Chapter Three

"Eric"

: Z :

Slowly at first, then with growing speed, the sun seemed to climb into view. Light shown through the heavy layer of smog that had covered the sky for almost ten years. The tall pine trees' pale green foliage became visible, as did the mountains in the distance. The few birds that still thrived in this particular area began singing - about what, I did not know. It seemed to me there was nothing to rejoice about. I had learned that my mission was just a hoax to get me murdered by They Fight, but if I called the Tallest to double check then I would be sent back to the IRD for still being alive. After all, my stay there was not over yet as long as I was still classified as a defective. Also, this strange Irken who had not yet dropped her disguise had been talking to me all night while the energy transfer was being completed. I had never met another like her. But, along with many other things, one thing she had mentioned still had my brain working on the answer. How had she known my name?

"So what I'm getting at is that our society needs total redirecting. How many more planets will we enslave for our own personal needs? Why must the universe suffer under our rule? Even if the Almighty Tallest do succeed in universal conquest, they should not torment the peoples they have conquered! It's not fair! It's as if they have no feelings towards anything! Have you not noticed that they heartlessly kill anybody who dares stand up to them or question them? Have you not noticed that they push around their personnel like common dirt wanderers? Have you not noticed that they are the ones who ruined your life?"

I sighed and nodded to myself. Yes, I had noticed. I had much more than just noticed. All those horrible nights spent in my tiny little room thinking about the reasons why they had done it; the hours I wasted staring out the window at the dark blue clouds floating through the lime green sky; the years of my life that had been thrown away. Yet, it all made sense to me for some reason. The Tallest were horrible, ruthless rulers. They needed to be overthrown. But . . . then again, they were the ones who had given me a second chance in the beat of a heart; the ones who had even helped me accomplish my mission by sending me advanced weapons such as the Mega Doomer. The things that had all happened in my life made little to no sense. They hated me . . . yet they assisted me. Yet they hated me . . .

"Zim?"

Again with her saying my name. Again she said it aloud, right in front of me, without me ever introducing myself to her. Every time she said it made me uncomfortable, because every time she said it I wondered how she had known. Even weirder, I didn't even know her name. I only knew she was somebody who had offered to help me hide from the IDR. The IDR: that horrible, horrible institute. I hated it.

She had talked not only about the flaws in our civilization, but the flaws with the IDR. The way she talked about them humored me to a point of smiling, but that was about it. Deep inside it didn't feel right listening to her insult the place like she did, but that feeling was sure to wear off. It was most likely just something that resulted from staying there for nearly a decade. After all, I did hate the IRD and everybody in it . . . didn't I? Didn't I despise Lonny and Kraak and Boss? Didn't I wish them murdered in a fiery explosion by They Fight?

"Zim?"

I turned my head at her call this time, hoping not to be rude, and answered simply, "Yes?"

"Haven't you noticed?" Noticed . . . noticed . . . noticed what? What had I not noticed? Was there something missing? Was there something amiss, out of place, disorganized even? I took a second to glance at the sky; the pale gray sky with puffs of white here and there. I thought over her confusing question. "Noticed" could be referring to a million and one things going on. Noticed the birds singing? Noticed the sun rising behind the smog? Noticed that day was approaching? Or was she referring to something she had said earlier . . .?

What had she said earlier? Something about our civilization, society, the IDR . . . something about fairness and equality. And something about the Tallest's rule, how they did things. How they had ruined my life by banishing me to IDR Facility Three. Yes! She asked me if I noticed the horrible things they had been doing; noticed that it was them who trashed my life.

"Yes," I answered rather quietly, "I have noticed." I glanced at the remainder of the ash-covered wood from the fire that was crackling, popping and hissing every time something shifted; the few remaining embers that were still glowing and giving off a dim light that grew harder and harder to make out as the morning stretched on. Yes . . . I had noticed.

"Master, you all sad!" a squeaky robotic voice cried out, interrupting my thoughts. Changing the direction of my attention to my little SIR unit, who was still sitting by what was left of the fire with a stick that had two marshmallows on it clasped in his hands, I only lowered my head in despair and let a tear fall from my eye. Yes, I was sad. As I recall, Gir had never seen me sad. Not like this. Before, I had been upset occasionally, even to the point of not talking about anything, but I had never been so depressed . . . as I was now.

I took in a deep breath, trying not to break down crying in front of another Irken Elite soldier. But it was becoming harder and harder to contain my unnatural emotions towards life at the moment; harder still to keep from letting an occasional tear wet my eyes. I feared the Irken warrior was beginning to notice. From the tone of her voice, she sounded slightly concerned for me, but it was awkward thinking of another Irken as feeling anything towards me but annoyed. I had been told many-a-time I was annoying.

"Yeah, your SIR's right," said the Irken warrior, agreeing with Gir. "You're depressed. You've hardly said a word to me since I said your name last night, and don't say that you haven't occasionally let a little tear slip out. Trust me, I know when I see somebody who's upset, and you are definitely upset." Yes, I was upset, but why was she so curious? My emotions were none of her business! She should just leave me alone and think about what to do with me when we go back to They Fight's camp.

Wiping the wet splotch from my face with my sleeve, I said defensively, "So? Why do you care?"

"Because," she answered, "you are going to have to become one of us. We'll be seeing each other almost every day, and I don't want to see you so upset. In They Fight, you're going to have to get over it and concentrate on your training. It requires total focus. If you're upset, then you're distracted. If you're distracted, you won't learn properly. And trust me; you have to learn all you can before our next mission, or else our number will be one person short when we return."

One person short she says? Is she implying that I can't handle breaking into a Pak Tech Research Center and stealing technology advances? Their little "missions" are simple and easy, nothing worthy of me at all. If it were more challenging, perhaps I would not be so offended by her statement. But They Fight was the smallest shrinking resistance against the Irkens in the history of forever! They were weak, pathetic, and useless!

"I can handle it," I argued, ambition growing inside of me, energy pulsing through my veins a bit faster. The sad images of my ruined life seemed to fade away as they were replaced with new images of fighting alongside this Irken - fighting for a better cause. I could handle anything They Fight threw at me, no matter what it was! Training here was most likely nothing compared to Hobo 13, which I had succeeded at one hundred and ten percent. They Fight's course would be "a piece of cake", as was said here.

Smiling now, the Irken warrior asked, "Are you sure?"

Was I sure? Of course I was! How could she not recognize that I was the best Invader out there, the best at almost everything I do? I was no ordinary Irken. That was for sure. Where many had failed, I succeeded. When others perished, I prevailed. There was nothing that I could not face and conquer! There was no obstacle that I could not overcome! Whatever this "They Fight" had planned for me, I would accomplish it with a broad smile on my face as I marched with the Irken invader stance that I had walked with my entire life.

I stood up, my energy levels higher than they had been in ten years. "I am positive!" I answered. "They Fight has not seen anything compared to me! I am the best there is! I am the one who will lead them to victory!" I spotted a nearby rock with a flat surface and hopped atop it, making myself feel taller. With a voice that had been lost to me until now, crushed under my sorrow while I had been at the IDR, I yelled as I used to when facing off Dib one-on-one, "I AM ZIM!"

: J :

As we walked into They Fight's "camp", if you could even call it that, I saw that some of the tents had been restored using scraps from multiple other burnt tents. The thirty-six others were up and about, cleaning up after last night's battle, making a breakfast of wild quail and dehydrated food preserves, and beginning the day's training. As I scanned the area, I noticed that our presence had not yet been made known. This was a good thing, for the only way of hiding little Zim was to use my own holographics, which limited him to staying within two feet of me. But as long as nothing separated us, he was as good as welcome here among the others.

There was no sign of Commander from what I saw, which meant he was in one of the three raggedy tents that had been pulled together. It was simple how Commander was involved in this: Zim's initiation. Commander was the one who oversaw the coming of new members, and Zim was going to have to become a member to keep Zita off my back.

As I put my arm around Zim, now known as "Eric", I felt the essence of his hatred vibrate through my hand. I could tell he despised playing the part of a lost human smeet who had the appearance of a completely innocent ten-year-old. Looking down for a moment, I saw his eyes were in the same position mine were usually in: half-closed eyelids that shadowed the flames in his pupils. He reminded me of myself so much that it was beginning to scare me. But I knew why . . .

"Just keep it low, Eric," I said to him. His eye twitched at my calling him that name. "Let me do the talking."

"I can talk for myself," he answered crudely, not even turning his head to look at me. The time I had spent with him gave me a few clues about his personality. I knew he liked doing things for himself, and I knew he was very ambitious. He seemed to dislike me pointing out mistakes or flaws in things he did, and he seemed to absolutely hate being assisted. Perhaps in training we would learn more about each other, maybe even form a certain relationship like we had had in Irken Year 57302. Of course, things were much different now than they were when Miyuki was still Tallest. Zim was young then. But comparing him now to the little smeet I had met a long time ago, I would say he has grown into a fine Irken, excluding height.

We neared the tent in the middle, which was most likely Commander's tent. Commander had a high opinion of himself sometimes, for a human who was only twenty-three years of age. But nobody questioned him; all of his plans and tactics always worked perfectly. Come to think of it, few people even talked with him. I had, of course, as had David and a few other respected members. And now I hoped Zim would be one who got to know Commander as well as I had.

I peered in, Zim still next to me, and spotted Dib sitting at a desk full of holes that was covered in blueprints and schematics. David, Brittany and Nina were around him, discussing the newest plan to infiltrate some Irken base. They looked up at me as I walked in calmly.

"Jiss!" exclaimed David. "Hey, I thought something happened to you!" The idiot. Not only had he spoken to me before Commander had, but what he said was of little relevance. He deserved to be put on night guard duty. Luckily, before he could say more, Commander silenced him by putting a hand up. Always count on Commander to rescue me from David's idiocy.

There was silence as he stood up and put his hands down on the desk. Brittany and Nina stood up straight as well and did not move nor speak, knowing to respect Commander as he decided what to say to me. David, the imbecile, was still looking through the papers and not paying any mind to anything going on.

"You didn't respond to the morning number call," said Commander to me suspiciously. I held my breath, hoping I wasn't in trouble. Not responding to number call was serious in his eyes; it usually meant you had been kidnapped or were dead. When you showed up before him after not responding to number call, you were in trouble. Big trouble. Hopefully adding a new recruit member would take his mind off my punishment.

Commander glanced down at Zim, whose eyes were wide as he stared at him. It was as if Zim knew something about Commander that nobody else did - something that he despised as much as the IDR even. He wasn't moving. I saw the invisible fire in his eyes that told me he hated Commander being near him, as if they had met and he remembered something horrible about him. Of course, there was no way Zim knew anything about Earth or its people, including Commander. He had never been to Earth before as far as I knew. I glanced up at Commander and saw that he, too, looked as if he recalled something about the appearance of this person before him.

He walked from behind his desk and up to us. He kneeled down next to Zim and squinted his eyes behind his goggles as he stared at him. This was the strangest thing I had seen in a while: Commander confused.

"So," he said to me, still looking at Zim, "you found a little friend?"

"Yes Sir," I answered. "His name is Eric." There was another moment without words as Commander looked into Zim's big eyes. He leaned slightly closer, and I saw Zim's enraged expression suddenly turn to total oblivion and innocence, as if something in him snapped. He slowly lowered his head and moved behind my legs like a little lost smeet.

"Uh, hi," he peeped, his voice cleverly disguised as that of a human boy: tiny, high-pitched and frightened. It amazed me seeing him playing out his part so well. For a while I was concerned he was going to lose it and cry out something that would give it all away, but here he was acting like he knew nothing except that I had found him in the woods and he was scared of this place.

Commander had on a pondering look as he stared deep into Zim's eyes and ordered softly, "Say something again. I want to hear you speak."

What was going on? Had I missed something? This was supposed to be all too simple. I get Zim initiated, train him, and we battle for the better cause, side-by-side as trainer and trainee. But here these two acted as if they knew each other, Zim especially. There must be some bit of information that they had never told me, something that connected the two somehow. Something . . . but what?

"What should I say?" asked "Eric" cutely, his voice differing so much from what it normally was that I never would have guessed it was him if I had not known. At hearing Zim speak once more, Commander smiled. I wasn't quite sure why.

"Well, Jiss, what do you plan to do with the little guy?" he asked me in play, standing up to face me once more. I almost collapsed with relief. I thought for sure I was going to be in big trouble for this, but is was obvious he was going to let it go. Now . . . what did I plan to do with "Eric"? I had to explain my plans for him in the right way, or Commander would never allow him to stay. What to say, what to say . . .?

"Commander," I addressed him formally, "I plan to train him to become a member of They Fight and aid us in upcoming pilfering missions. Do you approve?"

He seemed to think about the idea as Zim continued to play out the act of "Eric", and then answered, "Yes, I do. You may leave, Jiss, and begin teaching him basic training skills."

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Author Notes:

Look back to paragraphs 3 and 5 in Jiss's part. She acts as if she's met Zim before. She knows a lot about him already, in fact, but does not know that he is the one who conquered Earth. She doesn't know that Dib and Zim have met, and Dib doesn't know that Zim and Jiss have met. Zim actually doesn't know that he has met Jiss, either. God, this is so confusing… Ugh…

Meh. Chapters 4, 5, and 6 will clear things up . . . and bring on a huge problem. Hold onto your seats, readers.