Chapter Fourteen: The Gravity of Love
A/Note: It's the next-to-last chapter, finally. See? See? I didn't forget about this story! Much. Right.. Anyway..
We're finally to the climax here, and the chapter is titled for the song that inspired the story, Gravity of Love by Enigma. ^^
It was dark. A strange warm all-encompassing darkness that surrounded and held you closely, comfortingly. Gaz could feel it almost immediately, drawing her nearer as she 'fell' downwards. She couldn't feel anything of herself. No sensation of her physical body at all. Gaz flinched back slightly at the realization. Had she done something to herself? Had she actually died after the explosion of the P.E.G.'s core?
In lieu of opening her eyes, she opened her senses instead, scanning over herself. She could 'see' nothing save a ghostly contrail of bluish light, which contrasted sharply to the deep maroon-toned darkness around her. She concentrated, and a faint, translucent version of her own body formed out of the blue fog. Whatever she was, she had control of her odd new form.
Experimentally, she tried touching herself with a ghostly hand. The surface of her image wavered only slightly as she brushed her fingers over her other arm. It tingled softly, pulsing with energy. She didn't *feel* dead, she decided. If anything, she felt. purely alive. It was like she was made of a really good caffeine rush. Gaz giggled inaudibly to herself and waved her arm back and forth, expecting to see faint after-images of her not- quite-opaque limb. Instead, it seemed to blur strangely before resolving back into it's familiar appearance.
Something nagged at her mind insistently. Wasn't there something she was supposed to be doing? The others! She'd forgotten about them! How long had she been here, anyway? All sense of time was suspended, she had no idea if it had been minutes or days, even years after she had left her brother and that idiot alien. She *reached* out for the surface urgently with her mind, searching desperately for some sign of life. There! She could detect a pleasantly-flavored shimmer from above. There was still time, but who knew how much? She had to make it in time. For them..
Gaz turned, now seeking the ring of impending death that she'd let loose to close around the Earth. The massive heat signature of the core overwhelmed any sense of where the.. thing could be. How long until it closed? She had to act quickly and gather power from the Earth's core. Geo-thermal power, she recalled her father calling it. Heat energy. And surely there would be enough of it that she could put things right. She turned in the direction of the brightest "light" and headed towards it as quickly as she could move her strange not-quite-body.
As her surroundings grew brighter and more intense, she could detect something like the sound of a human heartbeat, only stronger. With each pulse it sent out, a small shockwave-like vibration of vital force washed out from the core like waves on a beach. Gaz groped feebly for the tendrils of energy. She could feel them, but not really touch them like the readily tangible electrical current she had been able to make such ready use of. After a few moments of scrambling in the spray, she realized why. The filaments were too thin here for her flimsy body to grasp, she would have to go farther still.
Gaz traced her fingers along the twining tide as she approached the Earth's heart, waiting for some tug of resistance to show her that her meager abilities could make use of the energy flowing in excess all around her as she progressed. She probed farther ahead with her strangely-augmented perception. Something was ahead. It didn't feel readily similar to anything she had noticed so far. While it felt *like* the strengthening currents that surrounded her, it was at the same time very different. Almost like a presence. She couldn't feel the intense heat of the molten rock that glowed a seared white-hot around her, blinding even to her odd new ability of discernment. Sightlessly, she stumbled ahead, sobbing of desperate exhaustion. She couldn't fail, not now! Not after coming so far!
Suddenly, the presence was all around her. Rippling energy became fibrous to her half-aware touch. Gaz's "sight" swam uneasily as she looked up. At last her vision cleared a little, and the girl was astounded to see what appeared to be the softly glowing face of a gentle-looking woman. Only it wasn't a woman, really.. it was.. was..
Gaz stared unabashed at the curious sight before her, remembering yet another of her "insane" brother's pet rants. '..this particular theory holds that the Earth is really a single massive living thing, with it's own awareness. It regulates the atmosphere, the land and water, all according to its' own will,' Dib's voice droned in her mind. In spite of herself, she couldn't bring herself to frown at the fact that this meant that now Dib had been right about a whole two things so far. (What next, Bigfoot in their kitchen making waffles?)
Gaz reached for the apparition, silently begging with every ounce of her being for its aid. The soft greenish-blue glow of Gaia intensified as the figure smiled, reaching for the small girl's seeking hand. Gaz felt herself swathed in incredible power, then everything faded to white.
Far, far above the lazily rolling Earth, GIR stared unhappily out the window of the base. A faint whine of expectancy forced itself out of his vocal circuits. From up here, he could see a dark line tracing across the globe, heading swiftly and surely towards its apex. The base computer observed with bored indifference that "Within seconds the point of convergence will be reached." GIR looked worriedly up at the ceiling, and the computer sighed. "The bad stuff will happen," it explained.
"We gotta save Master!" GIR cried, pointing urgently. A loud gameshow-like buzzer sounded. "Negative. The base has no means of locomotion in an orbital environment," the computer told him. GIR thought hard. "What about the ship!?" he persisted, amazed and proud of his own brilliance. The computer scoffed audibly. "The Voot Cruiser was blown up. Duh."
GIR wailed in fresh agony and pressed his small metal face to the cold glass. No more Earth. No more Master Zim. No more Scary Monkey Show! Everything he loved would be gone! Well, except for his piggy, it was right there on the floor beside him, staring blankly upwards. Poor Piggy, he obviously didn't understand what was going on. GIR lifted Piggy into his arms and hugged him. Piggy was too young to understand that they could do nothing but watch the Earth's doom.
As he detected the arcing slice of darkness nearing the end of it's journey, GIR waved tearfully to the sleepy-looking world below. "Goodbye. Goodbye Earth! I liked you as more than a friend!" he choked, clutching the blissfully naive Piggy tightly.
GIR's photoreceptors blinked. Wait. What was that light? A few strange rays of sparkling luminance shone out of the closing band of blackness. Was this the beginning of the wave of badness that would kill everything? GIR stared, fascinated. Was the end of the world supposed to be so.. pretty? Engaging a magnified view of the goings-on down on the surface blasted the robot back a few feet more from the surface of the window, but provided him with a much better view. The gloomy fog seemingly simmered slightly. It roiled and bucked almost as if in pain, struggling to close around the narrow beam of light that appeared to be no more than a centimeter in diameter.
"What's happening?" GIR squeaked nervously. After a few tense seconds of analytical silence, the brusque voice of the computer spoke up, sounding equally stunned. "Unknown. Insufficient data at this time."
The electronic eyes of the SIR unit and the Base computer were the only witnesses as the light widened, forcing the darkly malevolent energy back. It fought desperately, with blind anger at being unable to achieve its goal so close to victory. As it struggled, it struck out, biting deeply into the brilliance and forcing all the hateful venom it could into its foe. The light was unaffected. All the animosity that one person could summon and empower was nothing to the living essence of an entire planet. The radiance saw its opening and flooded the dark, overwhelming and absorbing it, even as it tried to flee back the way it had come. There was nowhere for Gaz's creation to go. Finally, it was forced to surrender entirely, fading away with the miraculous light just before the sun began to peer concernedly over the horizon.
GIR retracted his telescopic vision and gave a concerned yelp. "THEY'RE GOOOOOONE!" he screamed, throwing himself to the floor and pounding his small metal hands and feet into the tile. "A-Actually, they're not.." the computer interrupted. "Sensors detect Master Zim, very much alive, along with the entire plant, insect, and animal population." Before GIR could ask another question, the computer answered it for him also. "Yes, and the human population, too. All 6,283,515,578 of them. Oops, make that 579. Mrs. Matthei down the block just had a baby girl."
GIR shrieked joyfully. "I GET TO PLAY WIT' THE BABY!!!!!"
The three of them waited at the P.E.G. generator station for hours. Long enough for dawn to come to their disaster-prone city. Long enough for someone to notice the smoke still rising from the facility and think to call 911, after looking up the number. Long enough for an ambulance to arrive, and paramedics to forcibly sedate Professor Membrane in order to drag him away from the building, Dib in tow.
Still, Zim waited. Dib had charged him with waiting for the girl-sibling to return from wherever she'd gone, however she'd done it. But there was still no sign of her, save a shed strand or two of purple hair. Zim shook his head and turned away from the domed building. It was a shame, but good soldiers were sometimes lost in battle to serve the greater good. He inclined his head for a moment, paying the girl's memory tribute before marching resolutely in the direction that the ambulance had gone. Was it a moment's fancy brought on by the long, exhausting day he'd endured, or was the air a little purer today? The sky a little less hazed by pollution? Zim shook his head. He had to be imagining things. As soon as he had reported his opinion that Gaz was not coming back to the Dib-creature, he would get some quality down-time back at the..
Zim stopped mid-stride, and stared up at the sky. His base was up THERE, wasn't it? Hm. That was going to be a problem. A quick check-in with the computer reassured him. Everything was in fine working order. Almost certainly Dib or his father would be able to come up with something to retrieve it. They owed him, after all! The base was safe enough for the moment. The irken tucked his communicator away in his pak and fished out his spare disguise. Those fools at the human hospital would never suspect that the great and mighty Invader Zim walked through their midst! Zim strode off on his way, humming a merry tune.
His fantastic brain had directed him to enter through the door marked "Emergency". After all, any business of Zim was bound to be of pressing importance. As he entered, he looked about the abandoned waiting room. Odd. From the television, he had learned that humans were incredibly prone to inflicting self-injury. A dark-haired college student sat at the recessed window labeled "sign in, please". 'Strange name, even for a human,' Zim thought. "HEY! HEY! Down here! HEY! Desk slave!" he shouted, trying to get the man's attention.
As he jumped up and down waving, he was nearly run down by a trauma team that burst in through the outer doors, carrying a very light-seeming gurney. "We've got an emergency, here!" the woman heading the group shouted to the startled aide sitting at the desk. The young man grabbed for his paperwork and followed them, perplexing Zim. With no other clue where to go for assistance, he followed their voices down the corridor.
"Where is everyone tonight, Kevin?" "They left." "Say what?" "Like I said, about half an hour ago, they all pretty much just. got up and left. They all claimed they were fine now, whatever that means." "Weird, man." "You're telling me. It's not every day you see a guy's arm spontaneously heal a compound fracture. Okay, who have we got here?" "No name yet. A couple out for a walk found the kid laying in the driveway of a house out in the 'burbs. When they couldn't rouse her for anything, they got scared and called us." "Oo-kay.. So.. what's up with her?" "No clue yet. Good respiration, strong pulse.." There was a faint buzzing sound for a few moments. "..and the 'gram says she's got more than adequate brain activity. The only symptom I can put a solid handle on is fatigue." "Wonder what happened to our Miss Jane Doe?"
Zim peeked into the room, glaring at the humans each in turn for ignoring him before his eyes caught sight of the small form on the bed. "That is no 'Jane the female deer'!" he cried, "That is Gaz!"
A/Note: It's the next-to-last chapter, finally. See? See? I didn't forget about this story! Much. Right.. Anyway..
We're finally to the climax here, and the chapter is titled for the song that inspired the story, Gravity of Love by Enigma. ^^
It was dark. A strange warm all-encompassing darkness that surrounded and held you closely, comfortingly. Gaz could feel it almost immediately, drawing her nearer as she 'fell' downwards. She couldn't feel anything of herself. No sensation of her physical body at all. Gaz flinched back slightly at the realization. Had she done something to herself? Had she actually died after the explosion of the P.E.G.'s core?
In lieu of opening her eyes, she opened her senses instead, scanning over herself. She could 'see' nothing save a ghostly contrail of bluish light, which contrasted sharply to the deep maroon-toned darkness around her. She concentrated, and a faint, translucent version of her own body formed out of the blue fog. Whatever she was, she had control of her odd new form.
Experimentally, she tried touching herself with a ghostly hand. The surface of her image wavered only slightly as she brushed her fingers over her other arm. It tingled softly, pulsing with energy. She didn't *feel* dead, she decided. If anything, she felt. purely alive. It was like she was made of a really good caffeine rush. Gaz giggled inaudibly to herself and waved her arm back and forth, expecting to see faint after-images of her not- quite-opaque limb. Instead, it seemed to blur strangely before resolving back into it's familiar appearance.
Something nagged at her mind insistently. Wasn't there something she was supposed to be doing? The others! She'd forgotten about them! How long had she been here, anyway? All sense of time was suspended, she had no idea if it had been minutes or days, even years after she had left her brother and that idiot alien. She *reached* out for the surface urgently with her mind, searching desperately for some sign of life. There! She could detect a pleasantly-flavored shimmer from above. There was still time, but who knew how much? She had to make it in time. For them..
Gaz turned, now seeking the ring of impending death that she'd let loose to close around the Earth. The massive heat signature of the core overwhelmed any sense of where the.. thing could be. How long until it closed? She had to act quickly and gather power from the Earth's core. Geo-thermal power, she recalled her father calling it. Heat energy. And surely there would be enough of it that she could put things right. She turned in the direction of the brightest "light" and headed towards it as quickly as she could move her strange not-quite-body.
As her surroundings grew brighter and more intense, she could detect something like the sound of a human heartbeat, only stronger. With each pulse it sent out, a small shockwave-like vibration of vital force washed out from the core like waves on a beach. Gaz groped feebly for the tendrils of energy. She could feel them, but not really touch them like the readily tangible electrical current she had been able to make such ready use of. After a few moments of scrambling in the spray, she realized why. The filaments were too thin here for her flimsy body to grasp, she would have to go farther still.
Gaz traced her fingers along the twining tide as she approached the Earth's heart, waiting for some tug of resistance to show her that her meager abilities could make use of the energy flowing in excess all around her as she progressed. She probed farther ahead with her strangely-augmented perception. Something was ahead. It didn't feel readily similar to anything she had noticed so far. While it felt *like* the strengthening currents that surrounded her, it was at the same time very different. Almost like a presence. She couldn't feel the intense heat of the molten rock that glowed a seared white-hot around her, blinding even to her odd new ability of discernment. Sightlessly, she stumbled ahead, sobbing of desperate exhaustion. She couldn't fail, not now! Not after coming so far!
Suddenly, the presence was all around her. Rippling energy became fibrous to her half-aware touch. Gaz's "sight" swam uneasily as she looked up. At last her vision cleared a little, and the girl was astounded to see what appeared to be the softly glowing face of a gentle-looking woman. Only it wasn't a woman, really.. it was.. was..
Gaz stared unabashed at the curious sight before her, remembering yet another of her "insane" brother's pet rants. '..this particular theory holds that the Earth is really a single massive living thing, with it's own awareness. It regulates the atmosphere, the land and water, all according to its' own will,' Dib's voice droned in her mind. In spite of herself, she couldn't bring herself to frown at the fact that this meant that now Dib had been right about a whole two things so far. (What next, Bigfoot in their kitchen making waffles?)
Gaz reached for the apparition, silently begging with every ounce of her being for its aid. The soft greenish-blue glow of Gaia intensified as the figure smiled, reaching for the small girl's seeking hand. Gaz felt herself swathed in incredible power, then everything faded to white.
Far, far above the lazily rolling Earth, GIR stared unhappily out the window of the base. A faint whine of expectancy forced itself out of his vocal circuits. From up here, he could see a dark line tracing across the globe, heading swiftly and surely towards its apex. The base computer observed with bored indifference that "Within seconds the point of convergence will be reached." GIR looked worriedly up at the ceiling, and the computer sighed. "The bad stuff will happen," it explained.
"We gotta save Master!" GIR cried, pointing urgently. A loud gameshow-like buzzer sounded. "Negative. The base has no means of locomotion in an orbital environment," the computer told him. GIR thought hard. "What about the ship!?" he persisted, amazed and proud of his own brilliance. The computer scoffed audibly. "The Voot Cruiser was blown up. Duh."
GIR wailed in fresh agony and pressed his small metal face to the cold glass. No more Earth. No more Master Zim. No more Scary Monkey Show! Everything he loved would be gone! Well, except for his piggy, it was right there on the floor beside him, staring blankly upwards. Poor Piggy, he obviously didn't understand what was going on. GIR lifted Piggy into his arms and hugged him. Piggy was too young to understand that they could do nothing but watch the Earth's doom.
As he detected the arcing slice of darkness nearing the end of it's journey, GIR waved tearfully to the sleepy-looking world below. "Goodbye. Goodbye Earth! I liked you as more than a friend!" he choked, clutching the blissfully naive Piggy tightly.
GIR's photoreceptors blinked. Wait. What was that light? A few strange rays of sparkling luminance shone out of the closing band of blackness. Was this the beginning of the wave of badness that would kill everything? GIR stared, fascinated. Was the end of the world supposed to be so.. pretty? Engaging a magnified view of the goings-on down on the surface blasted the robot back a few feet more from the surface of the window, but provided him with a much better view. The gloomy fog seemingly simmered slightly. It roiled and bucked almost as if in pain, struggling to close around the narrow beam of light that appeared to be no more than a centimeter in diameter.
"What's happening?" GIR squeaked nervously. After a few tense seconds of analytical silence, the brusque voice of the computer spoke up, sounding equally stunned. "Unknown. Insufficient data at this time."
The electronic eyes of the SIR unit and the Base computer were the only witnesses as the light widened, forcing the darkly malevolent energy back. It fought desperately, with blind anger at being unable to achieve its goal so close to victory. As it struggled, it struck out, biting deeply into the brilliance and forcing all the hateful venom it could into its foe. The light was unaffected. All the animosity that one person could summon and empower was nothing to the living essence of an entire planet. The radiance saw its opening and flooded the dark, overwhelming and absorbing it, even as it tried to flee back the way it had come. There was nowhere for Gaz's creation to go. Finally, it was forced to surrender entirely, fading away with the miraculous light just before the sun began to peer concernedly over the horizon.
GIR retracted his telescopic vision and gave a concerned yelp. "THEY'RE GOOOOOONE!" he screamed, throwing himself to the floor and pounding his small metal hands and feet into the tile. "A-Actually, they're not.." the computer interrupted. "Sensors detect Master Zim, very much alive, along with the entire plant, insect, and animal population." Before GIR could ask another question, the computer answered it for him also. "Yes, and the human population, too. All 6,283,515,578 of them. Oops, make that 579. Mrs. Matthei down the block just had a baby girl."
GIR shrieked joyfully. "I GET TO PLAY WIT' THE BABY!!!!!"
The three of them waited at the P.E.G. generator station for hours. Long enough for dawn to come to their disaster-prone city. Long enough for someone to notice the smoke still rising from the facility and think to call 911, after looking up the number. Long enough for an ambulance to arrive, and paramedics to forcibly sedate Professor Membrane in order to drag him away from the building, Dib in tow.
Still, Zim waited. Dib had charged him with waiting for the girl-sibling to return from wherever she'd gone, however she'd done it. But there was still no sign of her, save a shed strand or two of purple hair. Zim shook his head and turned away from the domed building. It was a shame, but good soldiers were sometimes lost in battle to serve the greater good. He inclined his head for a moment, paying the girl's memory tribute before marching resolutely in the direction that the ambulance had gone. Was it a moment's fancy brought on by the long, exhausting day he'd endured, or was the air a little purer today? The sky a little less hazed by pollution? Zim shook his head. He had to be imagining things. As soon as he had reported his opinion that Gaz was not coming back to the Dib-creature, he would get some quality down-time back at the..
Zim stopped mid-stride, and stared up at the sky. His base was up THERE, wasn't it? Hm. That was going to be a problem. A quick check-in with the computer reassured him. Everything was in fine working order. Almost certainly Dib or his father would be able to come up with something to retrieve it. They owed him, after all! The base was safe enough for the moment. The irken tucked his communicator away in his pak and fished out his spare disguise. Those fools at the human hospital would never suspect that the great and mighty Invader Zim walked through their midst! Zim strode off on his way, humming a merry tune.
His fantastic brain had directed him to enter through the door marked "Emergency". After all, any business of Zim was bound to be of pressing importance. As he entered, he looked about the abandoned waiting room. Odd. From the television, he had learned that humans were incredibly prone to inflicting self-injury. A dark-haired college student sat at the recessed window labeled "sign in, please". 'Strange name, even for a human,' Zim thought. "HEY! HEY! Down here! HEY! Desk slave!" he shouted, trying to get the man's attention.
As he jumped up and down waving, he was nearly run down by a trauma team that burst in through the outer doors, carrying a very light-seeming gurney. "We've got an emergency, here!" the woman heading the group shouted to the startled aide sitting at the desk. The young man grabbed for his paperwork and followed them, perplexing Zim. With no other clue where to go for assistance, he followed their voices down the corridor.
"Where is everyone tonight, Kevin?" "They left." "Say what?" "Like I said, about half an hour ago, they all pretty much just. got up and left. They all claimed they were fine now, whatever that means." "Weird, man." "You're telling me. It's not every day you see a guy's arm spontaneously heal a compound fracture. Okay, who have we got here?" "No name yet. A couple out for a walk found the kid laying in the driveway of a house out in the 'burbs. When they couldn't rouse her for anything, they got scared and called us." "Oo-kay.. So.. what's up with her?" "No clue yet. Good respiration, strong pulse.." There was a faint buzzing sound for a few moments. "..and the 'gram says she's got more than adequate brain activity. The only symptom I can put a solid handle on is fatigue." "Wonder what happened to our Miss Jane Doe?"
Zim peeked into the room, glaring at the humans each in turn for ignoring him before his eyes caught sight of the small form on the bed. "That is no 'Jane the female deer'!" he cried, "That is Gaz!"