Doom Witch
By Julie Danskin

Author's Note: Hey peeps. Sorry it's been so long, but my computer was down. Hard disk error. Anyhoo, I've got a new one and even though I don't have my Zim files anymore at least I've got them on the net. Don't eat me please! I'm sorry, but there was nothing I could do! Anyway, here's the next chapter!

Chapter 30: Not you, never you

By now, Zim was more than slightly frantic about Jed not being there, and what the evil Tak was doing to her. In fact, he was so frantic that he decided drastic action should be taken. The thing was, however, Zim was scared that Tak may hurt Jed if he crashed into her base personally, so he thought for a while about how this unfortunate matter could be avoided.

After much deliberation, the answer finally came to him, and so trusting and naïve was he that he was not aware that they too hated him. These people he was going to seek help from were, of course, the Almighty Tallest, and we already know what kind of thing they are going to say to Zim, don't we? Yes, we do . . .

"IIIINCOMMIIING TRANSSMIIISSSIOOON FROM EEEAAARTH!" the over-exaggerating transmission detecting Irken guy announced to his leaders sitting on their luxurious thrones behind him, sucking on their brain freezers with uninterrupted mirth . . . until the transmission came in, of course.

"Who from?" Purple moaned, "We've got so many Irkens on that stupid little ball now . . . Zim . . . Jed . . . Tak . . . who's the other one . . . ?"

"Your sister," Red sneered back at his dopey comrade.

"Oh yeah. Fia."

Rolling his superior eyes in their sockets, the Red Almighty Tallest nodded in consent for the transmission to be cleared. As soon as the exaggerating transmission detecting Irken guy did this, a large green blob appeared on the screen, which soon revealed to be Zim screaming into the television.

"AAAAAAAAARGH!" squealed the purple Tallest in shock. GIR popped up in front of his master and screamed right back at his leaders/makers/nasty peoples before popping back down again and running off giggling with the other SIR unit the Tallests' recognised to be Jed's robot. The slightly wonky one. In the background, Purple pointed out Fia, who was hovering above the ground with her hands clasped in front of her. Zim noticed his leaders' attention from him wavering so he desperately started dancing to draw all concentration onto his bizarre movements.

"Zim, what ARE you doing?" Red demanded, and Zim abruptly stopped his absurd dancing ritual and straightened out his tunic, saluting his leaders messily before beginning his maddened plea:

"Please, my Tallest. Tak has come back to Earth trying to STEAL MY MAGNIFICENT PLAN from me once more! SHE SHALL NOT SUCCEEEEED! But wait! There's more! Invader Jed . . . the young Gemini of Tak . . . she's being held prisoner by her sister in Tak's new base. I've done some research, my Tallest, and I can say that it's an EVIL GIANT ICECREAM STAND . . . " he paused for breath and dramatic effect, "OF DOOOOOM!"

"Oh no," the Red Tallest mourned expressively once he had taken in the information. (in fact I'm being sarcastic, Red was in fact ALSO being sarcastic and didn't actually mean it).

"Oh yes, how very terrible," Purple continued, "you must be distraught."

"WELL! I'll live . . . but I need my . . . uh . . . ally! Yes! I need my ally back! But I need your help, my clever, sly Tallest! You must help me formulate a cunning plan!" Zim was beginning to think perhaps there was hope after all, his leaders seemed so sympathetic!

"Um, yes. We must do something to help you get back your . . . ally. Zim," Red enthused not very enthusiastically.

There was a long, dragged out pause. Behind Zim, Fia shook her head wearily. She had known long before this moment that there was no chance the Tallest would help her friend. She suspected they might even be in on it. Thinking on this matter, the more sure she was that this was the base. But she didn't say anything, because she knew Zim wouldn't listen to a word she said.

After a while, Zim spoke: "So, uh . . . what are you going to do?" he asked innocently, his red eyes wide and hopeful.

"What are we . . . what are we going to "do", did you say, Zim?" Purple replied, glancing sideways at his partner while feeling uneasy under his sister's cold stare.

"Yes! Yes, your cunning plan. I hate to rush you, my Tallest, but it really is a matter of life and death! We must do all we can to rescue Jed from the slimy claws of Tak . . . the . . . yak!" Zim expressed with real enthusiasm. Fia floated over to him and placed a reassuring claw on his shoulder, knowing it wouldn't mean much . . . it was more to comfort herself that Zim.

"Our . . .cunning . . . plan . . . "

"Yes. But it really does have to be very cunning, My Tallest. Perhaps . . . as cunning as a fox who has just graduated with a degree in cunning from the University of Cunning?" Zim suggested.

The Tallest looked at one another.

"I'm sorry, Zim, we're really in a no-win situation here. We will give you all our sympathy but we can't waste any cunningness of your proportion on something that won't really bother us in the long run. Sorry!" the Red Tallest shrugged mercilessly, and gave the go-ahead to sign off.

"NO!" Zim yelled, "NO! NO! It doesn't even have to be a fox!" The screen went black. "It could be a . . . a badger . . . or a stoat . . . "

Sitting down on the floor where he was, Zim buried his face in his hands and let out a loud, angry growl. Fia, however, stood, staring at the black screen with a feeling of utter loathing in her stomach as she thought of her brother and his friend as complete bastards.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Meanwhile, back at the ranch (well, giant ice-cream stand), Tak was pondering over ways in which to turn Jed against Zim. Her Gemini was very much in love with the Irken disgrace, that was evident, but there had to be some way in which Tak could change this. Although a cunning plan had not yet formulated, she had a feeling she could perhaps get an idea from the Tallest.

Back on the Massive (not the ranch), the Tallest heard the announcy guy say his bit all exaggerated-like, and rolled their eyes.

"If it's Zim, turn it off," Red ordered, "I wouldn't give him a cunning plan if he was the first one to set foot on the planet Garofsakwal and saved my mother from the nasty pointed tooth of Bulldozer."

"It's from a different location on Earth, sir. Something to do with a frozen food . . . "

"Ah! That'll be Tak! Yes, yes, send transmission!" Red agreed to this one, he was now interested in what was going on. When Tak's face appeared on screen, Purple woke up from his little annoyed trance he was in from Red turning off Zim's amusing pleas too early, and nodded a greeting.

"My Tallest," Tak addressed in her nasty evil voice, "I've successfully captured my sister, but there's a slight problem in getting her to hate Zim's guts."

"I never had any bother," Purple offered.

"Shh!" Red silenced his goofy chum and offered his own advice, "Hey! You! Transmission guy! Send this video in a file to Tak's computer!" the leader of the Irken Empire chucked a small disc over to the front, and using the super fast Whizz Whizz technology, the file was over there in no time, and Tak opened it.

The file erupted onto the screen, and there appeared a tree. It was dark and it was raining, and there was a girl sitting by the tree. She had her arms wrapped round her, trying to keep heat in. Then a figure appeared behind her. The girl, who Tak recognised as Gaz, leapt to her feet in surprise.

"Zim!" she cried, and then the figure, who must have been Zim, gave Gaz his jacket to wrap round herself. The girl sat back down, and Zim watched her. The girl sighs heavily and says, "What are you doing here? How did you know where I was?"

Zim sits down beside her. "I was walking," he says, "I bumped into Dib, who was looking for you. He'd seen you going into the field. We split up, and it looks like I found you first. I'll just let Dib know that I've . . . " He was cut off by Gaz grabbing his arm.

"No . . . we should talk . . . " she hisses, and Zim narrows his eyes at her but nods, and she jumps to her feet again, and turns to face him. Zim looks at her strangely. She pulls him to his feet and he steps away, "I've wanted to speak to you for so long," she says meaningfully.

Zim doesn't reply and just looks at her. "Dib said you tried to kill yourself," he says quietly. Gaz nods, and wipes her face with the back of the sleeve on the jacket. He just looks at her.

Suddenly she pushes forward and wraps her arms around him tightly. Zim looks shocked for a while but soon wraps his arms around her neck. They stand like that for a while, Gaz cries into Zim's shoulder. She stops and raises her head.

"Jed . . . " she whispers, "who is she?"

"She's . . . " Zim starts, but shakes his head, "it doesn't matter. Not now. I don't want to talk about it."

"Are you two . . . ?" Gaz asks. Zim nods but she shrugs and kisses him passionately. Zim pulls away and stares at her in horror. He backs away. Gaz seems angry, and throws Zim's coat on the ground, which he picks up and puts on himself.

He speaks into the camera about finding Gaz then looks back at her before walking away. Tak stared at the footage with an eyebrow raised. Interesting, but not enough . . . but wait . . .

After a few steps he stops and runs back to Gaz, gets a grab hold of her and kisses her. He pulls away again looking shocked at himself, looks at Gaz one last time and turns his back on her, running away.

"That's fantastic!" Tak exclaimed. "I will show this to Jed, and then it will be no problem! Thank you, My Tallest! How did you get it, can I ask?"

"Sure you can!" Purple laughed cheesily, "We love bragging!"

Red rolled his eyes; "Zim activated a communication device on that night, which has a mini camera in it. He carried it with him and this is the footage we received. We were very entertained that night. We hope it is of use to you. Now we have to go. It's time for our elevenses!"

"Goodbye my Tallest!" Tak saluted, then switched off the transmission screen and went through to show the film to her sister.

~*~FLASHBACK~*~

Jed nearly had him, she could feel it, but then he caught her eye and she felt herself weaken. By the time she caught herself, a split second later, it was too late and Zim had her pinned under him, flinching with his shoulder but keeping her down steadily. He had a look of anger in his eyes but she didn't blame him, really.

"I'm sorry," they said at the same time, and then almost smiled at each other. They were apologising for different reasons. Jed was sorry she had betrayed his trust, or non-trust, or whatever they had, and Zim was sorry because now he was going to have to kill her, wasn't he? There wasn't any other way to do things.

"I'm sorry things worked out this way," she murmured.

"I'm sorry too," Zim agreed, the hand around her throat loosening its grip.

"I-I'm sorry because I betrayed you."

"I'm sorry I have to do this."

Jed nodded and closed her eyes, waiting for his hands to tighten around her neck while she suffocated and died, never knowing where her sister was, never seeing her again, never being decorated as an Invader, never seeing the end of Operation Impending Doom 2, never doing a lot of things she wanted to do in her life. She had lived over a hundred years, fifteen in Irken years and would never be proven stronger than Tak, whom she had rivaled and loved all her life.

When Zim said "I'm sorry I have to do this", she thought he meant kill her, but instead he moved closer despite the burning pain in his shoulder hurting him, and he moved his mouth towards hers, and they kissed, both of them moving into a world that they couldn't afford to be in, but both wanted to.

He took his hands from round her neck and pulled her up so they were sitting, her arms around his neck and his around her waist, and they were just kissing and kissing until the Computer began to sob with emotion and put them off.

~*~ PRESENT~*~

When she saw the kiss, Jed let out a loud moan of misery. She at once formed tears in her eyes but forced them back, staring at her sister with nothing other than sheer malice.

"You staged this! This isn't real!" she accused, pointing a maddened finger at Tak, who had let her sister out of the cage.

"It is."

"No! No, no, no, no, no, no, no! He wouldn't do that, it's in the past!"

"Zim doesn't know what he should or shouldn't do. He does what pleases him."

Jed stood still for a moment, watching the film over and over again. He watched Gaz and Zim press themselves together as if life itself depended on it. She noted the date in the corner. It was the night Zim had stormed out on her calling her a traitor. Yet he had betrayed her.

Filled with rage, Jed moved to storm out of the base without her disguise. Tak stopped her and made her put on her human outfit. Tak did likewise and took MiMi and her sister out into the sunny day, Jed practically running ahead of them while the two exiles followed closely behind her.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

The door was blasted open. Jed stood in the doorway, her eyes full of shiny, wet tears. The robotic parents were shot to bits. Fia, MAX and a giggly GIR, who found the robot mother with her head lolling to the side to be very amusing, blocked Tak and MiMi, who stayed where they were quite happily as onlookers.

Zim stood in shock looking at Jed standing before him with such hurt and anger on her face.

"How could you, Zim?" she demanded, her voice no longer soft, but high and mournful, "How could you do this to me?"

"Jed . . . do what?" Zim asked, confused.

"You kissed Gaz, the night you found Tak talking to me! You kissed her out under that tree! You . . . you betrayed ME!"

"NO!"

"YES!"

"No . . . how did you know . . . how did you found out about this?"

"I don't know! But when I see a video of you and Gaz I don't care where it came from! Or is that unreasonable?"

"Jed . . . "

"NO!"

Zim tried to take her in his arms, but she stepped back from him, almost with fear. He shook his head helplessly.

"Please, Jed. I never meant to hurt you . . . "

Jed screamed and lunged herself at Zim, knocking him to the ground, her trusty gun to her head. She had a flashback of when she had Zim at her mercy back when they had first met.

~*~FLASHBACK~*~

She pressed the gun right against his forehead and tightened the pressure on the trigger, but Zim cried out.

"Wait a second!" he ordered, and she looked very surprised. GIR stood motionless, MAX poised and ready to strike. Dib just looked on, his eyes wide and terrified.

"What?" Jed snapped, angry enough, "I may not have a base but I can still destroy you!"

"And be stranded here?" Zim queried, and Dib suddenly noticed his plan, and his heart skipped a beat.

"Wh-what?" this Invader may be very confident, but she was still young and inexperienced.

"Think about it, if YOUR device is broken, and your Voot and my Voot are both in need for repair, then WHAT HOPE IN THIS UNIVERSE have you of possibly having any resources to take over this planet?" Zim analysed, but she still looked confused so he obliged, if it meant he may get to stay alive, "How are you going to operate the repair bay and all the equipment if you don't have a base?"

"I'll - I'll use yours!" Jed laughed, but Zim shook his head, chuckling at her slightly. She didn't like that, and tipped his chin up with the gun now to his throat. Zim swallowed and carried on.

"My Computer obeys my voice only. The commands of any other life form will be denied without exception, unless I program the Computer to accept those commands." Zim saw the look in her eye, "And I am not going to allow my base to work under your orders."

Invader Jed looked completely devastated, "Well, what . . . what do I do?"

Zim was surprised, as was Dib. Neither had expected her to ask Zim, whom she had come to kill, for help. Yet here it was, and Zim looked both happy he wasn't going to die and also quite annoyed that this Irken Invader that had been so sure and confident minutes before was now faltering.

"Well, you could either kill me, and remain stranded here, trying to use one of the human shuttles to get back to the Armada, which I very much doubt these slow in technology beings' spaceships are capable of, or we could come to a compromise." Zim looked at her, letting her know he would much more prefer the latter.

Invader Jed nodded and swallowed, still not lowering her gun. Her SIR Unit giggled briefly, and GIR joined in with a chorus of manic laughter. Dib supposed this was robot bonding. Zim stared hard at the intruding Irken, and she bore her eyes right back into his. Suddenly, she chuckled.

"I'd love to hear what Tak would do," she murmured, "She was always so sure, and I'm . . . "

~*~PRESENT~*~

"Curse you, Zim!" she spat, and dropped the gun to the ground, sobbing gently in his lap. This was when Tak started to get a bit annoyed, thinking her plan wasn't working out as well as it had first seemed to be.

"I'm sorry . . . I didn't . . . It just happened . . . Please don't hate me . . . I never meant to hurt you, Jed," Zim said honestly, his manic personality fading for a while. He reached up to touch her face, and they looked each other in the eye, the red lingering on red, "I'd never hurt you. Not you . . . not ever . . . "

Jed lifted her face to his, "Then tell me why you kissed her. Tell me why you went back to taste her. And just answer me honestly for once. Please."

Zim nodded and lowered his eyes, "Me and Gaz have history. I . . . I still have feelings for her, Jed."

~*~FLASHBACK~*~

"Anyone would think you were a doctor," she joked, still looking into his eyes. He didn't say anything in reply, and rolled the rest of her sleeve up, revealing her tattered green skin. Already it had started to heal itself. Zim started from her shoulder and held it there as the healing rays started mending her arm. Jed sighed, and he glanced at her quickly, then looked away again, "Look, Zim, you didn't . . . you could have let your robot finish. You didn't have to help me . . . "

He was looking at her now, the healing contraption moving down, down her arm, his hand leading the way down like he was stroking her arm. His touch made her shiver, or was that his eyes boring into her? He blinked, and she blinked, and they moved closer and closer, Zim tilted his head to the right and she tilted hers. Just when their mouths were almost touching, Zim came to his senses and pulled back, accidentally brushing against her arm, making Jed flinch.

"Sorry," he mumbled, his eyes on her arm again. Her arm was fine down to her elbow now, but the rest of it would take a little longer as it was worse. "Jed, who sent you? To kill me, to take over my mission. Are you a Rogue Invader?"

Jed remembered to never say who had sent her, "I'm not at liberty to say, Zim. But I will kill you, I . . . have to."

"Why?"

"That's just the way things are."

"It's not your place to avenge Tak for her."

"It's not . . . it's not about that. Well, it is, but it's other things too. It's complicated Zim, and we promised we wouldn't get personal. It's business."

"So you'll feel nothing if you manage to kill me?" Zim challenged. Jed didn't say anything.

"I have a job to do, I have to keep my promise, no matter how much I . . . um . . . never mind." Jed stumbled, "The fact is that I have to kill you sooner or later, because we can't afford to get close, Zim. I can't afford to know or care about you. It's better if you hate me, like before."

"Why are you so sure you'll kill me?"

"Because I have to."

Zim laughed, finishing off her wrist and hovering the thing over her hand now, "You know, I could defeat you like a single raspberry in a duckpond, Jed. Remember the duckpond. I will, if it comes to it."

"It will come to it," Jed promised, "And I'm not going to say anything else on the matter. The Voot will be repaired soon enough and I can call for another Drill A House device, and you'll be . . . you'll be history."

Zim nodded, and neither of them said anything else until he sat back, returning the device, and said, "Okay. That's done."

~*~ PRESENT ~*~

Tak stopped struggling against the door guards and smiled nastily in Zim's direction. He caught her gaze and glared at her horribly. Jed pushed herself off of Zim's lap and stood up. He did likewise.

"Jed . . . " Zim tried to go after her, but Jed shook her head. She didn't say anything, she just turned her back on him and moved to the door. Fia tried to convince her back, GIR waved goodbye to MAX who followed his mistress out of the door. Tak lingered for another victorious movement before bowing her head and sweeping after her sister, leaving the house in devastation.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

A/N: Dunnnn durrun dun! Sorry it's not very long, it was just a chapter to prove I was back in business, you know? So, get reviewing and hopefully the next chapter will be up very quickly!

"Eyeholes in a paper bag, greatest night I ever had" - Nancy Boy, Placebo.