Saving Zim by Dib07

Summary:

He was almost autumnal in a sense, as if he had lost the leaves of youth and didn't quite know what to do as a chill swept in. There was a gloom in his eyes, and a new slouch to his shoulders. When he held Dib's gaze in the rear-view mirror on the way home there had been something in his eyes, something that he couldn't quite say.

Disclaimer:

I do not own the IZ characters. However this story and this idea is mine.

Cover art beautifully made by TheCau! All credit goes to her, please do not use without his permission, thank you :)

Warnings:

Character angst. Blood. Swearing.


Dib07: Boom! Updates! Sorry for the wait - now and again I'll pop back to 'tweak' them as I go, but they're more or less as good as they'll ever be I suppose. Hope you enjoy! Thanks for the continued support and love. You've kept me going!

Guest

Hey no worries, I just hope you enjoy these slightly newer editions! Looking back did make me feel nostalgic and got me back into the swing of things again.

Guest

Oooh I know... I do have a terrible self-destructive nature that I have kind of adopted since school. School was really harsh with my creativity, always doing me down and making me feel ashamed. And I think that's why I feel so negligent and disappointed with my own work. I always strive to do better, but in the end I end up loathing the very stepping stones that helped me to progress. I am hard on my own work. And yeah you're right, so many love this story, I needed your encouragement, and I wanna make amends by putting these back up without ever removing sections. These will stay up for good. Sending good vibes your way, your words helped me move forwards.

Larrimeme

The Tallest are pretty hilarious and sneaky! And poor old Zim needs a new battery and a S.I.R unit! Better hurry up and go to a market Zim and I hope you have enough money! And yeah, it's not Gir's fault at all, the lil' dude - the conflict between them is really sad. Lol glad you like Clara! *I'm getting all sappy!*

little side-note:

Please review, same as always, it might make new chapters appear faster!


A Night Out

He turned away from the icy railings and made his way to the car that had frosted over with a thin layer of snow; making it hardly recognizable amongst the other vehicles. The door could only be opened with a hard jerk that made flakes of ice fly into his face.

Turning on the engine, or trying to, he listened to the desultory and loud coughing barks as the car struggled to life. As he battled to entice life into the cold hulk of metal, the headlights stuttering and flickering, he decided it wasn't such a bad thing that Zim had refused the offer of being taken home. The bug would have sat in the seat, listing off every damn thing wrong with the car, but at least he was a good mechanic and he might have been able to shimmy under the hood to see what was ailing it this time.

The engine caught, and a low, sickly hum echoed through the car, making it rattle and cough anew as yellowish grey diesel fumes spluttered into the air from its ice-rimmed exhaust. Gently patting the dash and blowing out a glad sigh, he backed her up and began the drive homewards. He swung round and out of the parking lot, taking a shortcut across from the Treaty. The edge of his periphery caught someone sprawling across the snow on the sidewalk, their handbag scuttling into the base of a lamppost. He flicked a look their way, slowing his car when he recognised the pale and windswept face. Shifting tidily in between parked cars and knowing he may never bring the car back to life, he hurried out, the bottom of his shoes instantly sliding out from beneath him. Swooping clumsily forwards, arms outstretched like a crooked ballerina, he was able to snag up the handbag in his fingers and shimmy over to the young girl who was trying to pick herself up. She was holding her knee and hair kept blowing in her face.

"Hey, are you okay?" He felt like he was saying that a lot lately. "You dropped this." And he lifted the handbag towards her.

Clara looked up, a slow, tentative smile appearing when she recognised him. She gratefully took the bag. "Thanks, Dib, was it?" She brushed the snow from her knees and front of her coat. "I saw a dog. It was emaciated and shivering, and when I tried to catch it, I slipped." She stepped forwards and buckled, wincing as she went to touch her knee. He brought out an arm and caught her even though it nearly made him drop onto the icy pavement.

"Looks like that dog's long gone. Do you live far from here? I can drop you off to wherever it is you wanna go. I have first rate first aid training, from when I was in skool!" It was a lame joke, and his cheeks reddened when it came out.

"It's a nice offer, but I don't want to impose." Her eyes flickered nervously his way.

"No, I insist. Besides, your knee could do with some ice on it."

-x-

The windshield began to buckle inwards, the control terminal sparking as electrical pink discharge purred across the screen and panels. Water started to seep in through every little ripped seam and crack. The ejection system wasn't working; the emergency manual override wasn't working. He pummelled his fists on the windshield, or the venting modules, the chassis and ceiling, but nothing would budge, nothing would open, and water was glugging in, filling the small cabin from every perforation until it reached the tops of his boots.

He could see him approach, that scythe of hair wasn't hard to miss, and the man's glasses reflected the iridescent pink fire as it ringed the Voot.

The man stood there a moment, the dark of his jacket a pale pink, his glass lenses bright brimstone. The water burst through the fissures, the command chair was sinking into it, the tiny cabin filling up with icy cold, and Zim could feel the water rising to his knees. Its icy touch was instant before it started to burn.

"Dib! Dib please!"

The man continued to stand there, the eyes hidden beneath the flame in the surface of his glasses, and then he turned, his figure wavering and dissipating as he began to walk away.

"No! Nooo!" He pitched forwards, his eyes convulsively blinking with one of them trapped behind a wad of padding while his right antenna flicked upwards. His distorted vision landed on something standing by his pod, the metal emanating a wire-like shine. He shrunk back and screamed, the back of his head hitting the wall, one eye darting to the spot when there was suddenly nothing there. His heart was thumping against his ribs like a bouncy rubber ball, claws violently clutching the sides of his incubation pod as he snapped looks to the floor, walls and main door to see that everything was sealed, with the laser walls still intact.

Doubling over with coughs, hand on his chest to brace the pain, he jumped when the computer spoke suddenly from above, "Master, you have two missed calls, and one recorded message. Proximity alerts went off when a human came to the door and used the doorbell, but he shortly vacated the vicinity."

"Anything else?" Zim asked, blinking to try and rid himself of the dots appearing in his one-sided vision. When he came down from the rinauh he felt rough and shaky, but the dots in his sight were new.

"No, Master. The Tallest haven't called, and nothing else has transpired. The base hasn't been breached and all systems are operational."

"And what of my S.I.R unit? Where is he located?"

"In the front living room, watching TV."

Zim kept a hand on his chest, feeling his heart finally begin to slow down. "And what of the delivery from the Tallest? What is its status?"

"Currently enroute. Expect it within twelve hours."

Zim lowered his claws and awkwardly slipped down from the pod, approaching the medi-unit with a drag in his step. The gel he had applied earlier had begun to mend the laceration across his arm. The outside flesh had more or less fused but the muscle and sinew was still under repair. He decided to keep the padding on his eye, and his midsection would just have to remain looking swollen until the inflammation went down.

Applying green unguent over the cracks under his eyes and the protrusion of anything else unsightly on his face, he removed his warm thermal wear and slipped on a fresh uniform, taking pains to straighten it out and work out the wrinkles. Only when he was back in his boots and pulling on his glossy black gloves did he feel a sense of strength returning to him. The shade of the old creature was hidden away again.

After he was done eating a sandwich for breakfast he decided to risk leaving the resting chamber. He was not going to cower for the next twelve hours.

Taking the conduit he rose to the top floor and emerged into the kitchen with his clawed hands on his hips. The clock on the wall read eight thirty in the morning. He had slept all afternoon and all night.

Gir was watching the Scary Monkey show on a slashed and torn couch. The Network was currently airing their 28th season of the show. In his lap was a bag of nachos which he greedily dipped into, often pausing to lick the crumbs off his hands. When Zim entered, the clacking of his heels preceding him, the robot looked up and gave a habitual smile. "Yous wanna watch with me?"

For a moment, the only sound between them was the tick-tocking of the mantle clock. "No, Gir. I have things that need doing. Who called?" He watched him carefully for any sign of something aberrant to his aberrant behaviour, but Gir's voice and smile was soft and authentic.

"Mary called!"

"Mary who?" He asked croakily.

"You know. The one with the big head?"

Zim unhooked his eye off him for a moment to survey the mess. Ripped plaster hung in ribbons, and tubing had come to rest here, there and everywhere. It looked like a bulldozer had charged its way in, going over the furniture a few times for good measure.

Keeping one eye on his S.I.R unit, he walked over to the phone, boots crunching on plaster and ceramic. One hand resting on his eye-pad, he picked up the receiver. 'You have one new message.' Said the automated response. He hit the 'play' button and turned up the volume dial.

He could hear Dib's husky voice speak through the phone. "Hey there, Zim. I came over earlier to introduce you to a special someone. I know you don't like anyone 'strange' near your base. Is that why you wouldn't answer, or were you too busy planning the end of the world?" There was a pause. "You there, Zim? Come on. You never miss a phone call. I know it's late, but who really knows what you get up to when the sun goes down? Call me back if you can tear yourself away from whatever weapon or evil potion you're making. Her name's Clara by the way, and I think you'll like her. Just don't eat her. Bye bye you..."

'End of message.' Intoned the robotic voice speaker. 'You have no new messages.'

He numbly placed the phone back down on its receiver.

Dib was growing up – or rather - had already grown up in the blink of an eye. Things had changed so suddenly behind his back, events, preludes and happenings closing over without as much as a sound. And now 'the Dib' had a 'girl' 'friend.' Soon he'd be off, reproducing, and adding to the vast quantity of humans on this rotten planet. He'd be a father, and he'd leave Zim behind. After all what place was there for him when Dib had little children to dote on and care for?

It made him angry. It made him want to break something.

I should have destroyed this planet a long, long time ago! Then none of this would matter!

When he looked over at Gir, he felt desperation rise from all floors, and he almost choked with the suffocation of it.

Warn Dib before he goes and reproduces! Warn him about Gir!

He leaned against the wall by the doorway, claws digging into his palm, upper lip curling.

It was just a setback, and he would solve it just like any other. And what if Gir happened to kill Dib?

Ha ha! He should think. So what? One less human to cache into the dungeon, one less obstacle in his way, one less fool to look upon.

He stepped back from the wall, claws begging to rip and slash and tear into something. How many decades of his life had he spent, sitting before another simulation? Thrown into battle without any other instructions? Just to aim and shoot and hope you didn't get annihilated?

He had chosen to be an invader when the comforts of solitude tempted him from the blood-soaked battlefields, when he was told he'd have his own tech, his own base if he could protect it, and his own S.I.R unit. He could attack the enemy at his own pace, and the promotions would come easy, so they had said. And he had believed it.

"Master?" Came that little voice.

He turned, realizing his claws were still in their stiff and rigid grasping position and attempted to relieve them by massaging each hand with the other. "Want some coffee, Gir?" He asked, struggling to stay platonic, struggling to smother the anger in his voice. He needed to devise a cage to hold the robot until the delivery of the parts arrived, but instructing Gir to do anything might trigger him. He supposed he had to take some responsibility for the way his S.I.R unit was acting. When he had turned the dials on the robot's Duty-Mode modulator all those years ago he could have stressed a component without realizing it. It was just strange that the damage hadn't presented itself until now.

"Oooh I'd love a coffee!" He said, barely pausing from his nacho-munching. On the TV screen, the stupid Monkey was swinging from the handle bars, snarling at the viewer.

Zim roamed about in the kitchen, trying to come up with ideas for this possible cage-in-the-making while hashing together some coffee. In the middle of his preparations, the computer alerted him that the proximity alarm had just been triggered.

"It's probably that infernal postman - AGAIN!" The packet of coffee he had just picked up was quickly and ruthlessly crushed in his claws. "I told them to stop ramming junk mail through MY letterbox! I don't want useless Earth trash!"

He stormed to the door, throwing on his disguise in perfunctory haste. He could only fit on one eye contact with the other covered in padding, and he threw open the door and barked out a: "Yes?"

Dib was waving warmly at him on his porch, wearing a thin and apologetic smile. As he blinked in the sunshine, he saw the stranger standing beside him. She smelled different, and he at once disliked the smell. Her hair was fluffy and brown, and her eyes were a rich amber like the Dib's. She was wearing a bulky winter coat and boots, and her thin, tepid smile was also uncertain.

Like all Irkens, he intuitively noted her tallness. She stood at the young man's shoulder, and wasn't nearly as tall as him, but, he also noted, she was wearing heels.

"Urm, hi there, Zim." Dib began, looking far more nervous than he ever usually was. "You didn't answer my call. I hope this is okay. I want to introduce you to Clara. Did... did you have another accident again? You... you look a bit..."

"Befuddled. I know." Zim answered for him as he continued to eye this 'Clara' up and down. He stepped into the wintry sunlight and pulled the door almost to a close behind him to hide the state of the interior. He reminded himself that he had to be polite if this was indeed Dib's future 'love' mate, so he put on an awkward smile that looked more like a pained grimace. Remembering their human customs, he put out his hand for her to shake and tried not to recoil too much when she took his hand in hers. "I'm Zim. Dib's very human friend because we're so very normal."

"Glad to meet you! I'm Clara. Dib's told me a lot about you."

"Eh? He has?" They parted, and Zim wiped the hand she had touched against his uniform. Finally he looked up at Dib, trying to keep his grimace neutral. "So, you have finally chosen an honourable mate for the duplication of your species. Tell me, how long does it take for a human worm baby thing to gestate these days?"

Dib visibly paled as if someone had just put a grenade down his pants. Zim's grimace deepened, wondering what on Irk he could have said wrong. Then his human began to chuckle. "Zim likes to joke," he said to a frowning and confused-looking Clara, "he's not from around here, so his humour is quite... strange."

On cue: "Where are you from, Zim?" She asked.

He hated it when he had to think fast. "Um! England! Yes! They're um... crazy over there! I am Englandish!"

Luckily that seemed to pull a funny cord with her, as she started lightly laughing. Zim watched on, anxiously tapping his claws together and throwing up confused, strained smiles.

Dib put his hands in his pockets, his smile also persistently pained and awkward. "So yeah, Clara and I are... going out. Thanks to you, Zim. I bumped into her on the way home last night. Turns out we have a lot in common."

"You bumped into her?" He didn't mean it to come out so cold and abrasive, and again the girl shot him puzzled, hurt looks.

"Yeah. She slipped and fell on the sidewalk not far from the Treaty. That's how we met." A kind of stony transformation was taking place, covering Dib's usually soft and easy features.

"So, no babies yet?" Zim asked, wondering what was going on, what he meant to say, and why Dib had even brought her along. Copulation was a private affair, as was 'mating' unless there was some other agenda? Maybe Dib had finally hoodwinked a believer, and their mission was to dupe and capture him?

Dib was getting more tempted to slap gaffer tape over the Irken's mouth. "Babies? No, Zim no! What is it with you and babies?" He shook his head and turned towards his 'mate,' "Let's get going, Clara. I've changed my mind..."

They turned round suddenly, and his desperation rose just as quickly, water was seeping in, the exits were closing, and he was suddenly terrified that Dib wouldn't stop, wouldn't turn back, would leave him... "Dib! Dib wait!"

They stopped, with the investigator turning slowly back towards him. Clara looked to Dib and tugged on the man's jacket sleeve. "The Rooster! Remember!" Was all Zim could pick up from her whispers.

The young man gave an ironical smile, and that stony front lifted. "We're going out tonight to the Rooster. Wanna come along?"

Zim could just about hear the tinny sounds of the TV behind him, and the tinny laughter of Gir. His dazed lilac eye looked up at the pair and an ill-timed breeze swept between them, causing him to bodily rattle.

"I am ever so insanely preoccupied at the moment..." He began. Dib's eyes were intently watching from behind his glass lenses that caught the light. He coughed to clear the gunk that kept getting into his throat. "Will I have to watch this... copulation ceremony?"

"Zim!" Dib winced. A flush was creeping slowly but surely into his cheeks and nose. "It's just a dinner! A nice, friendly dinner! So we can get to know each other better!" Then he discreetly mouthed the words: 'stop embarrassing me!'

"T-Tonight?"

"Yes. At nine o'clock. I can come and pick you up."

The alien tried to guess his intentions but the man's expression was closed to him. He could never quite figure out human emotions and why they did the things they did. "I shall try to be available."

Dib nodded, but was already turning away. "Well take care, Zim. And stop having accidents." Clara did a little awkward wave before following him down the path to the sidewalk.

"Yes yes. Off with you." Zim walked back inside, closed the door and tore off his disguise. Gir looked at him over the couch armrest.

He hurried into the kitchen and stayed there, lingering by the cooker as he listened to the TV and Gir's chuckles as he laughed at whatever was worth laughing about. He eventually brought himself out of the bubble just long enough to pour coffee, but his shaking was so violent that the boiling liquid splashed onto the countertop. He watched the chocolate-brown liquid drip down the lintel and cupboards, and when his claws reached for the coffee mug the following moments had the ceramic flying to the floor, with fragments joining the spillage.

His antenna felt movement. He spun, PAK pressed to the wet countertop. Gir was looking in on him, that happy misplaced smile melting at the edges.

"Don't you fucking cry!" Zim snapped, trembling. "D-Don't you dare!" He stepped forwards just close enough to swing the kitchen door shut, shutting Gir out in the process, not that thin metal doors would do much good from a S.I.R unit if he meant to use his weapons with intent.

He stooped down into a corner, claws tightly holding his shoulders as he watched the door with one eye.

When the first tear fell, another shortly following, he used a claw to angrily swipe at his cheek, nicking the skin.

Nine o'clock fast approached, and he thought of refusing the offer and telling Dib where to shove it, but another rattling chuckle from Gir in the next room had him drop another batch of coffee he had just made to make up for the last one, and his second ceramic cup exploded. He went to unbury the miniature mop and dust pan when the computer began to clear it up for him without waiting for the order.

He was worn thin of strategic plans for escape when it might just be another stupid and pointless 'social gathering' of the Dib's. He was reminded of that prom night in high school not long before he quit. He and Dib stood at the boundary of the event all night, watching others dance and have fun. It had been one of the longest and pointless nights he had ever suffered.

Zim slowly straightened, watching the computer mop up the broken ceramic fragments and coffee with a dishcloth affixed to an extending tube as another tube with a dust pan and brush swept up the mess with hasty efficiency. In seconds the spillage was erased, and as a last perfunctory measure the computer sprayed the clean area with a disinfectant spray.

He stared at where the mess used to be, wondering if his life would amount to the same thing: of broken fragments hygienically and efficiently erased – as if his life and the hereafter concerning anything of his failed existence would be dissolved just as quickly.

His smooth antenna ruefully lifted when he heard a car beeping its horn outside. He made no connection after the first few beeps, and when something clicked he was hurrying to the sink to remove the bandage over his eye before slipping his contacts on and fitting a spare wig into place. His eye was healing, the pain was not quite so unbearable, and some vision was there, presented as muddy water where colours and shapes were fuzzy undefined things, but when he went past Gir to grab his coat and scarf, his side cramped, causing him to hang in the doorway, holding his abdomen until the cramp passed.

Cauterizing the wound as standard would address the 'oozing' of it, but he wasn't sure how much internal damage was still healing, and if blocking it up could ultimately lead to an infection. He was unsure how to go about 'wounds' and 'injuries' that lasted more than a day. Without the PAK to dismissively take care of it for him, the rinauh had been exceedingly effective at helping him forget the comedowns of mortality.

He flung his arms into the sleeves of his coat and slipped a pink scarf around his neck. Gir looked up from the torn-up couch wearing his doggy uniform, even though Zim hadn't given him the order to wear it. The TV flashed with the latest news headlines predicting stormy weather. "You goin' out? Can I come?" He asked.

"No, Gir. It's just..." He stopped, realizing he had automatically put on his disguise and all his outdoor clothing as if he was already committed to going out without further thought. His indomitability cracked at the edges when there was a pounding knock at the door, followed by the sharp, jangly rings of the doorbell. He leaned his PAK against the purple wood of the door, staring at the dishevelled lounge, saggy wallpaper, and Gir.

He tried not to stare in case it might 'trigger' him, and realized that if he didn't look, if he didn't keep an eye on him, he would no longer be able to tell what colour the robot's eyes were.

There was another series of knocks that sounded desperate, and another ringing jangle of the doorbell. When he took a sharp squeeze of breath there was a rubber-band of pressure around his chest.

"Zim?" Came the muffles of the Dib through the door. "Are you alright in there?"

Suppose Dib had never changed? That, all along, his amity had been a ruse to weaken him over time, to wick away his towers and walls and ramparts so that he could storm an unprotected keep? How much had he seen through the guise he had so carefully crafted? Did any of the cracks show?

He flipped round, closed his claws on the door handle and pulled. As soon as he had flung the door open, Dib was bending down, eyes wide as if something disastrous had just happened. "Are you okay?" Dib wore an equally baggy black coat, and his scythe of hair was flashing this way and that in the gusty winds. Even Zim had to keep a hand on his wig to keep it from flying off in the dark.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"I just... I thought..." He blinked, and shook his head as the wind tussled and beat at his hair. He stood back up and gestured at the ugly blue Toyota parked at the curb that only made Zim heavily sigh. You'd think, after the hundredth time of fixing it, the idea might get into Dib's head that he was better off with a newer, better model. "You ready?"

He could see Clara sitting in the front passenger seat – a seat that had always been his. When she caught him looking, she meekly lifted a hand and waved. He didn't wave back.

Dib was peering in through the door at the messy interior. "Hey, what happened to the..." The door shut with a bang and Zim was marching down the porch steps to the sidewalk, fists swinging at his sides. The human paused for a moment before hurrying against the brushings of snow and screaming gales to catch up with him.

The interior of the car was cold and not that much different to the icy temperatures outside. When he struggled up to the seat, Dib closing the door after him, he took some of his frustrations out on the seatbelt, strangling it in his claws and fighting it into position when it kept trying to slap his face off. The conversation at the front was icy too, as if his presence was intrusive. Dib tried to make conversation which sounded strained at best until he shortly gave up and put on the radio.

When they arrived, the restaurant was toasty warm and brightly lit, promoting a sense of comfort as the storm raged outside. The booths were reasonably empty, and Zim wordlessly chose the one nearest the back where he could sit next to the window.

He kept a suspicious eye on the human pair, wondering what they were up to, and what his possible involvement could mean when he saw just how nervous the Dib was. He stuttered when he spoke which he never normally did, and his skin looked clammy with sweat. He was overly clumsy too, often spilling his diet poop and dropping the menu several times. It seemed to him that the more Dib interacted with this Clara, the more he stumbled with his words and the clumsier he became. If this was 'love,' than it seemed more of an affliction than anything else.

He sipped a little of his tea, and listened to the humans talk stupid trivialities. Whenever Clara's attention fell on him and asked questions, he felt like he was dodging bullets. All the while he kept looking to the door across from them, wondering what excuses he should make up so that he could hurry and leave.

"So, what are your hobbies?" Was Clara's latest hurdle for him to overcome.

"H-Hobbies?" He returned nervously, swallowing.

"What are you good at?"

"Urm. Designing stuff for... stuff! You know! Like... um, nuclear weapons to help with... the human crisis?" He really hoped she would not cross-examine him on the answers he gave, as he would never remember half of them. Dib just shrugged whenever Zim looked to him for help. He also pretended that he was an unemployed wormbaby looking for work in the 'shambles' of human society, and when she asked him if he had any family, he said yes, he had two parents who lived in closets.

Clara sounded about as fake and as awkward as he did. Zim gave her one of his worried smiles whenever her attention was on him, hoping she would go back to concentrating on his Dib. Eventually she excused herself and went to the restroom. While she was gone, Dib leaned forwards across the table and asked, "So? What do you think of her?"

"Well, is she applicable?"

Dib had to look at him twice. "Applicable? What does that mean?"

"You know... appropriate for your...urm... needs?"

"Zim, she's not livestock. She's a human being!"

Zim couldn't get his head around her sudden importance, and what Dib had to do with her. Was 'love' something you suffered, something you felt, something that hurt? Once, long ago, he had loved, or thought he had loved. Every Irken baby had a maternal instinct to love a mother that didn't exist. As soon as he was brought into cold existence, the love and need to attach himself to someone or something had made him ache. The first thing he had turned to was a robotic arm that had opened him from the hatchery. Then his animal instincts were marshalled away in the next few moments, suffusing knowledge via cables filling his PAK and brain with the Empire's pitiless philosophy and knowledge. From that moment on he had hardened himself to survive.

"That's your problem, Zim. You don't care about anyone. So of course you wouldn't understand." Dib continued as he ran a finger down the glass of his diet poop, creating a mark in the condensation.

Zim sneered at him. "I do! I care about Gir! And I care about my mission!"

"It's not the same thing. Besides, Gir's a robot. He isn't real. And does your mission mean all that much to you when there's so much more to live for?"

Just when he was about to retaliate with something of an explosive reply, Clara returned, and Dib decided to make a toast.

"To finding happiness or something!" He said, and clinked glasses with Clara. Zim observed their ritual, finding the whole charade idiotic. Their meals arrived to break the tedium of their insanity just as he was contemplating how quickly he could run to the door.

A dish was placed in front of him of caramel ice cream that was saturated in whipped cream, shiny cherries, chocolate sauce, toffee sauce and sprinkles alongside a cup of coffee. He had had 'human' ice cream before, and its frozen composition didn't give him an allergic reaction like most food stuffs, probably because there were fewer toxins, bacteria and other impurities.

Clara found it amusing to see that he had ordered a dessert and not a hot meal for his main course. "Why did you order that, Zim? Didn't like what was on the menu?"

The Irken paused, the spoon filled with cream and cherries half way to his mouth before he lowered it. He was running dry of energy and ammunition to keep up with her and her inquisition. It wouldn't be long before he cracked and said something to her that would accidently reveal his identity.

This time Dib came to the rescue. "He doesn't eat all that much. Besides, I think having dessert instead of a main isn't a bad idea."

Zim sighed in relief which caused some coughing, and he started tucking into his ice-cream sundae. Clara was eating some weird fish-food concoction that smelt awful, and Dib was snacking on a burger and fries. When he was half way through his sundae, he noticed that the table had begun to slowly rock and tilt from side to side. The conversations he could hear from Clara and Dib was muffled and distant as if he was trapped behind a glass wall. He looked up to see if they were noticing anything unusual only to abruptly feel light-headed. The voices around him continued to sound distorted and hazy, and the floor shifted and moved as if oil was running across it.

I must be feeling a little... ill. He thought, rationalizing the sensation from eating too much ice cream. He tried to push through it, thinking it would pass, that it must surely pass, but the table continued to tilt, and he felt as though he was drifting through space in his Voot without its stabilisers engaged.

Dib was starting to look at him suspiciously.

The sensation was not alleviating itself, and his panic continued to rise. He wanted to be alone; wanted to hide any weakness before it could show.

"Um, need to use the junk or whatever. Bye!" And he slipped down from the booth and hurried towards the reception area where restroom doors symbolised different genders. He pushed through the door labelled 'MEN.'

"Unusual friend you have." Clara said, chewing on the last of her salad. "Can I ask a question?"

"Sure, go ahead." He wiped his lips on the napkin provided.

"Why does he have green skin? And how come he's so... small?"

He's an alien. He wanted to say so badly. And maybe she'd believe him. And maybe she wouldn't. Regardless, he didn't want Zim to get between them. This was his life and he couldn't afford to keep fucking it up. "He has this skin condition," he heard himself say on autopilot, "...had it since we were in school. As for his size, I suppose he's got some stunted growth issues."

"Is he... sick?"

"No. Why? He just has a cough. It comes and goes."

She pushed her plate away and sipped from her wine. Dib tried not to keep staring at her. She was stunning in that long black sequinned dress that was trimmed in purple. She wore dark lipstick that went well with the black too. Her hair had been curled into bunches, and her eyelashes were long and bushy. Being with Zim made him less nervous, but he was still a stuttering wreck, and he felt guilty for having dragged the old bastard along just so that he wouldn't be alone with her, like a kid that still needed someone to hold his hand.

"Shall we order coffee? I don't really fancy dessert." She said, looking towards Zim's melting sundae.

They ordered when the waiter returned to take their plates away, and Dib ordered Zim another coffee since he wasn't there to order. When the waiter scurried away again, he pulled back his chair and left the table. "I'd better head on over to the restroom as well. That diet poop went straight through me."

-x-

The floor continued to rock and sway. It felt as though he was trying to walk across a wobbly, swaying bridge held together by fraying rope. He made it to the toilet stall and shut the cubicle door behind him, flipping the latch as he did so.

He didn't want to sit down anywhere – and even though the toilet seat and stall looked relatively clean – he saw everything as filthy. In the end he squatted down on the floor and brought up a hand to his mouth to cough into it, feeling his chest burn in reply. He took out the tiny pot of green unguent from a pocket alongside his flashmirror so that he could reapply more colour beneath his eyes.

There was no convenient dispensary to provide him with another shot of rinauh, and no computer to dispense advice.

He cursed quietly, hugging his spindly arms to his chest. He was just about to rest his head on his knees when the main door to the restroom clicked open. The Elite stiffened, trying to listen with his cramped antennae beneath the wig, and wondering how safe he was behind a latched but flimsy cubicle door.

Dib entered the restroom only to find it surprisingly empty and quiet. He quickly relieved himself at the urinal, noticing in the mirror that one of the cubicle doors was closed. He did up his fly, washed his hands, and against his better judgement quickly peered beneath the cubicle door to see a familiar pair of black boots and Zim's lower half squatting on the floor beside the toilet.

Dib straightened, puzzled. He knew how much of a germaphobe the Irken was, and Zim simply did not sit on dirty restroom floors. "Zim?" He asked softly. "It's me. You okay in there?"

There was a shuffling of feet and a string of incomprehensible curses before the words spluttered into intelligible English. "Oh yes, Zim is perfectly fine. Why wouldn't I be? I was just... eh... urinating! Is that what you humans call it when you mitigate your water?"

Dib heard the toilet flush just as he opened the cubicle door, and moved to the sinks to assess the state of his hair and Zim's staggering reflection as he walked towards him.

The Elite stalled partway before straightening, and marched with a slight grimace to the sinks. He could not wash his hands, as the sinks were too high for him to reach, and the water would have burned him anyway. He produced his own Irken soap, more aptly called 'cleansing chalk' and started rubbing his hands with it.

"You look... pale." Dib noticed, giving him a brief look. They kept to a respectable distance between them.

"And you look white. So what?"

"I'm nervous, Zim. Clara's beautiful. Don't you think? How could someone like her ever talk to someone like me?"

"She's as filthy as the rest of them. I don't see why she's so 'special.'"

Dib helplessly smiled at his crude and predicable remarks. He looked at himself in the mirror, hoping to see something attractive and 'cool' about him when in truth he looked just short of terrified. There was nothing out of place. His hair was styled just the way he liked it, and there wasn't any burger crumbs on his face but he still didn't look good enough. Was this what every guy thought when he looked into the mirror?

"It's that feeling you get, when you connect with someone." He tried to explain when Zim peered up at him with that sharp and confused stare. "It's hard to describe. Maybe I'm wrong, and there isn't a spark between us. If you chose a mate, Zim, hypothetically speaking, what would you look for? What would you find attractive?"

Zim just looked up at him condescendingly as if the human's IQ had suddenly and sharply dropped. "Again, this is where we differ, Dib worm. You... eh... monkeys are a lot more selective, fussy and emotional when it comes to making... eh... more monkeys."

"Come on, space jerk. There must have been a time when you monsters mated before the invention of technology and space travel. Don't you ever get aroused, Zim?" He felt sorry for him. Without any excitement, be it sexual or some other erotic stimulus, life must be so bland for an Irken who's only motive and passions was for an Empire. "What did you guys even do before space, and interstellar travel?"

Zim looked around, paranoid that they were discussing his Irken heritage in the men's bathroom. Dib picked up on this, fearing he would lose the conversation. "We 'humans' were clubbing each other to death just for some food." he continued, thinking that debauching his own race might get Zim to open up. Using his pride against him came easy sometimes. "We were savages back then. Hell, you might even argue that we still are savages."

Zim replaced the cleansing chalk back into his little side pocket and strayed towards the door, fists knotted by his sides. The human was prying for weaknesses, for those cracks he could widen. And even if his curiosity had merit, and he was merely asking to fulfil his misplaced sense of wonder, Irken records on such things had been destroyed, abolished, and essentially erased, as if their history, no matter how applicable, could be wiped clean as easily as one deleted files on a computer. The Control Brains may know a thing or two, moments and events forever archived, but soldiers were only ever focused on the future, even if...

"Zim...?"

The Elite turned round on one heel, his smile pale and strained. "We had... wings..." He choked out, confused at this useless piece of information that he had remembered through gossip and snippets of data briefly glimpsed on his computer. He was equally surprised that he had said it.

"You guys had wings?" His eyes comically widened. "What happened to them?"

"How should I know? Now leave it be!" He had seen the vague and questionable carvings in the files of his database, carvings that had once existed in temples and lofty buildings of either stone or wood before they were demolished for the metal floorings where the Academy now stood.

However Dib came back to his earlier question. "But what would you find attractive in a female?"

The human glanced hopefully down at him, and Zim sighed when he realized it would be easier just to dismiss the idiot. "I do not understand the stupidity of your question, Dib thing. I am attracted to battle. To be..." Recognized. Valued. Remembered.

Dib went to nudge his shoulder playfully when Zim half turned, lips lifting in a snarl before he realized the contact held nothing deceiving.

It wasn't exactly the most charming answer Dib was looking for, but at least the Irken had tried when he clearly had the imagination only a cold, mathematical creature could impart. "What happened to your wings? Did you guys trade it all in for technology?" Though he was not rushing to dissect him to see what made them tick, he was eternally bound by scientific curiosity of how Irkens worked. His history with Zim had eased but not erased the crack that divided them, but it had helped him see the alien in a different light. He no longer saw him as that hunched, crooked shape surrounded by pale metal limbs with eyes glowing red.

"...That's enough information for now, Earth boy. Give you any more and you'll use it against me."

"I sure would, space monster." Dib teased.

They headed back to the booth to find that their coffee had arrived. Zim was surprised that Dib had ordered for him. This charitable act both worried and achingly pleased him. Compassion was always false, and was only there to create weaknesses that created fissures to be teased wide. He half expected a brown bag suited for his size to be under the table, or a metal crate under Clara's chair, but the pair went back to talking, and Zim sipped at the coffee, wondering if it was worth remaining tense and wary of them.

Gir had shown him kindness, whether the acts were real or not. When the other S.I.R units did their duty by the side of their masters, Gir was playing with dolls and making stupid mud pies. Zim went about his missions, hoping his military ethics would rub off on the wayward robot over time and that it would make him less childish and more warrior-like. Relentless simulations and combat scenarios had toughened him up, so the same should apply to the robot. But time and toil hadn't altered anything, only proving that Gir's nature would never change. He had tried to force that change, illegally modifying his behaviour into Duty Mode remotely, upping the robot's battlefield aggression. When he had undone the change, vowing never to meddle with Gir again after the robot had him cornered, he began to appreciate the robot's banal traits, often finding them a comfort as he grew drained and weary.

But the change he had engineered had come back, and he wasn't sure he could remember how to make another remote to channel Gir's modes if the assets the Tallest had sent weren't enough.

He was in that suffocating bubble again as he watched the two humans banter and laugh, their warmth and friendliness a strange magnetism that drew him in. Dib was cutting and shuffling a deck of cards while Clara watched with that smile, but he could get no closer to them, and if the bubble should break, he might just break with it.