detail he goes into... it's quite disturbing."
Zim tightened his grip around her and shrugged. "So he talks about dissecting me, cutting me open in front of a million people to see and then sewing me back together again while I'm still alive and conscious enough to feel every nerve being pulled and shocked beyond pain itself. That's nothing new."
"You don't understand, Zim," Gaz said in a serious, low voice, standing up and pulling Zim by the hand out the door, handing him his hairpiece as she did so. "You've known my brother for a long time- you know how he doesn't give up."
"I am not afraid of your brother."
Gaz stopped, and a look of worry crossed her face. She gave his hand a squeeze and then looked Zim straight in the eye. "I'm serious, Zim. Now is not the time for your Irkenian-"
"Irken," he corrected.
She rolled her eyes and nodded. "Now is not the time for your *Irken* pride. We're at a critical point, here. My brother's made some powerful friends-"
"Those scientists?!" Zim snorted. "Please. Even G.I.R. could defeat those idiots." Her stern face did not leave, however and he sighed. "But if it should make you happy... all right. I will be more careful about hiding our... agreement."
A smile spread across her face and she gave him a quick kiss as they backed out the door. "Thank you, Zim," she said, after they had pulled out into the night and were finally able to breathe in the fresh air. She gave his moonlit face a light stroke and then walked back inside.
He turned, smiling to himself. Though he did look forward to the day when he would be able to see the shocked expression on his rival's face once he had found out exactly *what* he had been doing in his spare time- and it wasn't plotting to take over Earth.
Making sure his hairpiece was secured atop his head, he walked off into the darkness. Speaking of the subject...
Behind Zim, a pair of dark eyes glinted under the cast of the moonlight. Their carriers waited until Zim was fully out of site before standing up, dusting off his trench coat, and opening the door to his house.
"Gaz..." he sneered under his breath, and then slammed the door behind him.
-*-*-*-
Zim awoke to a bright beam of light, shining directly on his face. The white light flooded his eyes and he cringed at the intensity. What was WITH all the bright lights in this place?
He found himself looking straight up at the ceiling. They had taken him out of the tube and out of the filthy liquid and put him someplace else. But where?
There was nothing but an intangible silence around him. Was there a buzzing noise over in the furthest corner? And voices, directly above? He couldn't tell. Instead, he let his mind wander to the dream that had just had. It was the last time he had seen Gaz...
After that night, they had come. Destroyed his house and captured him easily. At the front was Dib. Dib, who knew everything. Dib, who would stop at nothing to make sure that Zim would pay the ultimate price for toying with his sister's emotions.
He did not go directly to the place he was in now. No... first, they had screened him. Stripped him of all the dignity he had just to prove the human Dib was right. And then he was forced into a cataleptic dream, and now he was here...
His body felt like a huge weight, every inch of his skin forcing him down as though it were pounds heavier than they truly were. He closed his eyes, as the light was beginning to bother and produce a severe headache in him. He attempted to move, but it was really of no use. His own... body was weighing him down?
"Like it?" a voice asked from across the room.
Zim cursed under his breath. So his mind was not playing tricks on him. He had never been alone. Dib had simply stood there the entire time, watching him struggle. Leering at his pain.
"It's some technology we picked up over the years," the voice continued. Zim followed the voice with his eyes, knowing that Dib was somewhere near him but unable to pinpoint an exact location. His head was throbbing, now, and he couldn't figure out why.
The voice uttered a laugh, and came closer to Zim. "That was an interesting dream you had, Zim. Very interesting."
Zim froze and his inner organs felt as they had suddenly lurched forward. "Wh... what?" His throat was scratchy and his voice sounded hoarse, most likely from not speaking for so long.
Dib laughed, now, a laugh that was not at all pleasant. "Stuttering now, aren't we, Zim?" he asked as he fasted his lab coat around him and then walked over to the metal table on the other side of the room. The entire room was too dark to see from Zim's perspective, but Dib, having the advantage of the light pointing directly as Zim and not himself, could see quite well. His hands felt across the table to where a pair of rubber gloves were. Quickly, he pulled them on over his hands and then walked eagerly back to the table where Zim was. "It's all quite simple, really. You do feel that pounding feeling in your head, don't you?" He didn't wait for Zim to nod- he knew- and continued walking toward him. "There's a small electronic device- the size of a pen- connected to your brain waves. We wanted to test it out to make sure it was working right for your..." he laughed, "Examination."
Zim felt a slight tug at the back of his neck, and saw Dib grabbing hold of a long black wire that was connected to some... machine of some sort. He held it up. "This is where they go, to be transmitted into light and sound waves into this machine," he gestured to it, "and then to a visual composition here," he gestured toward a large video screen that sat atop the machine. "I turned it off... for now. It can only handle so much information," Dib grinned down at his enemy... his /defeated/ enemy... searching his eyes for the pain from his rival that would satisfy his desires.
"This is low for you, human," Zim managed to say, finally. "All this... and you still had to call in reinforcements to capture me. What, you couldn't do the dirty work yourself?"
"Hardly," Dib scoffed, but Zim could see that he had struck an open wound. Dib said no more, so he stood there in silence too, seeing it useless to go on. Trying to make himself busy, and feeling the need to scare the hell out of Zim, he took upon the gratuitous task of organizing the table with all the metal devices.
An era of time seemed to pass from their silence, when voices from behind the closed door seemed to come closer, and closer.
"It looks as though our scientist friends have arrived," Dib said, giving Zim a regard of close scrutiny. He became excited, knowing this was his moment that he had worked so hard for. So many years... ever since that first day in class when he pointed out the truth, and everyone else was so blind that they couldn't see it. So many years... and it was worth every one of them if it meant Zim's inevitable defeat.
The door opened, and a large amount of humans, all in white lab coats, filed into the room, gasping upon their site of Zim and instantly talking in hushed whispers as he approached him. They all remained in the darkness, however, halting their advance at the exact place where the beam of the one bright light had ended.
The door finally closed, and two figures stepped forward into the light, joining Dib. Zim recognized them from earlier. One of them must have made a gesture of some sort at that moment, because everyone in the room quieted down in unison.
A sharp pinprick came from the back of his neck, at the same place where he felt the chip. Some sort of liquid flooded into his bloodstream. Was it some sort of numbing substance? Something to put him to sleep? He felt no change, whatsoever.
Dib grinned over at Zim's bewilderment. The liquid, in fact, was none of what he had most likely assumed. Only an elixir which would better help the process of examining his thoughts. He glanced up at his father as he put the syringe away, and felt a beam of pride swell up within him. /Finally/ he had been paid attention to. /Finally/, his dad actually recognized his existence. Ever since Dib had proved to the world what Zim was, he and his dad had become closer. They had talked face to face. They even had a conversation before that lasted longer than a minute. Imagine! If only... if only Gaz had not been so naïve. They could have been a family again. His face flushed with anger and he grabbed at any tool he could find, holding it up under the glint of the light.
"Hold on there, son," Membrane said, and taking the sharp metal out of his hand. "Use that and there won't be any of Zim left to examine."
The crowd of scientists laughed at this, and Dib blushed slightly, thankful for the poor lighting. Remembering to fasten his surgeon's mask on first, he instead took another tool, and handed a large pipette to Laura as she finished putting her mask on. "You might want to take samples of his blood, to examine later," he said through a muffled voice.
Laura nodded and gratefully took the pipette into her hands, walking slowly over to Zim's right.
Zim blinked, hearing the clicking of her slightly heeled soles across the floor. Even if he could move, he wouldn't, because the terror that had welled up inside of him for so long, the fear of this exact place, it was clutching every part of him now. This was the moment that he had feared the most. The moment that could have been evaded... if only she hadn't stopped to talk to him that one day. If only he hadn't talked back. If only they hadn't been so compatible.
Dib grinned over at Zim, taking a small sharp knife from the table. This was the moment that kept him sleeping each night. The moment, that had fueled his anger, his pain, every emotion over the long years except for defeat. Having this moment right here crushed his feelings of defeat altogether.
He lowered the blade into Zim's chest, beginning from just under his neck area and slowly dragging it down to the waist area. He kept his eyes on Zim the entire time, seeing him flinch in pain, biting his lip nervously and trying not to scream.
A dark blue blood flowed out of him, and Laura was quick to take samples of it using the pipette. Professor Membrane soon joined his son by his side, taking a pair of tools that would hold open the gash Dib had made inside of Zim.
Zim could only look up at the ceiling, breathing softly. The pain in his chest, the feeling of exposure- he was able to stand all of them. Then the pain increased, as if his entire chest was being ripped open. He jerked and closed his eyes, biting his lip further and in response of tasting his own blood knew that he had broken the skin on it. He laid his head back and tried to think of something better.
"Gaz..." he heard himself say. "I wish things could be different but they can't. We're not... you're not like me."
"Shut up, Zim!" she had snapped back. "Does that really matter? Or are you too arrogant to see that it's your own pride holding you back, not our species?"
The voice sounded like an echo to the present Zim. He shut his eyes tighter, and he could see the mental image now.
They were in the park, and it was a particularly cold day. The morning fog had just rolled in, so thick it could be sliced with a butter knife. He was thankful for paste, but at that moment it was the furthest thing from his mind.
They were both sitting on a park bench, one on one end, the other on the other. Gaz crossed her arms huffily- or maybe it was out of coldness- he didn't know. Nevertheless, the glared over at Zim. "You never wanted this in the first place. It was just a game to you. A game to get back at Dib."
"NO!" he had yelled, exasperated. Again, that sense of an echo rung in the present Zim's ears, but he didn't care. This was his dream. His way to escape reality- by being in a better one. "Well... at first, yes. But not now. Now, I..."
"You what?" she said, crossing her legs on the bench and smirking at him. He lowered his head, unable to go any further, and she shook her head, exasperated. She stood up off the bench. "Like I said. It had always been a game to you."
"No... Gaz, that's not true and you damn well know it," he sneered. He stood up and took her hands into his. "Now, I care about you and I don't give a crap what Dib thinks."
"So what do you think, Zim?" she had asked coolly. The wind blew, whipping her hair around a bit. Beyond their position, the mist collected around them, curling around the trees that surrounded them, and the bench. No one could see them, but they could see each other. They stood there in their calm silence, and then Zim had-
An acute pain in his lower abdomen broke him away from the memory. He opened his eyes, seeing a muffled laughter arising from the scientists in the darkness beyond. His eyes snapped up to the video screen, which had just begun to fade to black as his own memory faded. Damn you! he thought shrilly, and his own voice broke through the screen and he heard his own voice again. Like an echo.
Dib mumbled something, and a shocking pain ripped through his entire body. What were they doing? His chest heaved up and down as he struggled to breathe; a sort of drunken dizziness swirled around his head. A scream escaped him as he felt his insides being torn apart, exposed to the Earthen atmosphere, the utensils poking and prodding at every inch of his body.
The human would /pay/, Zim growled, not caring that the thought was heard. Dib glanced sharply up at the screen as a series of flashback memories crossed it.
Every moment of defeat, every point of humiliation- Zim was there to see it and remember about it. In his own moment of defeat, the only thing that kept him alive was remembrance about his moments of victory. Saving Earth, just so he could destroy it again. The meaningless battles that a younger he and Dib had engaged, which grew into more costly and violent battles as they grew.
"STOP IT!" Dib screamed at him, but the voice was far away. And so was the pain that ensued. He could hear himself scream but let himself lie back into a drowsy sleep, letting memory after memory come. Dib, being rejected at skool for his belief in the very real paranormal. Dib, being ridiculed even as he got older. Dib, Dib, Dib. Enough of Dib!
Zim let his mind wander to the misty day in the park, with Gaz. He had leaned in, and the two engaged in a kiss that said everything. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and he had smiled, brushing his own against her face and then down to her waist. They closed in the distance between themselves as they kissed, destroying any barriers that were there.
Dib, upon seeing this, cursed under his breath and frantically snatched a tool out of his father's hand, applying it quickly. Jerking slightly at this, Zim could feel his inner cardiovascular organs pumping, harder and harder. His breath became raspy and each gulp of air became more and more necessary to live. A sweat had broken out onto his skin, and his eyes, focusing on nothing at all but the ceiling above, dimmed to a black darkness every once in a moment, and then he would be shocked awake again. And then...
Darkness. Was it all over? Was it finally finished? No. Zim still wasn't alone, for they were all in darkness. The bright beam of light focused on Zim shut off, and all at once, the scientists burst into a state of confusion. A scream could be heard from far away- was it his own? He couldn't tell. But he could feel himself moving, the pain only increasing as the wound was worsened. He felt himself being held, being cared for. His mind reverted back to the times he and Gaz had spent together. Even... even though she had betrayed him. Seeing her alone would make his death worthwhile.
Zim fell unconscious, and let himself be taken away into the darkness.
Part Two: This Was The Moment
He was with her again.
She pressed her body forward into his, wrapping her arms around him, softly nibbling his lower lip. Then she moved her hands in a way that sent a tremor up his spine, and Zim could not help but smile.
"Gaz..."
Shaking her head, she put a finger to his lips and commenced in connecting their mouths again, stroking her tongue softly against his. He wrapped his hands around her waist and moved them up and down, returning the kiss as he did so. He inhaled deeply and his kissing moved from her mouth to her check, then down to the neck area. She playfully rubbed her fingers through his two antennae and then gently massaging his shoulders.
"Zim," she said, but the voice seemed so far away. He continued kissing her neck but Gaz smoothly pushed him in the shoulder, "Zim," she murmured again, and this time he stopped and their eyes met.
She blushed and smiled, and then grasped his hand. "It is getting late. You should go before Dib gets home."
Zim shook his head, exasperated. "We really shouldn't be tiptoeing around your brother."
She uttered a laugh and rolled her eyes. "Oh, and you think that making out right in front of him will solve our problem? He still hates you, you know. The way he talks about defeating you... the detail he goes into... it's quite disturbing."
Zim tightened his grip around her and shrugged. "So he talks about dissecting me, cutting me open in front of a million people to see and then sewing me back together again while I'm still alive and conscious enough to feel every nerve being pulled and shocked beyond pain itself. That's nothing new."
"You don't understand, Zim," Gaz said in a serious, low voice, standing up and pulling Zim by the hand out the door, handing him his hairpiece as she did so. "You've known my brother for a long time- you know how he doesn't give up."
"I am not afraid of your brother."
Gaz stopped, and a look of worry crossed her face. She gave his hand a squeeze and then looked Zim straight in the eye. "I'm serious, Zim. Now is not the time for your Irkenian-"
"Irken," he corrected.
She rolled her eyes and nodded. "Now is not the time for your *Irken* pride. We're at a critical point, here. My brother's made some powerful friends-"
"Those scientists?!" Zim snorted. "Please. Even G.I.R. could defeat those idiots." Her stern face did not leave, however and he sighed. "But if it should make you happy... all right. I will be more careful about hiding our... agreement."
A smile spread across her face and she gave him a quick kiss as they backed out the door. "Thank you, Zim," she said, after they had pulled out into the night and were finally able to breathe in the fresh air. She gave his moonlit face a light stroke and then walked back inside.
He turned, smiling to himself. Though he did look forward to the day when he would be able to see the shocked expression on his rival's face once he had found out exactly *what* he had been doing in his spare time- and it wasn't plotting to take over Earth.
Making sure his hairpiece was secured atop his head, he walked off into the darkness. Speaking of the subject...
Behind Zim, a pair of dark eyes glinted under the cast of the moonlight. Their carriers waited until Zim was fully out of site before standing up, dusting off his trench coat, and opening the door to his house.
"Gaz..." he sneered under his breath, and then slammed the door behind him.
-*-*-*-
Zim awoke to a bright beam of light, shining directly on his face. The white light flooded his eyes and he cringed at the intensity. What was WITH all the bright lights in this place?
He found himself looking straight up at the ceiling. They had taken him out of the tube and out of the filthy liquid and put him someplace else. But where?
There was nothing but an intangible silence around him. Was there a buzzing noise over in the furthest corner? And voices, directly above? He couldn't tell. Instead, he let his mind wander to the dream that had just had. It was the last time he had seen Gaz...
After that night, they had come. Destroyed his house and captured him easily. At the front was Dib. Dib, who knew everything. Dib, who would stop at nothing to make sure that Zim would pay the ultimate price for toying with his sister's emotions.
He did not go directly to the place he was in now. No... first, they had screened him. Stripped him of all the dignity he had just to prove the human Dib was right. And then he was forced into a cataleptic dream, and now he was here...
His body felt like a huge weight, every inch of his skin forcing him down as though it were pounds heavier than they truly were. He closed his eyes, as the light was beginning to bother and produce a severe headache in him. He attempted to move, but it was really of no use. His own... body was weighing him down?
"Like it?" a voice asked from across the room.
Zim cursed under his breath. So his mind was not playing tricks on him. He had never been alone. Dib had simply stood there the entire time, watching him struggle. Leering at his pain.
"It's some technology we picked up over the years," the voice continued. Zim followed the voice with his eyes, knowing that Dib was somewhere near him but unable to pinpoint an exact location. His head was throbbing, now, and he couldn't figure out why.
The voice uttered a laugh, and came closer to Zim. "That was an interesting dream you had, Zim. Very interesting."
Zim froze and his inner organs felt as they had suddenly lurched forward. "Wh... what?" His throat was scratchy and his voice sounded hoarse, most likely from not speaking for so long.
Dib laughed, now, a laugh that was not at all pleasant. "Stuttering now, aren't we, Zim?" he asked as he fasted his lab coat around him and then walked over to the metal table on the other side of the room. The entire room was too dark to see from Zim's perspective, but Dib, having the advantage of the light pointing directly as Zim and not himself, could see quite well. His hands felt across the table to where a pair of rubber gloves were. Quickly, he pulled them on over his hands and then walked eagerly back to the table where Zim was. "It's all quite simple, really. You do feel that pounding feeling in your head, don't you?" He didn't wait for Zim to nod- he knew- and continued walking toward him. "There's a small electronic device- the size of a pen- connected to your brain waves. We wanted to test it out to make sure it was working right for your..." he laughed, "Examination."
Zim felt a slight tug at the back of his neck, and saw Dib grabbing hold of a long black wire that was connected to some... machine of some sort. He held it up. "This is where they go, to be transmitted into light and sound waves into this machine," he gestured to it, "and then to a visual composition here," he gestured toward a large video screen that sat atop the machine. "I turned it off... for now. It can only handle so much information," Dib grinned down at his enemy... his /defeated/ enemy... searching his eyes for the pain from his rival that would satisfy his desires.
"This is low for you, human," Zim managed to say, finally. "All this... and you still had to call in reinforcements to capture me. What, you couldn't do the dirty work yourself?"
"Hardly," Dib scoffed, but Zim could see that he had struck an open wound. Dib said no more, so he stood there in silence too, seeing it useless to go on. Trying to make himself busy, and feeling the need to scare the hell out of Zim, he took upon the gratuitous task of organizing the table with all the metal devices.
An era of time seemed to pass from their silence, when voices from behind the closed door seemed to come closer, and closer.
"It looks as though our scientist friends have arrived," Dib said, giving Zim a regard of close scrutiny. He became excited, knowing this was his moment that he had worked so hard for. So many years... ever since that first day in class when he pointed out the truth, and everyone else was so blind that they couldn't see it. So many years... and it was worth every one of them if it meant Zim's inevitable defeat.
The door opened, and a large amount of humans, all in white lab coats, filed into the room, gasping upon their site of Zim and instantly talking in hushed whispers as he approached him. They all remained in the darkness, however, halting their advance at the exact place where the beam of the one bright light had ended.
The door finally closed, and two figures stepped forward into the light, joining Dib. Zim recognized them from earlier. One of them must have made a gesture of some sort at that moment, because everyone in the room quieted down in unison.
A sharp pinprick came from the back of his neck, at the same place where he felt the chip. Some sort of liquid flooded into his bloodstream. Was it some sort of numbing substance? Something to put him to sleep? He felt no change, whatsoever.
Dib grinned over at Zim's bewilderment. The liquid, in fact, was none of what he had most likely assumed. Only an elixir which would better help the process of examining his thoughts. He glanced up at his father as he put the syringe away, and felt a beam of pride swell up within him. /Finally/ he had been paid attention to. /Finally/, his dad actually recognized his existence. Ever since Dib had proved to the world what Zim was, he and his dad had become closer. They had talked face to face. They even had a conversation before that lasted longer than a minute. Imagine! If only... if only Gaz had not been so naïve. They could have been a family again. His face flushed with anger and he grabbed at any tool he could find, holding it up under the glint of the light.
"Hold on there, son," Membrane said, and taking the sharp metal out of his hand. "Use that and there won't be any of Zim left to examine."
The crowd of scientists laughed at this, and Dib blushed slightly, thankful for the poor lighting. Remembering to fasten his surgeon's mask on first, he instead took another tool, and handed a large pipette to Laura as she finished putting her mask on. "You might want to take samples of his blood, to examine later," he said through a muffled voice.
Laura nodded and gratefully took the pipette into her hands, walking slowly over to Zim's right.
Zim blinked, hearing the clicking of her slightly heeled soles across the floor. Even if he could move, he wouldn't, because the terror that had welled up inside of him for so long, the fear of this exact place, it was clutching every part of him now. This was the moment that he had feared the most. The moment that could have been evaded... if only she hadn't stopped to talk to him that one day. If only he hadn't talked back. If only they hadn't been so compatible.
Dib grinned over at Zim, taking a small sharp knife from the table. This was the moment that kept him sleeping each night. The moment, that had fueled his anger, his pain, every emotion over the long years except for defeat. Having this moment right here crushed his feelings of defeat altogether.
He lowered the blade into Zim's chest, beginning from just under his neck area and slowly dragging it down to the waist area. He kept his eyes on Zim the entire time, seeing him flinch in pain, biting his lip nervously and trying not to scream.
A dark blue blood flowed out of him, and Laura was quick to take samples of it using the pipette. Professor Membrane soon joined his son by his side, taking a pair of tools that would hold open the gash Dib had made inside of Zim.
Zim could only look up at the ceiling, breathing softly. The pain in his chest, the feeling of exposure- he was able to stand all of them. Then the pain increased, as if his entire chest was being ripped open. He jerked and closed his eyes, biting his lip further and in response of tasting his own blood knew that he had broken the skin on it. He laid his head back and tried to think of something better.
"Gaz..." he heard himself say. "I wish things could be different but they can't. We're not... you're not like me."
"Shut up, Zim!" she had snapped back. "Does that really matter? Or are you too arrogant to see that it's your own pride holding you back, not our species?"
The voice sounded like an echo to the present Zim. He shut his eyes tighter, and he could see the mental image now.
They were in the park, and it was a particularly cold day. The morning fog had just rolled in, so thick it could be sliced with a butter knife. He was thankful for paste, but at that moment it was the furthest thing from his mind.
They were both sitting on a park bench, one on one end, the other on the other. Gaz crossed her arms huffily- or maybe it was out of coldness- he didn't know. Nevertheless, the glared over at Zim. "You never wanted this in the first place. It was just a game to you. A game to get back at Dib."
"NO!" he had yelled, exasperated. Again, that sense of an echo rung in the present Zim's ears, but he didn't care. This was his dream. His way to escape reality- by being in a better one. "Well... at first, yes. But not now. Now, I..."
"You what?" she said, crossing her legs on the bench and smirking at him. He lowered his head, unable to go any further, and she shook her head, exasperated. She stood up off the bench. "Like I said. It had always been a game to you."
"No... Gaz, that's not true and you damn well know it," he sneered. He stood up and took her hands into his. "Now, I care about you and I don't give a crap what Dib thinks."
"So what do you think, Zim?" she had asked coolly. The wind blew, whipping her hair around a bit. Beyond their position, the mist collected around them, curling around the trees that surrounded them, and the bench. No one could see them, but they could see each other. They stood there in their calm silence, and then Zim had-
An acute pain in his lower abdomen broke him away from the memory. He opened his eyes, seeing a muffled laughter arising from the scientists in the darkness beyond. His eyes snapped up to the video screen, which had just begun to fade to black as his own memory faded. Damn you! he thought shrilly, and his own voice broke through the screen and he heard his own voice again. Like an echo.
Dib mumbled something, and a shocking pain ripped through his entire body. What were they doing? His chest heaved up and down as he struggled to breathe; a sort of drunken dizziness swirled around his head. A scream escaped him as he felt his insides being torn apart, exposed to the Earthen atmosphere, the utensils poking and prodding at every inch of his body.
The human would /pay/, Zim growled, not caring that the thought was heard. Dib glanced sharply up at the screen as a series of flashback memories crossed it.
Every moment of defeat, every point of humiliation- Zim was there to see it and remember about it. In his own moment of defeat, the only thing that kept him alive was remembrance about his moments of victory. Saving Earth, just so he could destroy it again. The meaningless battles that a younger he and Dib had engaged, which grew into more costly and violent battles as they grew.
"STOP IT!" Dib screamed at him, but the voice was far away. And so was the pain that ensued. He could hear himself scream but let himself lie back into a drowsy sleep, letting memory after memory come. Dib, being rejected at skool for his belief in the very real paranormal. Dib, being ridiculed even as he got older. Dib, Dib, Dib. Enough of Dib!
Zim let his mind wander to the misty day in the park, with Gaz. He had leaned in, and the two engaged in a kiss that said everything. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and he had smiled, brushing his own against her face and then down to her waist. They closed in the distance between themselves as they kissed, destroying any barriers that were there.
Dib, upon seeing this, cursed under his breath and frantically snatched a tool out of his father's hand, applying it quickly. Jerking slightly at this, Zim could feel his inner cardiovascular organs pumping, harder and harder. His breath became raspy and each gulp of air became more and more necessary to live. A sweat had broken out onto his skin, and his eyes, focusing on nothing at all but the ceiling above, dimmed to a black darkness every once in a moment, and then he would be shocked awake again. And then...
Darkness. Was it all over? Was it finally finished? No. Zim still wasn't alone, for they were all in darkness. The bright beam of light focused on Zim shut off, and all at once, the scientists burst into a state of confusion. A scream could be heard from far away- was it his own? He couldn't tell. But he could feel himself moving, the pain only increasing as the wound was worsened. He felt himself being held, being cared for. His mind reverted back to the times he and Gaz had spent together. Even... even though she had betrayed him. Seeing her alone would make his death worthwhile.
Zim fell unconscious, and let himself be taken away into the darkness.