Arm: Well, here's part 3. Leg and I have developed a slight problem with our two personalities.
Leg: You may not be familiar with them. Their names are Hip and Sam. They decided to review our story last night because they felt like getting on our nerves…and to make us look like idiots.
Arm: I swear, I'm just going to hand them the unrevised version of our fanfics (the parts that are written in a notebook, not on the computer) so that they won't review us again…. Enough of our ramblings, let's get on with part 3! Notes and disclaimers are at the end.
Betraying the Rivalry: Chapter 3: Friends?
Dib walked out of his house with Gaz, who was focused on her GameSlave. Dib seriously believed it was the other way around, the game wasn't your slave, you were the game's slave. He was doing a study on it before Zim had arrived on Earth. Dib had been doing a lot of studies before Zim's arrival, but he had stopped working on them completely since the alien had arrived.
"Don't even speak, Dib, I'm on a very important level right now, and if I so much as lose any points, I'll make you miserable for the rest of your pathetic life," Gaz threatened. Dib just rolled his eyes.
"Whatever, Gaz," Dib whispered to himself.
Gaz stared at the game intensely. Within those two seconds in which Dib had spoken those two words, she had lost a tremendous amount of points. She began to think of ways to make her brother miserable as she worked on getting back those points. She suddenly died (for the first time in a two days) as Dib "accidentally" bumped into her as he walked around her. "You do know I'll have to kill you now!" Gaz shouted at her brother's back.
Dib ignored this, Gaz said that every damn time he messed her up, but did she live out any of her death threats? No, so he didn't worry about it at all. He wanted to get to the skool faster so he could see if Zim was going to be there today. He even considered walking up to Zim's house to see if he was going to skool, but thought against it. Zim would probably attack him before he could explain why he was there because of what he had done the last time he went to Zim's house.
Once Dib made it to the skool, he looked around the playground for any sign of Zim. He couldn't spot a thing that might have been related to the alien. Dib looked at his watch, he was on time, so that either meant that Zim wasn't coming at all, or he was late. Which was another thing that was un-like Zim, Zim just was never late for skool. Dib decided not to wait for Zim, since he didn't know if he was going to come to skool at all today.
Zim was about to kill Gir. Gir decided to ask Zim billions of questions just as he was about to walk out of the door, and made Zim answer every single on of them. He even began to sing that blasted Doom Song as he opened the door, and even wanted Zim to join in with him.
"I can't, Gir, I'm gong to be late for skool!" Zim shouted agitatedly as he got ready to slam the door in Gir's face.
"Aw, someone needs a nice, big hug before they go!" Gir shouted happily at his master. Zim just slammed the door behind him and tried to ignore the sad sniffling behind the door. He walked to skool, nearly cursing at everything that crossed his path.
Zim hated being late, it was just the way he was. And Gir was no help, sitting outside without wearing his dog costume like that! Did Gir have any comprehension as to what could have happened? Zim shook his head. Of course Gir didn't, Gir didn't have a single intelligent thought in his head.
Zim nearly ran into Gaz in his hurry to skool. He apologized quickly as he continued on without much thought, his cursing spree now over. Gaz was nearly successful in grabbing his shirt so that she could beat the crap out of him. Zim had just cost her the best game she ever had! She whispered a death threat to him as she started a new game.
Zim stopped speed walking as he made it to the front steps of the skool. He made it on time, and he made sure that everything was in order (like his hair, for one) before walking into the building. He waited for Dib to pop out of somewhere and start ranting about his true identity as he walked down the hall. Nothing, not a trace of Dib anywhere. Zim wondered where that pitiful human could be, it was unlike Dib to go straight to class, but then again, he was late.
Zim walked into the sixth grade classroom and saw Dib working on something. Dib didn't even look up from what he was doing as Zim walked in. Zim walked up to Dib's desk, and made sure that Ms. Bitters wasn't in the classroom before he spoke. "What, did you finally give up on chasing me around everywhere of something?
Dib looked up at Zim, not at all looking surprised that Zim had asked him that. "No, I just decided to take a break and work on projects I've neglected," Dib replied tonelessly. He almost sounded as if he could care less, even though that wasn't the case. He was waiting to see if Zim was coming to skool, and seeing Zim in front of him had answered his question, so now he could get to work on something important to him.
"Did you send me an email this morning?" Zim inquired suddenly.
Dib was surprised at that. "Yeah, I did, what's it to ya? You probably didn't even read it before you deleted it," Dib stated as he continued working.
Zim stared down at Dib, trying to figure out why Dib was acting so strange. Dib almost sounded as if he was upset at the fact that Zim might have deleted that email.
Dib finally looked up at Zim. "What? Go sit down in your seat before Ms. Bitters comes in here and lectures us for talking," Dib ordered distractedly, not expecting Zim to actually listen to him and do as he was told.
"Fine, but all I was trying to do was talk to you," Zim whispered to himself as he walked to his desk. Dib lifted his head and looked over at Zim's retreating back. Did he actually hear those words come out of Zim's mouth? Dib shook his head as he continued working.
Zim was simply acting strange that morning. He acted like a…there's no other way to say this, he was acting like a normal human boy in skool. It wasn't as unnerving as the behavior he displayed yesterday, but it still freaked Dib out a bit.
Zim was thinking about Dib. Dib's behavior around him had changed drastically since yesterday. Was it simply because he was being nice to Zim out of pity? Or was it because he understood he wasn't going to try and take over the human race now that he was banished from Operation: Impending Doom II?
Zim sighed. Dib was just a huge puzzle that he was only beginning to understand how to solve. All those weeks at being at each other's throats and he thought he knew all he was ever going to know about Dib. Humans were just so complicated to understand, and Dib had to be the most complex.
Dib waited for the lunch bell to ring anxiously. He figured he should try to figure out what had happened to Zim yesterday, not that it seemed that Zim wanted to talk about it. At lunch Zim ate by himself, like he usually did. Dib wanted to try getting along with Zim, so he sat down at Zim's table, instead of next to Gaz. Besides, he could never be too sure if Gaz would live out her death threats or not.
Zim didn't acknowledge Dib's existence for a while. He was too concentrated on thinking through his plans to get back at Red and Purple. Some of the plans were really promising, but it looked like he was going to need some help, no matter how small it may be. Zim then looked up from his tray (which was still full of food), sensing that he wasn't alone at the table.
"Oh, Dib, I didn't notice you were there," Zim stated.
"I could tell, you seemed deep in though. Are you thinking about how you can get back at that guy you talked to over that phone-like thing yesterday?" Dib asked.
"Yes," Zim answered slowly. "Nobody makes a fool of Zim and gets away with it!"
Dib smiled somewhat, he knew that was coming. "What was that guy's name again anyway?" Dib asked.
"It's two guys, actually. The Almighty Tallest, to the Invaders. But since I'm no longer an Invader, I can't even call them that anymore," Zim said, his mood darkening somewhat.
"The 'Almighty Tallest,' huh? They sound like big-shots who only got where they were because they could intimidate the shorter people," Dib stated.
"That's very true, actually. My only friend, Jazz, is their second in command, and he's taller than everyone else on Irk-"
"Irk?" Dib asked, confused.
"My home planet," Zim admitted cautiously, waiting for Dib to start one of those "He just admitted he's an alien!" rants.
"Oh," was all that Dib said though.
"And anyway, he's taller than anyone else on Irk, but the Tallest of course. He told me that the Tallest were going to banish me for no reason at all this time. That they were going to tell me to stay here on Earth-"
"Wait a minute, 'this time'? What, were you banished before or something?" Dib asked.
"Yeah, I was, actually. The first time they banished me because I got a little too excited when I found out I was going to be a part of Operation: Impending Doom I, and I basically destroyed my planet in my excitement," Zim admitted, trying not to blush at the memory. "I 'quit' banishment when I heard of Impending Doom II. I wanted another chance at being an Invader, to prove to Red and Purple that I could be an Invader."
"Let me guess, Red and Purple are the Almighty Tallest?" Dib asked. Zim just nodded. "And they sent you here to Earth to humor you, and Jazz told all about that. And when they talked to you yesterday during skool, they…"
"Told me to stay on Earth," Zim finished the sentence for Dib.
"So they banished you again, but you already knew about it from Jazz, but you didn't believe it when Jazz told you. That explains why you were all depressed yesterday," Dib rambled off.
"Yes, that's exactly right. And that's why I have to get back at them. They humiliated me in front off all the Irken Empire when they sent me here to Earth…. No offense to your planet, though," Zim said quickly as he got up from the table to throw out his lunch. "Oh, and Dib?" Zim asked.
Dib was behind him, with his trash from his lunch. "Yeah, Zim?"
Zim searched for the right words. "Thank you…for being understanding and not trying to use what I told you against me. You are going to keep what I told you to yourself, right?" Zim asked, narrowing his eyes at Dib.
Dib tried not to laugh. "Of course, Zim. And you're welcome," Dib replied. "Friends?" Dib asked, putting out his hand for Zim to shake it.
Zim glanced at Dib's hand. He thought about it for a few seconds, and then he looked at Dib's face. He assumed that Dib wasn't going to try anything, so he placed his hand in Dib's. "Friends," Zim replied as they shook on it.
"So, Zim, need help coming up with plans to get back at Red and Purple?" Dib asked.
"I have a few good plans, but if you want to help, then you can help. There are a few that look promising," Zim told him.
The two sat down at the lunch table, and began to compare and look over the plans they started to come up with. They never knew they had so much in common.
Arm: Yep. End of chapter 3. I hope we didn't rush them into being friends. And as for ages, we think that Zim and Dib are in sixth grade because they act too much like sixth graders. Plus Gaz just has to be a fourth grader (she acts a lot like us when we were in the fourth grade.) Oh, and you all should know we don't own it. (Jhonen would probably kill us for this, so we know we don't have a chance to convince him to give IZ to us…^_^;)
Leg: We'll see you around. We should have chapter four out by the 20th, but we're not sure on it because we can get writer's block pretty soon. Please review on your way out?