Author's Note: For anyone that doesn't know, I'm Toaster (underscore) Phantom on livejournal. (Click the homepage link on my profile to get to my journal.) I'll be adding in extras from time to time that won't appear in the story. I'll also have previews of each chapter before they come out.

And just so you don't think my math is wrong: fifty people were on the ship when Zim left. One was born, two died. 50 plus 1 minus 2 equals 49. 49 minus 1 (Dib) equals 48. Take 1 more away for Keef, whose perspective you're reading from for the first scene, and you get 47.

Also, a couple of you are asking question about the plot (will so-and-so appear, how did Zim choose who to bring, is such-and-such going to happen). I really can't answer any of those questions beforehand because I don't want to give away any of the plot. Any spoilers that I feel I can give you will be on my LJ, and any semi-spoilers that I don't think give away too much of the plot line will be on my profile.

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Chapter Two: Judge Me Not

The hot parched air was difficult to breathe, and the oxygen level was noticeably lower than what he had been accustomed to on Earth. He felt the tug on the chain held by the undersized alien walking in front of him, stumbling forward. The rugged brown garments fit poorly, and his ankles and wrists had already begun to chafe from the tight fabric. He fidgeted, adjusting his shoulders—one of the few places the fabric hung too loosely. The clinking of chains sounded from behind him, jingling with the steps of the forty-seven people behind him.

Zim turned sharply, stopping on some sort of platform. He jerked at the chain, which Keef took as a sign to stand next to him. The rest of the party followed suit. Keef should have been fascinated by this—the sight of aliens rushing back and forth, the foreign machinery that lined the walls and streets hallways, the sounds of species he had never dreamed could exist should have thrilled him to no end. Instead of being overjoyed from the new sights and sounds, or even terrified by the thought of being light-years away from home, though, he simply felt crestfallen; but it was from neither captivity nor homesickness, nor even the poor conditions that this feeling originated.

"I guess Dib was right about you," he murmured, watching the lights around the platform flicker one at a time.

Zim placed one hand on a black pad. It lit up with a diffused red glow, sweeping across Zim's palm.

"If it's taken you the whole ride to Irk to figure out that I'm an alien, you're far stupider than I have given you credit for," Zim told him coldly.

Keef felt a sudden queasiness wash through him as the lights intensified; whirring sounds emitted from the wall. The humans fumbled in confusion, a few falling over each other.

"No," he said plainly. "I've known that for a while. I didn't really care. I meant that Dib was right about you being evil."

An elongated silence hovered around them. Only a faint clink of the chains and an occasional cough could be heard from the crowd. The lights dimmed and the whirring slowed, soon dying out altogether.

Keef strode in time behind Zim, feeling the fabric scratch at his ankles. Zim walked slower than before, seeming to contemplate something.

An Irken in solid red who Keef guessed was about five feet tall stepped forward, snapping a metalloid ring around his neck. Keef reached up to rub his neck, feeling the metal press against his collarbone. He touched the black band around the edge, feeling it squish inward and leaving an imprint of his fingers. The red light on the side blinked.

"That's to make sure you don't try to escape," the Irken said, deep voice echoing softly through the hall. Escape…

Lost in his own thoughts, he failed to notice that he had been pulled back into motion. Zim unchained him from the group and pushed him through a transparent red sheet of light that seemed to serve as a wall. The device around his neck beeped and flashed green.

Zim turned and stepped away to unlock the next human, his metallic legs clicking softly against the floor. He thrust Gaz into the cell, smirking as she stumbled forward. She spun back, growling and charging at him. She hit the wall of light, froze, and was flung backward. She tumbled to the ground, skidding across the floor, braced on her elbows. He could hear the floor screech painfully as her skin rubbed across the floor.

"The moment I get out of here, Zim, I'm going to tear your damn arms and legs off three inches at a time, and then I'm going to make every single fucking circuit in your stupid pak go haywire!"

"I'd like to see you try, little Gaz," he said mockingly, pushing the next human into the cell. Seven more followed.

"Don't you think it's a little hypocritical for you to call me little?" she hissed. He sent her a sharp glare and turned to walk to the next cell.

"I used to think Dib was wrong about you being evil, Zim," Keef said lowly, eyes downcast.

Zim turned to face him, narrowing his eyes. "For an Irken there is neither good nor evil, only traitors and loyalists; victors and vanquished." Keef swallowed hard, letting the thought set into his mind. In Zim's mind, he was the hero. His loyalty to his planet—that was what he defined as 'good'. Keef and the others were just prisoners of war—a sacrifice that had to be made for the good of the empire.

Keef felt a sinking feeling in his stomach, a sudden faintness washing over him. He let himself fall back onto the floor.

…neither good nor evil…

How long had it been since he slept? He couldn't remember.

…I've been stupid…

The sounds in the background began to fade.

…should've listened…

Gaz was yelling at someone, but the words sounded almost foreign, and so far away.

…might have been able to help…

The cold of the floor was numbing.

…wouldn't be here if…

His mind clouded over, and he began to drift away.

---

She felt him thrust her into the cell, with no more or no less force than the last human. Her knees buckled from exhaustion and she tumbled to the floor. The ring around her neck beeped and flashed green to signify that she was, indeed, trapped within the walls of red light with no escape. It was an improvement on the conditions in the ship, as the lighting was much better and it was far roomier. The idea of slavery, however—of being on constant watch, of never having free will, of being at the mercy of whatever beasts owned them…. She shuddered. She did not want to think about it.

Dib was leaned against the back wall, eyes closed. She almost mistook his state for sleep, but he seemed unnerved, a deep scowl etched into his face, eyebrows forming a soft 'v'. He was deep in thought, she concluded, likely forming escape plans and running through them, only to realize that not a one of them could ever work. She would not doubt that he had been doing this for hours. She quietly sat down next to him.

He groaned, raising his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, readjusting his glasses. "There has to be something…" he said under his breath.

She placed a hand on his shoulder, quivering slightly. "You'll…um…" she stammered slightly, looking across the cell at the other eight Earthlings. "You'll figure something out," she told him, with much more confidence than she felt. Still, if Dib could not save them, no one could. He was the single strand of hope in their hopeless situation. Every last one of them knew that.

He sighed, smiling halfheartedly. "But it's the waiting…." He lowered his voice, and somberly gazed across the cell. "Right now I—all of us—are powerless. Taking too long to come up with a plan means that people could be lost—dead, sold, miles away…. I want to make it out of here with as many people as possible. The people are weak, famished; and the Irken Empire will think nothing if a few humans die." He looked her in the eyes. "Never trust one of them. They're the enemy. Remember that, Gretchen."

She nodded solemnly.

The guard, who Gretchen recognized to be the one who had put the collars on them, slid a large vat of some type of slop through the red light. She crawled over to it, peering over the edge. It didn't appear much more edible than whatever it was that Zim had fed them, but it was food. The other eight captives swarmed around the tub, hungrily gobbling up as much as they could. Only Dib remained where he was, staring off into the distance grimly, deep in thought.

She bit her lip, tempted to try to get him to eat again, but decided against it, digging her hands into the strange green stew and drawing it to her mouth. She swallowed, shuddering from the cold, bitter taste left in her mouth. She tried to remember the taste of cheeseburgers, of bagels, of bologna, of snickerdoodles…. Anything but this. She sighed in defeat, digging her hands into the gruel once more.

---

The former soldier marched through the halls of the Irken Universal Building, her head held high as she boarded the platform along with several others of her race. She impatiently pressed her palm to the scanner, tapping her foot. A diffused glow emitted from the pad, and the hum of the machinery began. She hated the mass teleporters that littered every governmental structure in the empire. After years of flying, it seemed so sluggish just standing and waiting. They could have made quicker teleporters—everyone knew that. Of course, keeping them slow meant that there was more time to scan the entrants. In the past one hundred years, there had been more than fifty attempts on the lives of the Tallest. Some of the assassins had even been Irkens (defects, of course, or at least that was what the public had been told).

These scans were mostly a scare tactic, she concluded, and it worked surprisingly well. She had been on Irk for more the four years now, and not once had an assassin gotten through the security system.

"So, I hear there's a new shipment of slaves in," the burgundy eyed Irken beside her said casually, rocking back and forth on his heels.

The worst part of these mass teleporters, though, was being forced to make conversation with imbeciles.

His simple attire was a sign of status: he was a civilian, probably a middle-class twit who spent most of his time doing tedious tasks that were deemed too important to be handled by slaves, usually monitoring security or verifying documents, possibly even managing a shop or a fast food. He had likely never even been outside of their solar system.

"So I've heard," she hissed.

"From… uh, what planet was it?" he asked, antennae twitching as he racked his brain.

"Earth," she said coolly. "I've been there once before. The inhabitants are stupid, weak, filthy, worthless piles of flesh. The few that aren't stupid are as impudent as they come. A poor choice, unless you want something that does nothing but whine, eat, and sleep."

"My neighbor said that he saw them being transported here," he continued merrily. "He said they were tall."

She repressed a growl. The Empire was overflowing with idiots. Did they honestly think that height and intelligence and power were somehow linked? In her short experience, it seemed that the taller the humans were, the more ignorant they became. If only they knew….

"So I've heard," she grumbled. The lights dimmed and the whirring slowed, and she brushed past him onto the floor. The amethyst tile seemed to stretch forever in both directions, fading into the ruby tile of the rounded ceiling. Hurriedly she marched up to the guard, eyes narrowed.

"Can I help you?" he asked monotonously, not even bothering to make eye contact.

"I'm here to test a slave," she announced, annoyance biting at the edges of her voice. It was the slave level! Why else would she be there?

"Any particular—"

Before he even finished, she was stalking along the cells. Vortian, Medici, Plebeian, and various other species filled the chambers. She was unconcerned with these. She had only one in mind, and she had no doubt that he was here. Zim would never allow him to stay on the planet.

At last she reached them, the undeniable stench of human permeating into the receptors on her skin, the all too familiar odor registering in her pak. She touched one claw to the neural implant in her forehead, shaking away the sensation. She was not in the mood to deal with its… malfunctions.

"You!" a voice snarled. She turned her head slightly to see the plum-haired teenager less than an inch away from the protective beam, shaking in anger, lips curled and eyes abnormal wide. "What the hell are you doing here?" she demanded.

His sister's yells were enough to draw him to his feet. The pale, thin human stood in the corner of the cell nearest his sister, eyes widened behind coke-bottle glasses at the figure standing in front of him. No sound came from his mouth, but the letters formed perfectly on his lips.

Tak.

"It's been a while, Dib," she stated, eyes narrowed and arms folded across her chest.

After six years, there stood the second Irken he had ever met, just as he remembered her, accent and all.

She reached through the crimson ray, leaving a long and narrow gap between her wrist and the floor. Her fingers curled around his collar, pressing into the soft foam-like substance. She pulled him toward the light, and for a moment he was almost sure it was going to zap him. Instead, the collar beeped and the light flashed green. He was now on the other side of the light field.

She tugged on the collar, dragging him behind her. The fact that she was hardly more than four feet tall in comparison with his more than five and a half made this awkward for both, and extremely uncomfortable for Dib.

"What are you doing?" he hissed, trying to keep in step behind her. She seemed rushed, even… unnerved? From what he remembered of her, she was generally composed and self-assured. It struck him as odd.

She stopped at the guard, who was checking the conditions of the Plebeians. She pushed Dib in front of her, scowling. "I'd like to sign it out for the day," she told him, more of a command than a request. He nodded, holding what looked to Dib like some sort of laser up to his collar. He pressed a button on the side and the collar's green light flashed and beeped again. He held a tablet with palm scanner on it. Tak pressed her hand to the pad, which lit up with the same diffused glow of the teleporter. When the light faded, she pushed Dib through the hall, not waiting to talk to the guard any further.

"What's going on?" Dib insisted coldly. She merely pushed him forward. Deciding that he was going to get nothing out of her unless she planned on telling him in the first place, he sighed and kept walking. At least this would mean getting out of that crowded cell and seeing a little more of the planet.

---

Every piece of the planet was artificial. There were no plants, no animals, no landscape—only glassy magenta structures stretching as far as the eye could see against the backdrop of a cloudless crimson sky. Irkens rushed back and forth, most of which were dressed much more simply than any of the Irkens he had seen before. Civilians, he concluded. Most of them had seemed to regard Tak with a level of respect.

He noticed that he was not the only non-Irken in the city, as many Irkens were trailed by slaves. Several he recognized from the files saved onto Tak's Spittle Runner—Vortians were the most common, as well as Aragonians, Hapzoids, and a species that appeared almost Elvin.

The current street was filled with shops. Some contained what he assumed were appliances of some sort, some held weapons, some sold food, and there were even a few clothing stores. It almost reminded him of Earth, in a strange sort of way. He could not help but feel a sudden homesickness welling inside of him.

Tak looked out the window on her side of the taxicab, drumming her claws on her arm. She seemed less anxious than she was earlier; now she merely appeared bored.

He touched his fingers to his temples, wincing. This damn headache! It was like his heart was pounding against his skull!

The cab swung left through a tunnel, stopping at a gate. The sign was in Irken, so Dib had no way of knowing where they were. Tak nodded, handing several coins he assumed were Irken currency to the driver. The driver smiled, chuckling to himself as he counted the coins. "Anytime you need a driver, Ma'am, feel free to look me up," he told her, saluting.

She narrowed her eyes in annoyance, climbing out of her door, boots clicking as she hit the metallic ground. She opened Dib's door, pulling him to the ground. His bare feet hit the ground, burning from the heat. He winced but walked alongside Tak with no complaint. She obviously had some ulterior motive for bringing him here, and knowing Tak, it in some way involved humiliating Zim.

The hum of the taxi faded into the background as it sped away.

"Identify yourself!" the gate's automated voice demanded.

"Tak," she announced. "Room three hundred seventy-two."

He shifted on his feet, picking one of them off of the searing metal ground. The heat was excruciating! He would do just about anything at the moment to have his shoes back.

The gate hummed mechanically and slid open, allowing the two of them to walk inside. Irkens and alien slaves crowded the courtyard, ranging from civilians to others dressed militarily as Tak was. She pushed past a few of them, dragging Dib by his wrist to the nearest teleporter. Unlike the ones at the Universal Building, these required no verification. Tak simply pushed a few buttons and the two were instantly transported into a hallway. Like most Irken architecture, the ceiling was high and tubular, decorated with complex and tightly winded circular structures in brilliant shades of green.

Tak stood in front of one of the doors and pressed what he at first thought was a doorbell. An emerald beam shone from a tiny light on the wall, sweeping over the Irken. The door swished open.

It's another type of identification, he thought to himself. The Irkens certainly valued their security. He followed Tak inside her chamber and the door closed behind them.

The indigo walls rose into a soft dome, a crystalline amethyst orb at the zenith shining with a pale luminosity. Sapphire crystals spiraled down the sides of the walls, glistening. The ceiling was lower than it had been outside, and his hair occasionally brushed against the ceiling.

Tak took her seat on the silver bench, smirking. "I'm sure you're wondering why you're here," she began. "My motives are my own, but this I will tell you now: I'm going to help you."

Dib's eyes widened, Tak's words slowly sinking in. She could not be serious, and yet it all seemed to make sense: her apprehension when in the Universal Building, her haste in getting away from the crowds, the fact that she sought him…. If she simply wanted a slave, she would have no reason to pretend to be on his side. Even saying those words was probably considered an act of treason on her planet, and she would never risk it meaninglessly.

Tak hates Zim, he reminded himself. This is revenge. It made sense that she would want to help them. It would prove Zim's incompetence.It would be even worse then never conquering a planet at all, because it would mean that the escapees knew some of the inner workings of the empire and could steal technology. Because Earth was so secluded and undeveloped, it was an easy target. If the slaves returned to the planet, not only would they be informed with everything they needed to know to bring down the Armada, but they would know the exact coordinates of the planet. They would be able to sabotage the single most important building in the entire intergalactic Irken Empire. Zim would be deemed more than incompetent—he would probably be executed, from what Dib knew of the mercilessness of the empire.

"I will tell you what you need to know as you need to know it," she told him, "but in the meantime, don't do anything stupid."

Still, what if she betrayed him? What if she freed them, only to lead them into a trap? Zim would be put to death—or at least exiled—and Tak would be venerated as a hero.

"How do I know I can trust you?" he asked her, folding his arm across his chest and narrowing his eyes.

"You aren't going to make this easy for me, are you…" she hissed under her breath, hanging her head. The dim light glowed ethereally across her features. "Fine. Sit. But you must swear that as long as I am alive, you will never repeat a single word of what I am about to tell you."

He studied her for a moment, making his way to the bench with all the speed of molasses. Even as he sat next to her, a cold chill ran down his spine and every muscle in his body tensed. He touched his fingers to his forehead, cringing. His head was throbbing! The closer he was to Tak, the worse it seemed to get….

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Author's Note: I actually hadn't planned including Gaz until chapter three, but I started writing, and there she was! So, yeah. Cliffhanger. I had planned to write a little more, but I decided to leave it for the next chapter. I tried to put in a little foreshadowing, though. Anyone who guesses where I'm going with this gets virtual cookies. I should be getting some Valentine's Day-ish things out soon. I think at least one of them should be IZ.

Don't forget to review! Remember, I love constructive criticism! Don't hesitate to point out mistakes, whether grammatical, contraditions to canon, OOC-ness, contraditions to something I've said earlier in the story, etc. :)