Author's Note: Hey there, thanks for reading my story. I think I'm not focusing on Zim or Dib enough. If you think I should focus more on the stars of the show, or if you think it's fine the way it is, leave a review and let me know, because, after all, I can't fix it if I don't know it's broken. ^_^ Chapter 7: When they shoot you.

Jarka sat quietly in his command chair. Within the hour Zim's base would be stripped of any usable material, scanned for information concerning Darkness Flame, and then the rest would be destroyed. Jarka Grinned.

            With a small beep a view screen emerged from his Pak, coming to rest a few feet in front of his face. The pitch of the beeping informed him he had an incoming call from the lab on Deck C.

Lid.

"What's on your mind, Lid?"

            The view screen showed only static.

            "Lid?"

            Jarka pushed a button on the screen, and the communicator within his Pak tried to redial to Lid. The call was met with more static. The view screen returned swiftly into his Pak as Jarka turned towards his chief technician.

            "Send an Engineer down to the Lab. Something's wrong with Lid's Pak."

            As the technician turned, Jarka added, almost as an afterthought.

            "Send a surgeon, too."

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            Dib sat on the cold steel bench, his legs pulled up to his chest. Didn't the stupid thing ever stop talking? Dib didn't have a watch, but it must have been close to three hours since their imprisonment, and Zim had not shut up since.

            "Fools! Ha! Do they think they can fight the Irken Empire? Ha! That's the most pathetic thing I've ever heard! The Tallest will wipe the floor with them! Why, even without their most prized Invader! It won't be long now… the Armada will arrive, they'll pound this ship into space vapor! AHAHAHAHA!"

            The alien began one of his trademark evil laughs. It had reached peak crescendo when Dib interrupted.

            "But… if they blow this ship into space vapor, won't you be killed too?"

            The alien laugh stopped immediately.

            "Ah… yes… yes, I suppose I would."

            The two stared at each other for about seven minutes, before Zim began his revised rant.

            "They'll send in the Royal Guards to capture the ship! Flying and shooting and lasers and HORRIBLE SCREAMING DOOM!"

            Zim laughed evilly.

            "THEN! Then, Dib-Human, they'll get to the detention cells and rescue yours truly. You'll be shot, of course. I hope you like being vaporized, human. Because that's exactly what you'll be!"

            Dib simply stared back at the alien, a look that rested somewhere between dismay and confusion resting on his face.

            "You know… when they shoot you."

            Zim appeared to have finally run out of steam. It was a good thing, too. Dib's ears were starting to bleed.

            "With the laser."

            Dib sighed happily and sank back against the wall. Finally, a little peace and quiet. Now maybe he could think of an escape plan…

            "RIGHT IN YOUR BIG, STUPID HEAD!"

            "My Head's Not Big!"

            "IT IS HUGE! IT SWALLOWS GALAXIES WITH ITS… HUGENESS!"

            "Shut Up!"

            "I'm sorry, Dib. I can't hear you with all the wind howling through your BIG EMPTY HEAD!"

            The guards posted on Detention block didn't care to break up the ensuing fistfight.

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            Treaka walked down the hallway towards the lab, medical droid in tow. Every time something went wrong, everyone came whining to her. Even the captain. For the love of Irk, did they think she didn't have anything better to do? Treaka grinned at the thought. Actually, she didn't. The door to the lab slid open and Treaka stepped gingerly in.

            "Lid? Jarka says there's some-"

            Her words hung in the air, cold and ominous, cut short by the sight before her. The stasis tube on her left had been smashed open, shards of glass and sickening green goo littering the floor. Tables had been overturned, instruments were scattered across the floor. Amidst the broken glass and scattered scientific debris, were the bodies.

            Three of them.

            Treaka recognized two of them as the ships scientific team. They were sprawled across the floor like discarded toys. The third was Lid, propped against a large computer console, his eyes half closed.

He wasn't moving.

            Immediately the medical droid swooped into the room, spinning and beeping as it scanned the Paks of the three Irkens. Of the three, only one was reporting any life signs, and those were faint. The droid hovered to a stop above its patient; it's engine whirring as it began a deeper assessment of the patient's condition.

            The laboratory onboard the Majestic was small as labs go, about the size of a two-car garage on Earth. Anything larger would have merely been wasted space. Designed primarily to aid in the research of alien life and technology that the ship encountered on its mission, the lab was equipped with a single stasis tube and a two person scientific staff. Biological life forms would be placed in the stasis tube and studied for natural weaknesses and immunities. There wasn't any protocol for dealing with the aliens afterwards, mainly because none had ever survived the testing.

            Alien weapons were tested in an isolated chamber off the main lab. They were tested for durability, destructive power, and general coolness. If they proved their worth, they would be sent to the ship's cargo hold to await reverse engineering in a real lab when the ship returned to Irk. Most were tossed overboard after testing, however. There were few species in the galaxy that could construct weapons that proved a match for Irken technology.

            At least in the eyes of the Irkens.

As the emotional shock wore off, paranoia set in. Treaka spun around, her spider legs extending to form a quad laser. She backed slowly into the room; nervously glancing around her. If whatever they had been in that stasis cell had broken out, and it sure as Hell looked that way, then it was probably still close… maybe still in the room.

In the northeastern corner of the room (assuming the front of the ship was north, of course) there was a loud crash, followed by a small explosion. Treaka screamed and whirled around, firing her quad laser at the source of the noise. The fallen memory bank exploded in a thunderous boom, sending shrapnel flying everywhere. A large piece caught Treaka in her right temple, sending the engineer crashing into a heap on the floor; her spider legs fell limp underneath her as violet blood gushed from the wound. An audio transmission echoed from her Pak.

"Treaka? What's going on? Weapons fire was reported in the lab. Is everything alright?"

The ensuing silence was deafening.

"Treaka?"

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            Twenty-Eight minutes later

Jarka stood beside the hospital bed, watching the doctor as worked. After several minutes of diligent examination, the doctor stood up, pulling off his purple examination gloves and disposing of them in a waste shoot.

                        "Well?"

            "Your friend should be alright. He lost a lot of blood but we've got him hooked up to the auto-doc, now. He'll be critical for a few days, of course, but that's normal for this kind of trauma."

            Jarka's face remained cold, his eyes narrow and piercing.

            "What about her?"

            "Lieutenant Treaka, Engineer. She's going to survive, more than likely, but that debris hit her pretty hard. They'll probably be some brain damage. Until she regains consciousness I couldn't tell you more."

            "The science team?"

            "Dead. Anemia."

            Jarka's eyes widened with surprise as he turned to face the doctor.

            "That's impossible. I was with the response team. There wasn't a drop of blood in the room." He looked at the limp form of the engineer, a tone of sadness in his voice.

"Except for hers."

"All I can tell you is that they died from loss of blood."

Jarka stared at the bodies in the medical bay.

"I'm going back to the lab. Maybe they found something new by now."

The door swooshed open as Jarka neared it. He cast a solemn glance at his unconscious friend, held it for a few seconds, and then left the medical bay.

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At that same moment, a heated debate was taking place across the cafeteria. The events of the past hour were explained, exaggerated, examined, dismissed, re-examined, and exaggerated even more, all between mouthfuls of rationed energy bars and gulps of Slurge. Various theories had surfaced about what was happening in the lab. They varied from transponder malfunctions to escaped alien prisoners killing off crewmembers one by one. Still, the general concession seemed to be that, whatever happened in the lab was definitely under control. (Although a few of the more paranoid members of third shift fully believed that they were going to die)

The debate stopped abruptly when the lights overhead cut out, leaving the cafeteria drenched in total darkness. The silence was broken as a ceiling grate clattered to the floor; it's sound echoing through the dead air.

Outside, the darkness was interrupted by flashes of light shining through the cracks in the cafeteria door, accompanying the high pitched shriek of laser blasts, the metallic tap of spiders legs striking the cold metal floor, orders being shouted above the hectic frenzy, and the piercing screams of the dying. For seven seconds the chaos lasted. Then, with a final, muffled scream, the flashing light stopped, and the room once again fell silent.