Chapter 3
"Ooooo!" GIR's aqua blue eyes telescoped in curiosity as he hopped off the couch and peered inquisitively at the object. Well, it wasn't TV, GIR was sure of that. And it wasn't a monkey. Or a piggy. But it looked kind of interesting anyhow. It was heavy too, and GIR had a bit of difficulty heaving it onto his lap. "Ooo, it opens!" he bubbled happily at this discovery, and flipped through the pages looking for some pretty pictures to color. To his disappointment there were no pictures, but there were a lot of funny looking words, and GIR tried his best to sound them out.
Meanwhile, Zim had managed to scurry under the couch and he stuck his tongue out in Dib's direction. Dib was getting tired of the game now and was beginning to wish he'd just finished Zim off with a head-exploding spell, but he was too far into this to quit now, he supposed. His tail twitched and he drew his ears back.
"Alright Zim, this is it! I'm going to take a lot of satisfaction ripping you to shreds with my own two hands… er, um… paws! Then I'm gonna haul your little body on down to the research lab and finally prove to everyone what you really are!"
Dib reared back and dove for the space under the couch at the same time a tinny voice from across the room rattled off a choppy, weird sounding incantation.
In mid-air, Dib suddenly began to change back to his old, human self. He still sailed towards his target, but the unexpected transformation had interfered with his trajectory, and he pummeled headfirst into the couch's baseboard. "OWW!" came his voice, and he dropped to the floor like a sac of bricks.
Zim, observing the scene from his hiding place, was now rolling on the ground in fits of laugher, but his glee at seeing his enemy in pain was unexpectedly cut short as his body began feeling funny again.
"Wha…? YEAAHHHRGH!" the green one cried out as his head suddenly struck up against the underside of the couch, and he was forcefully squished inside the tiny space as he grew rapidly back to normal size. Grabbing the edge of the couch, he managed to pull himself out and stumble to his feet in a daze. Rubbing his antennae tenderly, he glanced down at Dib who was out cold, laying face down on the floor.
Another strange string of words reverberated throughout the room in that same, tin can voice.
There was a loud, thundering bang and something fell from above and bounced off Zim's head, causing his already sore cranium to throb even worse. "Now what!?" he growled, gazing down at the object at his feet. "A moose?" Zim cocked a non-existent eyebrow and picked up the small toy, which squeaked in his grip.
More moose toys began falling around him by the dozens, a bizarre symphony of squeaky noises echoing throughout the room as they hit the ground.
Down on the floor, Dib, roused out of his sleep by the sound of a hundred dropping squeaky toys, groaned and tried to sit up groggily.
"What happ- Hey!" he cried as a moose landed on his back. Brushing away the pile of moose toys that had accumulated around him, he staggered to a standing position and another barrage of toys hit him from above.
"What's going on?" Dib glanced around the room and his eyes landed on a certain little robot reading a thick black book, surrounded by a pile of mooses. "Hey, give that back!" he shouted, breaking into a mad dash towards GIR. GIR saw him coming and, scooping up the book, dodged out of the way. The tiny robot giggled, his square-ish pink tongue sticking out from the side of his mouth in blissful stupidity. GIR opened the book and sounded out another jumble of syllables.
Dib was about to charge again, but he found that he couldn't move his arms and legs. "What the…!?" Dib looked down and his face was suddenly plunged into a deep pile of frosting. His entire body had been encased inside an enormous, pink cupcake.
GIR screeched with joy, leapt forward, and chomped into the side of Dib's tasty prison.
"OW! OWWW! Quit it! That's my ARM!"
Zim chuckled, quite amused at seeing Dib become GIR's snack. "Nice job, GIR. For once your stupidity does our mission good. Now hand me the book." Zim held out his hand expectantly. The robot ceased his munching and looked up at his master innocently. "The book, GIR! Hand over the book!" he snarled impatiently.
A huge smile spread over GIR's metal lips and he dashed across the room.
"GIR! Come back here! Give me that book right now!" The alien darted after his robotic companion, but GIR thought his master was playing a game and avoided Zim's advances, a playful grin slapped across his face.
"Hehehehe…!" GIR giggled mindlessly. "C'mon, Master! Catch me!"
Zim made a running dive at him, but ended up skidding across the floor painfully as GIR skipped cheerfully out of the way. He peeled his face off the tile with a snarl then shot GIR the most burning, 'I mean business' glare he could muster. "GIR! I'm not playing with you! I want that book!"
"Do a little dance!" GIR squeeled.
Zim climbed to his feet. "No, GIR! I- Whoa…!" Zim's legs seemed to suddenly take on a mind of their own, and he began twirling and jumping around the room as dance music wafted through the air.
"GIIIIIIIIRRRRR!"
Meanwhile, Dib was attempting to break free from his cakey restraints (yes, even I know how stupid that sounds). Struggling didn't seem to be working, so he'd had to resort to eating his way out. He was now almost down to his shoulders, his mouth stuffed to the brim with a mix of pink cake and frosting. He was starting to feel sick to his stomach. "If Zim's robot doesn't kill me first, I'll probably end up in a diabetic coma," he frowned, and took another bite.
GIR was still watching his master shaking his 'groove thang,' clapping and laughing, oblivious to the long and steady stream of obscenities that were pouring out of the green one's mouth.
"Come on, Master! Do the funky-monkey dance!" he chirped, hopping up and joining in the dance.
"I have no monkey!" Zim screamed, "Now stop this at once! YAHH!" Zim yelped as forces beyond his control forcefully jerked and twisted his body in all directions.
"YAY! Move your body, every-everybody, move your body, c'mon now everybody!" GIR skipped and sang to the music. "Isn't this fun, Master?" He looked up at Zim sweetly, but the extraterrestrial's attention was focused on what GIR had left behind.
"The book!" Even though the book was no longer in GIR's possession, the spell hadn't worn off. No matter, Zim thought, still dancing as he tried with all his might to force his body to move in the direction of the spell book. It wasn't easy going against the control of the magic, but inch by inch he managed to make his way over towards it, every vein on his neck standing out in concentration. Okay, he was close enough, but now came the hard part: bending over.
With a desperate burst of strength, Zim wrenched his body and leaped for the prize, only to have it snatched out from under his fingertips at the last second.
"I got it!" Dib declared, triumphantly holding the book high over his head, bits of cake and pink goo dripping from his sleeves.
"Yoink!" GIR suddenly leaped through the air like a dolphin and grabbed it back from Dib who immediately gave chase. He screamed and squawked at GIR to give him the book, but the playful metal one just giggled and called out another spell.
Dib was about to make a dive for the robot, but stopped dead in his tracks when his scalp suddenly began to tingle like mad, and he sensed something was very, very wrong. "What is-…?" he began and caught a glimpse of his reflection in Zim's TV. "Oh my God!" he screamed horrified and tugged at his spiky hair which was now a blinding, platinum blonde.
GIR meanwhile was now running from Zim who was quickly gaining on him. The robot suddenly halted and read some more from the book, and Zim froze dead in his tracks and flung his arms over his eyes, dreading what result he'd find when he opened them. He dared to take a small peek.
"A bear suit?" Zim held up a fur-clad paw bemusedly. "Well, I guess that's not so bad." Or so he thought, till he unzipped his costume. "What the-!? GIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRR!"
Dib, who'd been collapsed in a desolate bundle by the TV, now rose and tightened his fists in rage. No one… NO ONE… messed with his hair. If people only knew how he spent hours every day and hundreds of dollars worth of hair gel and mouse to make it perfect. Consumed with fury, he let out a battle cry and charged for the book. GIR saw him coming and dashed to the side just as Zim was making a move… or at least trying to. It was rather hard to make his move quickly considering he was now in the body of a great big turtle.
The young paranormal investigator got the upper hand and swiped the book away from GIR. "Yes! I've got it!" he giggled madly. "And now to finish what I started. But first…" he brushed his blonde hair spike aside which had gone limp and was hanging in his face, flipping pages frantically trying to find the reversal spell. He tried one and produced a hand mirror out of thin air to see the effect it had. "AGH!" he choked nearly dropping the mirror at the golden curls and little pink bows that had appeared on his head. "That just made it worse!" Dib quickly tried another spell and his hair faded back to its normal, raven color and morphed into its proper scythe-like style. Sighing in relief, he turned to Zim who'd only managed to crawl about two and a half feet in the time it took.
Dib snickered. "You know, Zim, turtles live in the water. Not a very good thing considering your allergic reaction to it." Zim scowled and Dib went on, "Of course I could fix that for you by making you into something else. How does a flea sound? Or maybe a nice, harmless garden slug. Do you want to be a garden slug, Zim?"
The transmogrified alien growled deep in his throat causing Dib's smirk to grow wider. "On second thought, I think I'll just encase you in a big block of Lucite for all eternity, and finally, the world will know that I was right all along! Bye Zim. Can't say it hasn't been fun, but now playtime's over. But I do have to thank you, after all you're going to make me famous. Maybe I'll mention your name when I'm on Mysterious Mysteries, telling everyone how pitiful your defeat was."
Zim grunted and took another agonizingly gradual step forward. "Can the pathetic speeches, Dib-human. You're forgetting one thing."
"Oh? And what's that," he sniffed condescendingly.
Zim simply replied: "I may be an Earth tur-tull, but I'm still an Invader," and with that the center spot on Zim's shell whooshed back and his mechanical spider claws shot out and knocked the book out of Dib's arms. Dib dove for it, but Zim scuttled under him and whipped it away. The second Zim got his hands- er, claws, um… uh, well, whatever it is that turtles have- on the book, POOF! he instantly transformed back into his Irken self. His very, VERY angry Irken self.
"Alright Dib, this has gone far enough! I will put an end to this now!" he declared leafing through the pages, settling on one that read 'Ultimate Chaos and Doom Spell'. He started to read the incantation when Dib grabbed the book, but this time Zim was ready for him and held on to it, his grip like iron. The two pulled on either side of it, engaged in an odd game of tug-of-war. As the spine of the book started making rippy, crackly noises, neither one noticed the tiny green sparks jumping and popping off the pages.
The enemies tugged harder, muscles tensed in extreme concentration, and the book finally did what any book will inevitably do when pulled in opposite directions; it ripped in two.
A/N: Well, I promised you insane, and insane I shall deliver, especially in the next chapter.
Just where the heck did Dib get such a F!#$%& up Spell book from!? I mean come on! A spell that makes it rain mooses!? ^_^ LOL I'm aware that magic isn't this ridiculous or this easy to do, but this is cartoony, 'Invader ZIM' magic, so I had to make it as weird as possible. Hey, it worked for Harry Potter.
