Disclaimer: I own nothing! Nothing, I tell you! Invader Zim is the brainchild of the almighty Jhonen Vasquez and his army of winged monkeys.

The Masks We Wear
Chapter 3: So Where Is Red?

Purple cracked his eyes open slowly. What a weird dream! The Tallest stretched - or at least, he tried to. Someone had tied him up! Purple struggled against his bonds. He had to get help! His struggles dislodged a cold cloth which had been laying across his forehead.

As the cloth slid down his face, reason stepped in and Purple paused to assess his situation. First - and most imporant - he was still breathing. Though he'd been out cold and helpless, the assassin hadn't killed him. Why? Not that Purple was complaining, mind. He just couldn't see how it would benefit her to keep him alive.

Purple again tested his bonds. He definitely wasn't going anywhere, but he wasn't uncomfortable either. His captor just didn't act like she wanted him dead. Glancing around, Purple relaxed another notch. He was still on the Massive, still in Red's room.

Purple sighed and laid back against the pillows. Tied up in a bed with a gorgeous female nearby... Purple had fantasized about something like this ever since he'd gotten that first hormone burst which initiated him into manhood. Yet in his fantasies he'd always been the one in charge; now he was helpless.

"If you promise not to scream, I'll take the gag out." Purple's antennae twitched at what was most definitely the woman's voice. Managing to roll over, Purple watched the woman. She lounged across an armchair, wrapped up in a crimson robe. Very slowly Purple nodded.

The woman got up from the chair in one fluid movement and crossed the floor to the bed. She kept her hands away from her sides - a sign which Puprle took to mean, "Look. No weapons." Yet as she approached, Purple still had to squelch an instinct to cringe away. Slim fingers worked at the gag and soon Purple's mouth was free.

Oh, sure, Purple did think about screaming. He could easily get the guards back in the room. But the woman could still kill him before the guards arrived. And so Purple kept his promise. When he did open his mouth, all that came out was, "Where's Red?"

The woman sighed and began to rub her temples. "Can't you think of any better questions? He's dead, Purple." The woman's lips quirked into a tiny smile. "Not that it should matter since you never knew him."

A soft growl rumbled out of Purple's throat. This was getting ridiculous! "If you don't stop talking in riddles..." Purple never finished his threat, though. He was, after all, not in a good position to be making threats.

The woman merely held up her hands apologetically. "Sorry, sorry!" Dropping her antennae back, she stretched out on the bed, laying her head on Purple's chest. "It's just... All of this has been my secret for so long. I know I've got to explain it to you since you've found me out, but that doesn't make this any easier. You've always been the last person I ever thought I'd be telling this to." The woman paused to smirk. "Because I always figured you'd be one of the first to go running to the Control Brains."

Purple ground his teeth silently. How hard could it be for this woman to just give him her life story? Unless... Unless she was having to make it up on the spot! Ha! The assassin wanted to win his trust, huh? Well then Purple would just expose her! "So tell me... If Red's been dead for years and years, then who have I been ruling with?"

"Me," came the woman's simple reply.

'Yeah, right,' Purple scoffed in his head. He would have noticed if his co-ruler had been a woman! It's not one of those easy-to-hide things. "Maybe you need to start from the beginning, lady."

"Delan," the woman murmured. "My name is Delan." She slid off the bed and went to the dresser where she spent a few moments rummaging through the top drawer. When she returned to the bed, she held a photo in front of Purple's face.

Red's face smiled out from the photo. By his side was a crimson-eyed woman in a high-collar coat. Both Red and the woman only had eyes for each other. And even though Purple couldn't see anything of the woman's face beyond her eyes, he could tell she was smiling.

Delan absently traced a finger over the photo. "Red and I were... very close. He was a soldier and I was a nurse. Red was always pushing himself during training and ended up in sickbay. And I helped Dr. Gizmo patch him up. Then one day he asked me out for dinner. And after that we got closer and closer..."

Purple kept a close watch on Delan's face. He always prided himself on being able to distinguish truth from falsehood - though being in politics he always saw more lies. But he couldn't read Delan's reactions as she stared at the photo. Her face was the same carefully cultivated neutral that Purple himself always used in diplomatic meetings.

Delan grew silent for the space of a few heartbeats, and Purple would've given anything to know what was going on in her head right at that moment. When at last she spoke again, tears began dripping down her cheeks. "Then Red got the word that he was to go away... To invade a faraway planet... I... It was foolish, but I snuck along."

With each word, the blank mask was stripped away, revealing the raw emotion underneath. Almost against his will, Purple began to believe Delan. "And Red never came back from the mission?"

"I saw him die," Delan whispered, antennae laying flat against the back of her head. "He died trying to give me time to get back to the ship. I swore I would avenge him one day, and so I took his place and told the Control Brains that I was the one who died." Laughing bitterly, Delan added, "I had plenty of time on the long trip back from that backwater dirtball to plan everything out."

"What planet was it?"

"Earth."