Lyric Wheel Submission

Title: Sick

Part 1

"Blinking red light – message from Gaz. I'll lend you the fifty, and I'll give you another fifty if you don't ever call me again, you freak." Dib did an uncanny impression of her voice into his hand-held recorder. He only had two minutes before sleep time – he let his log flow incoherently.

"I have time for five hours tonight. More sleep than I've gotten in the past week. Zim. . ." Dib burst into a sudden fit, banging his fist wildly against the steering wheel of his van. "Aaaarg. . .get ahold of yourself, Dib!" He screamed.

Dib wiped the spittle from the side of his mouth. He gritted his teeth so hard he could feel a chip fly loose. "The enemy will not win this time. Can't tell if his plans are actually getting less stupid, or if the rest of the world is just getting more stupid. I. . .I HATE him SO MUCH." Leaning his head against his steering wheel, he closed his eyes and tried to steady his breathing. His recorder had been in his hand the whole time, but the banging had cracked it. It would make it harder to pretend it still worked, but he would manage. The recorder hadn't worked in months.

"I need more money for supplies. I need sleep. I'm getting better. . .if Zim is getting better than I'm getting better too." Dib took a deep breathe. "Agent Mothman out."

Taking a bottle of pills from one of the many lockboxes in his van, he swallowed two pills dry, set his alarm clock, and laid back in his seat.

Work tomorrow. Zim was nearing completion of his plan, he knew it. The alien never slept. It was not a comforting thought as Dib fell into a deep black sleep. Comforting thoughts were few and far between these days.

Part 2

It had taken Dib six months to find Zim's latest base. He spit sand out from between his teeth as he walked across the desert towards where Zim's fortress crouched in the dunes.

Zim was getting better. Through the years spent on this forsaken rock he couldn't help but soak up some knowledge about it. Better disguises. Better locations. Better weapons, it seemed. And with every new plan he showed more and more innate understanding of the world around him.

With every passing year Dib became further removed from the world around him. His existence now was Zim. He couldn't hold down a job, but he could maintain a country-wide network of contacts and surveillance outposts. He couldn't keep an apartment, but the van in which he traveled housed all of the latest technology earth could provide. The daily necessities of eating and sleeping sometimes escaped him, but when called to step into the space that his enemy called home he could dodge every trap laid out for him by instinct alone.

Once he'd made it through the outer perimeter and past the initial defense ring, Dib sat leaning against one of the metal panels of the base computer, catching his breathe.

The little grey robot-pet walked up to him and shouted 'Hi!'. It grinned inanely while Dib pulled it apart limb by limb, still smiling when Dib tore its head from its torso and its eyes turned black.

Dib finally breached the inner core. Zim was there. Saying 'Zim was there' to Dib was like saying 'the hydrogen bomb went off' or 'the world began and ended'. Dib had learned that these few moments when they met were the most significant in his life. The psychological toll would be severe. For the next few months he wouldn't be able to sleep or wake without pills. He would get the shakes, get the shits, puke his food out on a regular basis. He would rant, rave, and hallucinate.

Zim was there. Zim, with that green skin, and those red eyes, the gloves and the uniform and that toothed grin like nothing else in the world. He dreamed of Zim during every sleeping and waking moment of his life now.

For two seconds while he dropped into the room, Zim couldn't see him.

Dib shot at Zim with his newest untested weapon. The poison released over him didn't kill him as hoped for. It dropped him to the ground, incapacitating him for a few minutes. A few minutes would be all Dib would need.

Dib crouched over the alien, growling like a rabid dog. He pulled back Zim's clothes. He ran his hands over Zim's smooth skin, feeling the bones and muscles underneath and wondering how hard it would be to break them. His life had been stolen by this alien, this thing, and he wanted to do to him the most violent thing that he could. So he raped him.

And while Dib was on top of him, rutting away inside of him, Zim understood only a little of what was going on. He thought he knew the significance of the fleshy protrusion grinding in and out of him. He understood what tears were, but wasn't sure why Dib was crying. He had only a vague idea of what the lips mean, the deep kisses that Dib gave him in between his sobs. What Zim knew, what Zim understood instinctively was power. And after Dib had shuddered and filled him with his seed, he and Dib both understood that someone here had won. And it wasn't Dib.

Part 3

Dib woke from a sound sleep, curled in his nest of rags. The base was moving again – he could feel the deck beneath him shifting. He hugged the little grey robot tighter against himself. Since it had been repaired it followed him everywhere, smiling that stupid, expectant smile at him. It whispered in his ear. Dib nodded. The little robot was always right.

Wandering from room to room, Dib finally found Zim in the command centre. There were fires burning in every view screen. Dib didn't know which city it was – it was a different city every time, but cities all look alike when they're burning. Secretly now he always pretended that it was Paris, city of lights. He supposed he was just romantic that way.

When at first he approached Zim and began to kiss the back of his neck, Zim tried to nudge him away.

"Not now, earth-stink." Said Zim, preoccupied with the controls.

"Yes, now, Zim." Replied Dib. He picked Zim up, carried him over to the wall, and fucked him against it.

When it was over Dib crumpled to the ground and lay looking up at the ceiling. After rearranging himself, Zim walked over and knelt beside him. Snorting, the alien tucked Dib's spent member back inside of his pants, then turned his attention to Dib's face. Poking and prodding at his skin, looking into his eyes and opening his mouth to study his teeth and gums, Zim examined Dib like a dead fish in a marketplace.

Dib looked down at his shirt. The stickiness there was not his own. Once he'd finally learned the basic method of pleasuring Zim, the alien climaxed with him almost every time.

"If you actually enjoy that, Zim, you must be sicker than I am." Said Dib.

Zim snorted again. "Highly unlikely, earth-stink." With the dusting of his hands he finished his examination and got up. "Computer – fifty milligrams of zynthopantenthol, and twenty of metacetamol."

The computer obediently pumped a syringeful of liquid into Dib's veins. Zim didn't know was that Dib had reprogrammed the computer to give him saline water instead of zynthopantenthol. He appreciated Zim's effort to make him less insane, but he didn't like how flat and colourless the world seemed after that particular drug had been administered. The metacetamol he accepted gladly – the gauzy haze it wrapped around him was rather pleasant.

"Mmm. . .gonna sleep in a little bit, okay Zim? Sleep, sleep, sleep. . .turn into a butterfly soon." Said Dib. He wasn't getting any better. He could feel himself turning inside out, turning into something new. Whatever came of this, whatever being that would eventually crawl out of the empty husk that he was turning into, maybe that, it, would be better.

Zim chuckled at him.

Dib looked up at the star chart on Zim's ceiling. So many stars. More stars in the galaxy than there were cities on the earth.

"I never liked any of the earth cities anyways. This is supposed to be my home, but I never really like it. Actually I hated it. . .a lot." Confessed Dib. "Did you like it out there, where you came from, Zim?" He asked.

Zim looked up at the stars. "Not really." He shrugged and turned away.

"Good." Replied Dib. He looked over and saw Zim's toothed grin, reflected in the flames of the viewscreen. He realized that Zim really was as sick as he was. The years spent on this planet had apparently taken quite a toll.

"Two of a kind now, eh Zim?" Dib closed his eyes and smiled. "Today we play at my house, tomorrow we'll play at yours." He yawned. He'd always wondered why Zim kept this truce. "The last two sane people in the universe. . ."

Dib fell asleep to the sound of Zim's evil laugh, and was comforted.

The End

Story suggested by submitted lyrics:

Slipknot - Sic

Enemy - Show me what you wanna be
I can handle anything
Even if I can't handle you
Readily - Either way it better be
Don't you fuckin' pity me
Get up, get off...
What the hell am I sayin'?
I don't know about malevolent
Sure as hell decadent
I want somebody to step up, step off
Walls! Let me fall! FUCK YOU ALL!
Get a grip, don't let me slip 'til I drop the ball
I - I want it all!
Fuck this shit, I'm sick of it
You're goin' down, this is a war!
Who the fuck am I to criticize your twisted
state of mind?
You're leavin' me suspect - I'm leavin' you grotesque
Feels like a burn from which you never learn
Cause and effect, you jealous ass
Press your face against the glass - SUFFER!
I - I want it all!

Fuck this shit, I'm sick of it
You're goin' down, this is a war!
I've just begun
It's about that time
Gotta get mine
YOU CAN'T KILL ME

CUZ I'M ALREADY
INSIDE YOU
SICK