Three and a half months later, something broke.
It was soon after the beginning of school, while the days were still warm by noon. The feeling of fall was in the air, though; in the crispness of morning and evening and in the way the leaves had begun to turn.
It was the start of Gaz's sophomore year, although she wasn't in control of the experience. Dib should have been a junior but he wasn't there at all; Membrane had kept his son in the labs to treat him further, and otherwise the three family members moved through different lives.
Until Gaz had her breakthrough.
It was fourth hour, just after lunch, during history class. She sat in the back and so no one noticed when she stiffened, muscles clenching so tightly that she broke her pencil in half. In the next moment her head fell forward a bit, and then Gaz drew it up again, her eyes hard and focused, and very angry.
The girl promptly slammed her binder closed, sweeping it into the backpack that was sitting it under her desk. Pencils and a pink pig-shaped eraser followed it until her desk was clean. The banging and shuffling noises caught the attention of everyone else in the classroom and the other students turned to stare at her. The teacher frowned disapprovingly at the lapse in attention.
"Is something wrong, Gaz?" the middle-aged woman asked. Membrane's daughter was quiet, reserved, and not much of a troublemaker, so if the girl was breaking her usual pattern of behavior there might be a plausible reason to take trouble for her.
"No," Gaz responded harshly. Her voice was very different suddenly- much harsher then the usual toneless, quiet timbre that the teacher had grown used to. "I have to go to the nurse's office. I have," her mouth drew back into something that might have been a snarl or a toothy, dangerous grin, "cramps. Very bad cramps."
A muffled snigger ran through the class and the teacher frowned. "Well, go to the nurse's office, I suppose- here, I'll write you a pass-"
She looked up from her desk at the front of the classroom when the door banged. Gaz was already gone.
The girl herself walked rapidly down the halls, head lowered and with her backpack slung over one shoulder. The halls were dingy and empty between classes. Trash was scattered around the lockers and someone had left a heavy black boot print on the wall. It was possibly the most beautiful thing she had seen in weeks, because this time Gaz was the one choosing where to walk and what to look at, Gaz was controlling herself: not the thing that Zim had put in her head. She walked out one of the emergency exit doors at the end up the hall, and beside the graffitied concrete wall with cigarette butts scattered around her and the chill of autumn in the air she threw back her head and laughed. It seemed appropriate and didn't attract as much attention as screaming with victory did. She was pleased and flushed and proud, proud, proud, and had a goal in mind.
It was a privilege of the Membrane children that whenever they took ill, be it a common cold or a broken limb or a strange mental defect where everything that was eaten tasted like pork, their father would take the time to take care of them. It was most attention they ever got from him, and at one point in his youth Dib had been so desperate to get his father's notice that he had taken to standing out in the rain in his underwear attempting to catch a cold. At about age seven he had gotten terribly embarrassed at the fact that his sister was seeing him in his underwear (and, after thinking it over, was coming close to joining him) and had stopped courting illness for his father's attention.
But the tradition hadn't died, and when Gaz was plagued with the flavor of pork her father had taken her in to find out what was wrong and fix it. In the end that problem was out of his league and Membrane had never known the truth about how it was solved, only pronounced that she was cured when Gaz and Dib had returned victorious from the land of the Shadow Hog. And now that Dib had taken ill in the head, Membrane had put his son into the laboratories to see if he could find out what was wrong there.
The problem would never be solved by Membrane, though, because there wasn't truly a problem. Dib might seem delusional but he was correct. It was pointless to keep him here.
The labs were brightly lit and quietly busy. Gaz slipped between orderlies and scientists, headed for the compound where her brother was kept, confident that she could handle whatever security threw at her. She had never used passwords or card keys in her father's labs; she had never really needed to, because the building accepted her. She got where she needed to go, always. If this was anything like their last try at shaking off Membrane's security it would be a cakewalk, although she didn't know where they'd get beaver suits this time.
A migraine was beginning to develop, and Gaz paused to rub at her temples. It didn't help; the pain seemed to be set back farther in her head, towards where her neck merged with the curve of her skull. We're fighting, she realized. That thing and… me. The control hadn't been broken; it was just pushed off for a while. Maybe she couldn't count on being entirely free until the device was out of her head entirely.
How long had she been moving under her own command? About an hour and a half, maybe, getting out of school and walking to the labs. She didn't know how much longer she could hold the control off. The pain that was beginning to manifest seemed to suggest that she wouldn't have too much longer.
That made it even more important to get to Dib and free him. Gaz started to walk again, following her guts. The siblings might not get along in their day-to-day routines, and in fact were often entirely at odds, but in a pinch there was no one Gaz trusted more than Dib to back her up. They made a good team, really, with her ruthlessness and Dib's ingenuity and energy. It was unfortunate that Zim's machine seemed to be winning back control; it meant that all she would be able to do would be to turn Dib loose and then wait until she had the energy to resist again.
She came to the heavy metal door that opened into Dib's secure area, and put her hand against the fingerprint reader. The mechanism cleared her for entry without any trouble.
The containment field around Dib was basically the same as the one she had been held in several years ago. Force field walls made a small enclosure furnished with a narrow bed and a simple toilet. No distractions were offered. At the time, Gaz had simply sat, brooding. Dib paced instead, incessantly, hour after hour, and was pacing now. He had never been good at sitting still.
He turned very quickly when he heard the door come open, and came forward to look at her without reaching out to touch the force field. He looked strained and intense. Gaz didn't make eye contact but went for the controls to the field instead, glancing them over. She didn't have Dib's skill with computers but that didn't really matter.
"Gaz," he croaked harshly. "What are you doing here?"
He sounded suspicious, which was irritating. Here she was, glaring at the controls to his prison, and it wasn't obvious to him?
Well, perhaps not. He had been here for three months and she hadn't come to visit him- hadn't been able, but he couldn't know that. In the regular course of their lives the concern she showed to him was almost nonexistent- Dib could take care of himself- so he probably didn't expect her to show up to help him. Maybe it wouldn't be a waste of time to fill him in.
"I'm here to let you out, idiot," she replied, fiddling with some buttons in front of her. A window popped up on the monitor and Gaz frowned at it.
"Why?" Dib asked. He glared at her suspiciously and brought his hands up to his shoulders, moving his fists close to touching the field. The field dealt a nasty shock whenever it was touched- Gaz had discovered this herself when she was kept here- and Dib had probably found it out as well.
"I can't help my brother just because I feel like it?" Gaz said, glaring.
Dib glared back at her. "Well, you've never bothered to before, so you know, I'm just wondering at the sudden… change of heart."
His sister glared at the screen in front of her. Several boxes had popped up now, flashing their individual error messages. If this went on for much longer an alarm would probably sound and security would come down on them like a ton of bricks. The thought didn't worry her but it would be irritating to fight them all off and have to rescue Dib on top of that. It was probably coming to where she'd have to ask Dib for help with getting through it.
The pain in her head seemed to be building. It couldn't be too much longer before that thing had worn her down enough to grab back the reins.
"Listen, Dib," Gaz told him lowly. He narrowed his eyes at her and she sighed. "Look, Zim put this thing in my head. And Dad's too. It…" Oh, it was nearly painful to say… "It gives orders."
Dib looked breathless, angry. "Orders?"
"Don't trust Dad," she told him. "He can't resist it. He took your ship away."
Dib stiffened. Gaz didn't need to look at him to sense his anger. Dib was possessive about the ship, possessive and obsessive and he needed it in a way, because he wanted to get out so much and that was the way to make it. "Where!" he demanded. "Where is it now!"
"Zim's house," Gaz replied, reaching out to brush the screen with her fingers. She could feel the static from it, fizzling at the pads of her fingers like soda bubbles.
"He took it to Zim!" Dib forgot the field for a moment, jerked to slam his fists into it, then recalled where he was and jolted back very quickly. "That traitor…"
His sister hissed between her teeth irritably. "It isn't Dad, Dib. It's Zim. Dad never even noticed your dumb ship before, remember?"
"I need to get it back," Dib told her, eyes deadly.
"Well duh," Gaz snapped back at him. "You'll need something to take after Zim. What do you think I'm letting you out for?"
Dib's face darkened but he remained silent. Gaz stared incredulously down at the screen, which was going nuts with blinking windows and error messages. "Dib, how did you do this before?" she demanded.
He gave her a sideways look. "Well, I had my computer," he snapped. "And I searched out the password before I came."
"Not like I had time for that," Gaz growled in return. "Came straight from skool after being controlled by Zim for three months, remember! You should be the one who knows the password; you've been sitting here listening to the people for three months."
"And how am I supposed to know that!" Dib said shrilly. "It's not like they just say it in front of me! Even if there's no way I could get there and let myself out… well… they think it's a security risk!" And it is, he added mentally.
Gaz scowled, pushing down the urge to just stomp off, to hell with the world and her brother. Remember Zim. Remember revenge. "Well," she said. "If you don't know the password and I don't know it, how are you supposed to get out?"
"Jeez, search me," her brother returned. "Why don't you grab some poor scientist and threaten to doom his ass if he doesn't tell you? Isn't that your thing?"
Gaz looked up at him thoughtfully. An average person wouldn't notice the change in her expression but Dib had years of practice at reading his sister's moods and recognized the purse of her mouth for what it was. He stared at her blankly for a minute. "Gaz? Um, Gaz! I was joking!"
She smirked. "Not a bad idea, though."
Dib restrained himself from screaming for no real reason as she left. It wouldn't have bothered anyone if he had lost it for a minute (they were used to it) but it bothered him.
He paced back and forth through his prison for a few minutes, and eventually settled on his bed to gnaw his fingernails anxiously. He realized with surprise that his hands were shaking madly, and wished Gaz would hurry up and get back already. Dib felt sorry for whatever poor idiot she caught but he was so desperate to get out… and hey, at least it wasn't him this time.
It took another couple of minutes but Gaz returned, harrying a skittish-looking junior scientist before her. The young man looked entirely cowed, and close to dropping the thick wad of folders under his arms. He looked up at Dib and down to the screen nervously, shoving up the safety goggles he wore with one hand. "Him! I can't let h-him out!"
Gaz looked like she was enjoying the opportunity to take out her rage one someone. "That's fine," she purred. "I guess you really don't have to. Of course, you don't have to breathe, either, but there are consequences." She didn't ask if he understood her. The young man's pinched face and bobbing Adam's apple showed that he did.
"But!" the young man tried, in one last-ditch protest. "If I let him out of there, I could lose my job! I've worked for years to get a position at Membrane Industries! And besides, it's for his own good! He's crazy, don't you know!"
Dib rolled his eyes. If this guy thought that trying to get pity from Gaz would get him out of this, he was going to have a very nasty surprise in the next couple minutes.
"Oh, believe me," Gaz said, her voice abruptly very cold. "Everyone will understand why you let him out. If you make me get ugly about this then they'll all wish you had let him out so they wouldn't have to clean up your quivering remains."
Apparently the deciding that he could always find another job with someone else, the scientist whimpered and reached for the keyboard.
Dib grinned as he watched the shimmering force field panels dissolve away like oil rainbows on water. He tore the thin sheets off his bed and jumped for the now-open edge of his prison, twisting the cloth in his hands. The stuff was tough fabric, very resistant to tearing to prevent patients from tearing it into strips and somehow committing suicide with it; and when he had formed it into a crude rope it would probably be decent for tying someone's hands together.
Gaz slammed her knee into the top of the young man's back and held him down as Dib tied his hands behind his back, doing his best to make sure that it was snug enough to be secure without cutting off too much blood to the man's hands. Another sheet-rope went around his ankles and one more made a cumbersome gag. After that the two siblings dragged the scientist over to Dib's former cage and rolled him under the bed. A simple tap of a button restored the force field, and Dib neatly stacked up the folders that the scientist had been carrying next to the edge.
After that they went for the exit, Dib shaking with eagerness and Gaz with strain.
"Ungh… unh, SHIT!"
Gaz slammed her shoulder into the metal panel as best she could. She could feel a lump growing on her head where she had slammed it against a metal partition in the vents and Dib's upper body was heavy and warm across her calves.
"Gaz," he whispered. "Could you be quieter! There are probably guards right out there! And why did we have to wear these bee suits!"
His sister curled her lip back towards him. "I checked already. It's fine; he's probably out smoking pot or something."
"What about the bee suits!"
"Because they didn't have beaver suits this time, duh."
The bee suits that both of them wore were heavy, fuzzy, far too hot, and reeking of mothballs and maple syrup. Gaz had snagged two of them from a behavioral study going on in one wing of the building and the two of them had walked quite calmly down the hall for several wings with Dib's distinctive hairstyle hidden by the hood before Gaz had dragged them into the ventilation system. Now they were right next to the outside, but the damn covering panel was stuck. Gaz gritted her teeth and slammed against it again.
"I think I heard the screws giving," Dib said quietly. "Try it again."
He was awful confident back there where she couldn't reach him. "I am," she ground out. "You know, I would love to let you do this."
Thankfully, Dib shut up. She could hear his breath hissing as he shifted and scratched at the edges of the bee suit. He seemed to be allergic to something in the fabric.
Gaz tried once more, driving her body weight into the grate, and held her breath and she heard a cree-eeek-ping! noise. One screw down.
The girl maneuvered a hand underneath her torso to push at the corner she thought it had come from. It was an awkward position but it was the right place and she was pushing hard enough that the screen began to bend and give outwards. Another screw pinged free.
Those were the two bottom ones; Gaz sighed in relief and worked to get both hands free to push at the lower part of the grate. Reluctantly the metal gave way and she was able to make a small opening to the outside world. She turned her head and started to push through it, the metal dragging harshly over her cheek. It felt for a few seconds like her ear was going to come off and then the edge was scraping over neck and compressing her shoulders. Gaz rounded them as much as she could to fit through the opening and after that it was easier, with only a tense moment as she worked her hips through the metal. Then she was slithering full-body across the concrete strip in an alley, smearing the black-and-yellow front of the bee suit with dirt and filth. She grimaced when she stood and pulled in her arms, making a brief and desperate search for the internal zipper. When she was free from it she gasped, feeling as through her internal temperature had just dropped by ten degrees. Those things were hot.
Dib grunted and swore softly as he contorted himself to get out behind her. He tore of the suit with even more gusto, and Gaz didn't bother to restrain her snicker at the livid red rash starting up on his neck and wrists. He was definitely allergic to something in the fabric.
He bundled up the hideous furry thing in his arms and went for a garbage can sitting by the wall. When he opened the lid his nose wrinkled in disgust; he closed it and went for another. Gaz opened it to see what had bothered him, idly curious. The smell that blasted from it made her grimace and her eyes watered as she looked: the flaccid remains of lab animals. Figured that they wouldn't be disposed of right. This was disgusting.
She slammed the lip down on top of them and went with Dib to the next one, wadding the scratchy suit down on top of a mass of shredded paper. Dib brushed his hands off distastefully and looked over her head, down the alley at the street. It was madly busy out there, people crossing and cars roaring by. That had probably drowned out the noise of their emergence.
It felt like someone was boiling a pot of water in her head: everything was simmering and blurry. She wondered how much longer she could hold out against Zim; Dib needed to get out of here before she lost it and tried to take him back in. How much longer before that scientist would be discovered, anyway? How often did they check up on Dib?
Gaz rubbed at her temples again. It didn't help. "Look, Dib," she said grouchily. "You need to get out of here now."
He glanced down at her distractedly. "Are you okay, Gaz?" The next second he looked back up and at the outside again. Brotherly obligation: Dib still felt beholden to it, for all that Gaz had attempted to establish that she would really rather not be his sibling.
"No," she told him. "Now get lost."
Dib looked back down at her, nervousness and concern fighting for dominance on his face. "Will you be all right?" he asked.
They would just have to see.
"Yes," she told him. The pain in her head was even worse now. "Get lost before you get caught out here."
She had the feeling he didn't believe her, but when she clenched her fist and raised it threateningly in his direction Dib gave in. "All right," he said to her. "I… I guess I'll see you later, huh?"
Gaz bit down hard on her lip. "Maybe," she said. Dib nodded and turned to walk down the alley towards the street, giving her frequent anxious glances over his shoulder. Gaz crouched down beside the garbage can filled with paper and leaned her forehead into her hands, which felt very cold all of a sudden. She hoped she could fight it off long enough for him to get away.
END OF CHAPTER 12
July 29, 2005
Many thanks and much love to the lovely J. Random Lurker and Red Crow for their help on this chapter. They're both great ficcers, go check them out.