Chapter Five
Guillotine
-----------------
Zim's point of view for the entire duration of the final chapter.
-----------------
My cells are already healing me and the face of which Dib had struck five or six times. I sit up. A feeling of dizziness overcomes me and I sway gently, but regain my posture. Gir is on Dib's chest on the other side of huge long crater, using his fists. Why doesn't he use his ocular lasers? It would kill Dib instantly, eliminating the threat of which my now 'SIR' like assistant seems to see.
I don't want to see that. Even through Dib's beatings and hatred, I know, or at least hope, that he feels for me. I feel for him, and he would miss me, or my opposition toward him and this planet, if I left. If I could leave.
I would miss him.
I would miss him if Gir killed him.
I unsteadily get up and stumble along toward his form on the smashed road. I don't even realise the gaping chunk of street missing, and I fall down it's pointy, bumpy, concrete and earth strewn side, and I roll into the middle. I raise my upper body with my clawed hands, shaking slightly, and eventually get up and climb up the opposite side. All the time being burnt and pained from the hot linear crater, especially when my head hit the bottom. I make it back onto the road, and reach him. I pull Gir off of his frail, thin and human body. His shirt is torn and his trench coat lies a few feet away. His face is already bruising and blood is running from his mouth. His eyes are closed. I kneel down and listen for a breath.
He lives. I sigh with relief, my own sour, acidic breath escapes from my mouth, near his face. I turn my head and tell Gir to leave and wait inside the house. He salutes and does as he is told. It's the first time since I can properly remember, when he has shown even this level of loyalty- -and then my neck is seized. By Dib. He's conscious.
And his pathetically stick-like hands are crushing my frail neck, making no sense of the actual image. I claw at my neck, and fail to actually do anything. So, I then punch his eye.
It gets him off me. I fall back, gasping for air; he falls back clutching his eye. My melted gloves were covered in dirt, and small pieces of broken concrete. Even for me, that would hurt his naked eyes. I think briefly where his glasses are. He doesn't need them right now, seeing up close to fight is easy for him. But about a metre away and he can't see a thing.
I'm first to sit back up, and I scramble away from him. I don't want to hurt him. After all, he doesn't heal like I do. I eventually stand, and watch as he struggles to wipe away the grime and bits of dirt from his left eye. Hot dirt. Hot specks of diamond dust, against his naked eye. I can't stand here and watch, as I can easily see that he is in intense pain. I turn to run back to the house, and fetch cleaning liquid.
People are gathering now. Police, civilians, neighbourhood residents. This is going to get out of hand- -Shit.
I haven't stepped a foot in the opposite direction of Dib, and before me I see her. High above me, using her arachnid like Pak legs.
I stare, mouth open and hanging, my eyes wide as I gape at her face, full of anger, hate, writhing pain and the scar that I gave her. She looks just like I remember. I still look up at her, like when I knew her, on Irk, when I was small.
And I spy upon her own legs. I take a step back, the reaction of seeing her knees. I can't imagine what the fuck happened to her, but it's extremely recent, like someone took a sledge hammer and pounded her knee caps into a mushy pulp, but didn't tear the fabric of her leggings, so all the blood an mush collected in her bottom clothing, including her boots. It all drips on the hot road. Her breathing is raspy yet hard and menacing. In her hand she holds small laser pistol, which she slowly, shakily raises to point at my head.
I close my mouth.
I shut my eyes.
.....
And run.
.....
I open my eyes and I'm running into a crowd of people, who must think this is some street theatre or something, because they're cheering me, and I'm not wearing a disguise.
And even though I don't have them, I open my ears, and they're not cheering me, they screaming. And amongst all their ugly cries, I hear one, clear significant scream.
I was standing in front of Dib. She fired, and I ran, just in time to miss it. But missing me meant... She shot Dib.
Everything seems to fade away, but my grievance for the one person I could connect with, in a weird kind of way, does not last for long, as Dee is advancing upon me. The pistol is lying next to Dib, where she must have dropped it and her outstretched arms reach madly for me, as if they hunger to rip me apart. And as she speedily races to grab me, I stand on the spot, just in front of the crowd of people. I cannot do anything. The hate in her eyes, her horribly bloodshot eyes, in fact, bloody eyes, eyes covered in blood, make me stand where I am. Her mashed legs dangling, barely attached, probably because of her clothing, are flung back because of the speed of her race towards me. I raise my arms in front of my face instinctively, and turn my head o the right, shutting my eyes and clenching my jagged Irken teeth, waiting for the moment of impact.
And it all flashes back to me.
...........
THUD.
......
Tall metal buildings surround a pair a Irkens. One tall one, and one small one. This opening is akin to a cul-de-sac, but much more closer together. More like an alleyway, in between the towering metal structures. And at the end of this opening, is a circular area, containing a circular hatchway, which led into a sewer system, which, if followed for about a mile, would lead someone into the core building of the power supply for the whole northern hemisphere of a planet known only as Irk.
Looking closer, the two Irkens were arguing. The taller one, a female, spoke loudly and had an angry look on her beautiful face, devoid of any imperfections. She took her appearance as something that made her better than others, because she achieved a lot of attention from her beauty. The smaller one spoke quietly and kept looking around, in case anyone saw them. He was very small in height, and standing next to this other individual made him look tiny and minuscule. Nonetheless, they argued with eachother, as if the different ranks between them meant very little.
"Zim, this is wrong, we'll be executed for this, or worse, sent to Foodcourtia!" She shouted, a slight echo resounding off the metal walls. She continued "How did you ever think this would work!?" Her voice lowering in volume, only by a fragment, as she saw Zim's face clench as he heard the echo of her voice. "Dee, quieten yourself, or I will phase your mouth together! This mission requires stealth!" His arms flailing wildly, and his voice did almost the same at random points of speech. Giving him a completely eccentric, over- the-top look. "Need I remind you, female, that Tallest Miyuki gave us this mission, because of our obvious, and intense greatness!!" The last part making an echo, making him force his hands over his mouth.
"But Zim" Dee responded, shifting her weight "Why would the Almighty Tallest need us? How are we important to this 'mission'?"
"You question the Tallest!!!!" Zim jumped up, grabbed her standard issue shirt and screamed this into her face. She pushed him off of her, and he landed on his rear. He quickly stood back up.
"We are doing nothing wrong!" he said, looking back down the alley. "We are just... changing the ways that Miyuki asked us to infiltrate and seize the felons, inside the power supply. And we will not be sent to Foodcourtia, we will be honoured, and praised, and become kings!!" Dee gave him a confused look, and Zim coughed. "Um... sorta....Anyway, come on, we have to go now." She sighed and followed him to a circular hatch, at the end of the alley, which Zim opened. A sickening stench blasted from the hole, and both Zim and Dee covered their mouths and turned away from.
"Here, put this on!" Zim gasped, as two breathing masks were handed out from his Pak, on mechanical arms. The masks were put on, and Zim jumped in first, with a splash. Dee, reluctantly, followed, making a bigger splash. Using his Pak's mechanical legs, Zim reached up and closed the hatch.
Flash forward.
Zim walked through the waist high goopy water, and making sure that she couldn't hear him, he raised his left wrist to his mouth. A small communicator appeared, and Zim whispered into it.
"Yes, Irken City #2188 Police Enforcement? I would like to request a team of enforcers at the Power supply generator. Yes that's right, yes... yes! Get there right away! A brake in by protesters is about to happen in about thirty minutes! How do I know? uhhh...I'm tailing them, errr, undercover, as one of them. There's two of us. I'm the short one. The taller one is the leader...Got it? Go!" He ended the transmission and continued walking through the slush.
"Did you say something? Zim?" Zim froze, but only for about a millisecond, and kept walking normally... as normally as you can when you're wading through waste.
"Uh, yes.... I... was... talking to my...wrist journal! Yes, that's it. So that our courageous actions can be documented for the media!" He was very pleased with this lie. Zim loved to lie, even if most of them didn't sound too real.
"Oh..... okay.... how much further?" Dee didn't sound reassured, but she had faith in Zim. A faith no one else could possibly have. It was a faith that would cot her, and shape her future.
"Turn a left in about five minutes, and keep going straight.... keep going straight until you reach a ladder, then we go up it. And on to our fame and glory...."
"right... right...." Dee didn't feel right. Zim had been acting strange ever since she met him. But now, he had been acting stranger, as if he were hiding something. But she had her faith in him.
Flash forward.
"Zim! What's going on!?" Flood lights glared at her, as her arms were raised and her face a look of utter shock, she turned to see Zim standing behind her, with a look of pleased disappointment.
"Dee, please understand-"
"Understand what!?"
"Understand, that I, the almighty Zim, must do anything and everything to gain superiority. If I am not to grow, then I must grow my aspects, and my greatness. And Dee...." he got much closer to her, so that he was whispering, "...You were always better, but with this little stunt, you're now a common criminal, and I'm the one who stopped you from plunging half a planet into darkness....." he walked away from her, her face now was a mask of hatred, one that she would use many a time from now on. "Take her away!" Zim commanded.
But before the Enforcers could reach her, she spun round and jumped at Zim in anger. She had never been betrayed before, no one had the heart to do something like this to her, she just looked too nice and beautiful to hurt. But Zim was different. Zim hungered power. He wanted the authority to send legions into battle, at the mere flick of his wrist, anyone would do as he would say and fear and love him. They would do anything for him, and Zim wanted this more than anything in the universe. He needed power, and if he had to betray someone who had befriended him, even with the height difference, then he would do this. Zim would conquer everything, everyone and everywhere. Betrayal.... was nothing. He would be a hero, and the rest would be simple.
She grabbed Zim and scooped him up, due to his smallness, she could easily hold him in one arm. He just sighed and his Pak opened and released his mechanical legs, which poked at her body, and forced her to drop him. She jumped back at him, but he jumped right over her, his mech.-legs extending, she grabbed one while passing. They both landed on the cold metal floor. The machines humming and working in the background, almost muted out what Zim did next. From his Pak, he received two items. A blaster pistol, and a small knife. He looked at her, and said "Sorry Dee." He shot her head.
He then plunged the knife into his abdomen.
When the Enforcers finally arrived to them both, they saw what Zim wanted them to see. A struggle ending with Zim being wounded by a knife, but not actually killed. And Dee, who may or may not make it. The laser went straight through her head, but missed her brain, and just below the eye. Her jaw was mangled, but with modern Irken hospital, she would most likely live, but with tremendous scarring.
And it would all be down to Zim as the hero to say: "It was self defense. I wish she had just come along peacefully. But these things always turn out badly."
And it all flashed back to me.
THUD.
She lands on top of me with a force that only hatred could give birth to. The blood that covers her pours onto me and my face, she screams at me. She screams at me with all the pain inside her, and at the end, she coughs up more blood, probably her vocal chords exploding. With her voice gone, she starts to pummel my face.
And I lay here, being smashed by the one person who I have known the longest. She has the right to do this. I ruined her, so she can do this. I wronged her...
She stopped.... No, she's not on me anymore. I wearily get up and Gir is beating her. This is not Gir's situation, this is mine.
"GIR! Keep... the... House secure!" And loyally, he flies off of her and stands in front of the house's door. She's not moving. I start to run to her, but fall onto the floor, I hear and feel my face painfully cracking onto the broken concrete. A moan slips out of my closed mouth, and as I lay, the flashes of the exact moment I destroyed her life keep playing over and over and over, past my closed eyes. The state in which she is in, make me wonder what things she may have to go through just to get here. She wants her revenge much more than I could ever want anything now.
I get back up. How many times have I got back up from the floor in the past day? Doesn't matter. I stumble, but manage to half walk half run over to her lying form. She looks like a corpse covered in blood. I glance a few feet away and Dib lies dead. Blood has stained his chest like a fountain, and I look back down at Dee. I'm the one who should be dead. I am the one has done wrong to so many people, from all over the galaxies. My past is strewn with individuals who I have scarred, or killed or maimed, in order to get what I want. I am now Selfor, the most selfish being in the universe. Even more so than Kyookaspech, a being I met on Devastis. I shudder at the memory, and shudder again at the memory of what I did to him.
Suddenly, I am awakened from my thoughts, as I hear her croak out words. They sound like gargles, so I bend down to lift her head, to clear her mouth of liquid. Now, I am the only one with her, to hear her last words, before her tortured soul can finally be free from this nightmare.....
......I feel a gun at the left of my head, and her face curls into a disgusting smile. She spits out blood onto my confused face, and it feels hot and sticky. She rises above me on her Pak's legs, all the time looking like she is superior. She probably is. I have no evidence that I am better than her. She has won this time. It's like the day I broke her, but the roles are reversed. Ironic? I think so. My last words? Let me think. "Dee?" I recite her name in a question like manner. She tries to say something, but the fluids keep flowing into her mouth. She coughs it all out, and responds:
"Ye...Yesh?" Her face, her once beautiful face looks the happiest I have ever seen it to be. I change. Change back to Irken. My last words in my native tongue.
"I want you to know, that all the years I have lived her, this has been the most exciting day I have ever lived. And this is one fuck hell of a climax." She looks confused, because there isn't an Irken word for Fuck or Hell. Nonetheless, it was all true. Up until a day or two ago, I have been bored with life, and contemplated ending it myself, because of my lust for excitement. Thanks to the late Dib, and my executor, the last moments of my life have been... fun.
"Szzhim. Teh payne I haf hadt to f... feel." Her speech is hard to understand, but it's bearable. "You...Putsh me fru.... agony!" The last word you could feel, as she coughed it out.
"What can I say Dee. I remembered everything. You deserve your revenge." Her expression changed to confusion, but changed instantly to anger.
"Shzim....Are you... ready ..to.... die?" I nod, all the time staring at her eyes. And I say these words that for no reason I can think of. They appear into my head. And they make perfect sense. It all seems clear.
So I say them.
"Dee, life is as heavy as a mountain...." She looks bewildered, and replies:
"Andsh.... Death?" spraying bloody saliva.
"Death? Is as light as a feather." The instinct to live happens so fast.
I fling my head back, and grab for the pistol. Successfully holding onto it, I pull it away from her broken hand, it fires into the crowd and kills someone. My moment of spontaneous victory is brief.
As I turn it to face her, she screams, releasing a torrent of bodily liquid, and one of her mechanical legs impales me. I fire out of shock. I watch as the things go distant, and she has the same look I have on my face. Death is also shocking. Especially when you don't expect it. But hers stays. I smile. It's the end. The world turns black. I can't hear anything. I can feel something, feels like a child tugging the metal rod out of me, and it shouts something. But I'm already deaf to it.
The blackness consumes. And everything is numb.
I try to say 'goodbye'. But I don't think it even got to my mouth.
.....sleep....
rest.... now....
Night....
And Death? The last memory fades. Is as light as a feather....
--------------------------------------------- Chapter End. ---------------------------------------------
Additional.
I wake up. Where am I? And the memories come flooding back. I jumped out of a window. I remember hearing my neck crack sickeningly. I'm alive?
I must be. I stare at the window, and the sun on my face feels warm. So nice and comforting. I look around some more, and my attention is drawn to a nurse who walks past a window into the corridor. She turns and walks in. She lifts her head, and sees me. She jumps, and looks quite shocked.
"You're awake!" she squeaks. She rushes out, to get a doctor supposedly. I'm in the city hospital..... Birds tweeting outside...... And I remember more. Dib!
"Where is he?" I ask, but no-one's here yet. A few minutes later, and a doctor enters. He asks standard questions.
"Shut up!" I yell at him. He looks surprised. I'm surprised too, my voice sounds fine, yet my neck was broken. "Where is Dib? Dib Membrane!?" The doctor looks sad. He tells me there was an... incident with some government cover-up. Something about aliens.
What do I do now?
I have no brother.
Life.
It's as heavy as a mountain.
------------------------------------------------
The End
------------------------------------------------
This story, and everything I do and think, was in the memory of Harrison Chapple, 1988 - 2003
Guillotine
-----------------
Zim's point of view for the entire duration of the final chapter.
-----------------
My cells are already healing me and the face of which Dib had struck five or six times. I sit up. A feeling of dizziness overcomes me and I sway gently, but regain my posture. Gir is on Dib's chest on the other side of huge long crater, using his fists. Why doesn't he use his ocular lasers? It would kill Dib instantly, eliminating the threat of which my now 'SIR' like assistant seems to see.
I don't want to see that. Even through Dib's beatings and hatred, I know, or at least hope, that he feels for me. I feel for him, and he would miss me, or my opposition toward him and this planet, if I left. If I could leave.
I would miss him.
I would miss him if Gir killed him.
I unsteadily get up and stumble along toward his form on the smashed road. I don't even realise the gaping chunk of street missing, and I fall down it's pointy, bumpy, concrete and earth strewn side, and I roll into the middle. I raise my upper body with my clawed hands, shaking slightly, and eventually get up and climb up the opposite side. All the time being burnt and pained from the hot linear crater, especially when my head hit the bottom. I make it back onto the road, and reach him. I pull Gir off of his frail, thin and human body. His shirt is torn and his trench coat lies a few feet away. His face is already bruising and blood is running from his mouth. His eyes are closed. I kneel down and listen for a breath.
He lives. I sigh with relief, my own sour, acidic breath escapes from my mouth, near his face. I turn my head and tell Gir to leave and wait inside the house. He salutes and does as he is told. It's the first time since I can properly remember, when he has shown even this level of loyalty- -and then my neck is seized. By Dib. He's conscious.
And his pathetically stick-like hands are crushing my frail neck, making no sense of the actual image. I claw at my neck, and fail to actually do anything. So, I then punch his eye.
It gets him off me. I fall back, gasping for air; he falls back clutching his eye. My melted gloves were covered in dirt, and small pieces of broken concrete. Even for me, that would hurt his naked eyes. I think briefly where his glasses are. He doesn't need them right now, seeing up close to fight is easy for him. But about a metre away and he can't see a thing.
I'm first to sit back up, and I scramble away from him. I don't want to hurt him. After all, he doesn't heal like I do. I eventually stand, and watch as he struggles to wipe away the grime and bits of dirt from his left eye. Hot dirt. Hot specks of diamond dust, against his naked eye. I can't stand here and watch, as I can easily see that he is in intense pain. I turn to run back to the house, and fetch cleaning liquid.
People are gathering now. Police, civilians, neighbourhood residents. This is going to get out of hand- -Shit.
I haven't stepped a foot in the opposite direction of Dib, and before me I see her. High above me, using her arachnid like Pak legs.
I stare, mouth open and hanging, my eyes wide as I gape at her face, full of anger, hate, writhing pain and the scar that I gave her. She looks just like I remember. I still look up at her, like when I knew her, on Irk, when I was small.
And I spy upon her own legs. I take a step back, the reaction of seeing her knees. I can't imagine what the fuck happened to her, but it's extremely recent, like someone took a sledge hammer and pounded her knee caps into a mushy pulp, but didn't tear the fabric of her leggings, so all the blood an mush collected in her bottom clothing, including her boots. It all drips on the hot road. Her breathing is raspy yet hard and menacing. In her hand she holds small laser pistol, which she slowly, shakily raises to point at my head.
I close my mouth.
I shut my eyes.
.....
And run.
.....
I open my eyes and I'm running into a crowd of people, who must think this is some street theatre or something, because they're cheering me, and I'm not wearing a disguise.
And even though I don't have them, I open my ears, and they're not cheering me, they screaming. And amongst all their ugly cries, I hear one, clear significant scream.
I was standing in front of Dib. She fired, and I ran, just in time to miss it. But missing me meant... She shot Dib.
Everything seems to fade away, but my grievance for the one person I could connect with, in a weird kind of way, does not last for long, as Dee is advancing upon me. The pistol is lying next to Dib, where she must have dropped it and her outstretched arms reach madly for me, as if they hunger to rip me apart. And as she speedily races to grab me, I stand on the spot, just in front of the crowd of people. I cannot do anything. The hate in her eyes, her horribly bloodshot eyes, in fact, bloody eyes, eyes covered in blood, make me stand where I am. Her mashed legs dangling, barely attached, probably because of her clothing, are flung back because of the speed of her race towards me. I raise my arms in front of my face instinctively, and turn my head o the right, shutting my eyes and clenching my jagged Irken teeth, waiting for the moment of impact.
And it all flashes back to me.
...........
THUD.
......
Tall metal buildings surround a pair a Irkens. One tall one, and one small one. This opening is akin to a cul-de-sac, but much more closer together. More like an alleyway, in between the towering metal structures. And at the end of this opening, is a circular area, containing a circular hatchway, which led into a sewer system, which, if followed for about a mile, would lead someone into the core building of the power supply for the whole northern hemisphere of a planet known only as Irk.
Looking closer, the two Irkens were arguing. The taller one, a female, spoke loudly and had an angry look on her beautiful face, devoid of any imperfections. She took her appearance as something that made her better than others, because she achieved a lot of attention from her beauty. The smaller one spoke quietly and kept looking around, in case anyone saw them. He was very small in height, and standing next to this other individual made him look tiny and minuscule. Nonetheless, they argued with eachother, as if the different ranks between them meant very little.
"Zim, this is wrong, we'll be executed for this, or worse, sent to Foodcourtia!" She shouted, a slight echo resounding off the metal walls. She continued "How did you ever think this would work!?" Her voice lowering in volume, only by a fragment, as she saw Zim's face clench as he heard the echo of her voice. "Dee, quieten yourself, or I will phase your mouth together! This mission requires stealth!" His arms flailing wildly, and his voice did almost the same at random points of speech. Giving him a completely eccentric, over- the-top look. "Need I remind you, female, that Tallest Miyuki gave us this mission, because of our obvious, and intense greatness!!" The last part making an echo, making him force his hands over his mouth.
"But Zim" Dee responded, shifting her weight "Why would the Almighty Tallest need us? How are we important to this 'mission'?"
"You question the Tallest!!!!" Zim jumped up, grabbed her standard issue shirt and screamed this into her face. She pushed him off of her, and he landed on his rear. He quickly stood back up.
"We are doing nothing wrong!" he said, looking back down the alley. "We are just... changing the ways that Miyuki asked us to infiltrate and seize the felons, inside the power supply. And we will not be sent to Foodcourtia, we will be honoured, and praised, and become kings!!" Dee gave him a confused look, and Zim coughed. "Um... sorta....Anyway, come on, we have to go now." She sighed and followed him to a circular hatch, at the end of the alley, which Zim opened. A sickening stench blasted from the hole, and both Zim and Dee covered their mouths and turned away from.
"Here, put this on!" Zim gasped, as two breathing masks were handed out from his Pak, on mechanical arms. The masks were put on, and Zim jumped in first, with a splash. Dee, reluctantly, followed, making a bigger splash. Using his Pak's mechanical legs, Zim reached up and closed the hatch.
Flash forward.
Zim walked through the waist high goopy water, and making sure that she couldn't hear him, he raised his left wrist to his mouth. A small communicator appeared, and Zim whispered into it.
"Yes, Irken City #2188 Police Enforcement? I would like to request a team of enforcers at the Power supply generator. Yes that's right, yes... yes! Get there right away! A brake in by protesters is about to happen in about thirty minutes! How do I know? uhhh...I'm tailing them, errr, undercover, as one of them. There's two of us. I'm the short one. The taller one is the leader...Got it? Go!" He ended the transmission and continued walking through the slush.
"Did you say something? Zim?" Zim froze, but only for about a millisecond, and kept walking normally... as normally as you can when you're wading through waste.
"Uh, yes.... I... was... talking to my...wrist journal! Yes, that's it. So that our courageous actions can be documented for the media!" He was very pleased with this lie. Zim loved to lie, even if most of them didn't sound too real.
"Oh..... okay.... how much further?" Dee didn't sound reassured, but she had faith in Zim. A faith no one else could possibly have. It was a faith that would cot her, and shape her future.
"Turn a left in about five minutes, and keep going straight.... keep going straight until you reach a ladder, then we go up it. And on to our fame and glory...."
"right... right...." Dee didn't feel right. Zim had been acting strange ever since she met him. But now, he had been acting stranger, as if he were hiding something. But she had her faith in him.
Flash forward.
"Zim! What's going on!?" Flood lights glared at her, as her arms were raised and her face a look of utter shock, she turned to see Zim standing behind her, with a look of pleased disappointment.
"Dee, please understand-"
"Understand what!?"
"Understand, that I, the almighty Zim, must do anything and everything to gain superiority. If I am not to grow, then I must grow my aspects, and my greatness. And Dee...." he got much closer to her, so that he was whispering, "...You were always better, but with this little stunt, you're now a common criminal, and I'm the one who stopped you from plunging half a planet into darkness....." he walked away from her, her face now was a mask of hatred, one that she would use many a time from now on. "Take her away!" Zim commanded.
But before the Enforcers could reach her, she spun round and jumped at Zim in anger. She had never been betrayed before, no one had the heart to do something like this to her, she just looked too nice and beautiful to hurt. But Zim was different. Zim hungered power. He wanted the authority to send legions into battle, at the mere flick of his wrist, anyone would do as he would say and fear and love him. They would do anything for him, and Zim wanted this more than anything in the universe. He needed power, and if he had to betray someone who had befriended him, even with the height difference, then he would do this. Zim would conquer everything, everyone and everywhere. Betrayal.... was nothing. He would be a hero, and the rest would be simple.
She grabbed Zim and scooped him up, due to his smallness, she could easily hold him in one arm. He just sighed and his Pak opened and released his mechanical legs, which poked at her body, and forced her to drop him. She jumped back at him, but he jumped right over her, his mech.-legs extending, she grabbed one while passing. They both landed on the cold metal floor. The machines humming and working in the background, almost muted out what Zim did next. From his Pak, he received two items. A blaster pistol, and a small knife. He looked at her, and said "Sorry Dee." He shot her head.
He then plunged the knife into his abdomen.
When the Enforcers finally arrived to them both, they saw what Zim wanted them to see. A struggle ending with Zim being wounded by a knife, but not actually killed. And Dee, who may or may not make it. The laser went straight through her head, but missed her brain, and just below the eye. Her jaw was mangled, but with modern Irken hospital, she would most likely live, but with tremendous scarring.
And it would all be down to Zim as the hero to say: "It was self defense. I wish she had just come along peacefully. But these things always turn out badly."
And it all flashed back to me.
THUD.
She lands on top of me with a force that only hatred could give birth to. The blood that covers her pours onto me and my face, she screams at me. She screams at me with all the pain inside her, and at the end, she coughs up more blood, probably her vocal chords exploding. With her voice gone, she starts to pummel my face.
And I lay here, being smashed by the one person who I have known the longest. She has the right to do this. I ruined her, so she can do this. I wronged her...
She stopped.... No, she's not on me anymore. I wearily get up and Gir is beating her. This is not Gir's situation, this is mine.
"GIR! Keep... the... House secure!" And loyally, he flies off of her and stands in front of the house's door. She's not moving. I start to run to her, but fall onto the floor, I hear and feel my face painfully cracking onto the broken concrete. A moan slips out of my closed mouth, and as I lay, the flashes of the exact moment I destroyed her life keep playing over and over and over, past my closed eyes. The state in which she is in, make me wonder what things she may have to go through just to get here. She wants her revenge much more than I could ever want anything now.
I get back up. How many times have I got back up from the floor in the past day? Doesn't matter. I stumble, but manage to half walk half run over to her lying form. She looks like a corpse covered in blood. I glance a few feet away and Dib lies dead. Blood has stained his chest like a fountain, and I look back down at Dee. I'm the one who should be dead. I am the one has done wrong to so many people, from all over the galaxies. My past is strewn with individuals who I have scarred, or killed or maimed, in order to get what I want. I am now Selfor, the most selfish being in the universe. Even more so than Kyookaspech, a being I met on Devastis. I shudder at the memory, and shudder again at the memory of what I did to him.
Suddenly, I am awakened from my thoughts, as I hear her croak out words. They sound like gargles, so I bend down to lift her head, to clear her mouth of liquid. Now, I am the only one with her, to hear her last words, before her tortured soul can finally be free from this nightmare.....
......I feel a gun at the left of my head, and her face curls into a disgusting smile. She spits out blood onto my confused face, and it feels hot and sticky. She rises above me on her Pak's legs, all the time looking like she is superior. She probably is. I have no evidence that I am better than her. She has won this time. It's like the day I broke her, but the roles are reversed. Ironic? I think so. My last words? Let me think. "Dee?" I recite her name in a question like manner. She tries to say something, but the fluids keep flowing into her mouth. She coughs it all out, and responds:
"Ye...Yesh?" Her face, her once beautiful face looks the happiest I have ever seen it to be. I change. Change back to Irken. My last words in my native tongue.
"I want you to know, that all the years I have lived her, this has been the most exciting day I have ever lived. And this is one fuck hell of a climax." She looks confused, because there isn't an Irken word for Fuck or Hell. Nonetheless, it was all true. Up until a day or two ago, I have been bored with life, and contemplated ending it myself, because of my lust for excitement. Thanks to the late Dib, and my executor, the last moments of my life have been... fun.
"Szzhim. Teh payne I haf hadt to f... feel." Her speech is hard to understand, but it's bearable. "You...Putsh me fru.... agony!" The last word you could feel, as she coughed it out.
"What can I say Dee. I remembered everything. You deserve your revenge." Her expression changed to confusion, but changed instantly to anger.
"Shzim....Are you... ready ..to.... die?" I nod, all the time staring at her eyes. And I say these words that for no reason I can think of. They appear into my head. And they make perfect sense. It all seems clear.
So I say them.
"Dee, life is as heavy as a mountain...." She looks bewildered, and replies:
"Andsh.... Death?" spraying bloody saliva.
"Death? Is as light as a feather." The instinct to live happens so fast.
I fling my head back, and grab for the pistol. Successfully holding onto it, I pull it away from her broken hand, it fires into the crowd and kills someone. My moment of spontaneous victory is brief.
As I turn it to face her, she screams, releasing a torrent of bodily liquid, and one of her mechanical legs impales me. I fire out of shock. I watch as the things go distant, and she has the same look I have on my face. Death is also shocking. Especially when you don't expect it. But hers stays. I smile. It's the end. The world turns black. I can't hear anything. I can feel something, feels like a child tugging the metal rod out of me, and it shouts something. But I'm already deaf to it.
The blackness consumes. And everything is numb.
I try to say 'goodbye'. But I don't think it even got to my mouth.
.....sleep....
rest.... now....
Night....
And Death? The last memory fades. Is as light as a feather....
--------------------------------------------- Chapter End. ---------------------------------------------
Additional.
I wake up. Where am I? And the memories come flooding back. I jumped out of a window. I remember hearing my neck crack sickeningly. I'm alive?
I must be. I stare at the window, and the sun on my face feels warm. So nice and comforting. I look around some more, and my attention is drawn to a nurse who walks past a window into the corridor. She turns and walks in. She lifts her head, and sees me. She jumps, and looks quite shocked.
"You're awake!" she squeaks. She rushes out, to get a doctor supposedly. I'm in the city hospital..... Birds tweeting outside...... And I remember more. Dib!
"Where is he?" I ask, but no-one's here yet. A few minutes later, and a doctor enters. He asks standard questions.
"Shut up!" I yell at him. He looks surprised. I'm surprised too, my voice sounds fine, yet my neck was broken. "Where is Dib? Dib Membrane!?" The doctor looks sad. He tells me there was an... incident with some government cover-up. Something about aliens.
What do I do now?
I have no brother.
Life.
It's as heavy as a mountain.
------------------------------------------------
The End
------------------------------------------------
This story, and everything I do and think, was in the memory of Harrison Chapple, 1988 - 2003