A/N: Hello, everybody! I hope you're all doing well this fine Tuesday morning. As promised back in 2019, here is FINALLY a fully updated version of Chapter 2. I spent the entirety of a weekend working on these revisions and I think the narrative flows MUCH smoother now compared to the older content. So I hope you all manage to enjoy the revisions. Much love to new and old readers alike! :3
-Pat (4/6/21)
QQQQQ
A/N Update: So I'm finally getting around to updating Chapter 2 here. It's not completely finished just yet, but I figured I'd upload what I have revised so far and leave the rest for later. About roughly half this chapter is revised while the other half is still the old content. I'm just currently trying to work out how to make that second half of the chapter flow a little smoother. In the meantime though, I hope you'll all enjoy the changes I've made thus far. :3
-Pat (8/24/19)
QQQQQ
A/N: Alright. Before it gets too late, let me post the second chapter of ZADR Orange here. Not much to say save for hope you all enjoy it and feedback will be much appreciated. =3
QQQQQ
~ZADR Orange Chapter 002: -REVISED-~
Disclaimer- We do not own the cartoon that this fanfiction is written for, nor any of the characters from it. We do not make any money from the writing of this story.
Rating: M for later chapters
Warnings: EXTREME OOCness! (If you can not handle the OOCness in this story, then please click the back button now and don't even bother commenting about it. Any flamers we get WILL be blocked accordingly).
Zim's parts written by Notgonnadie
Dib's parts written by Myself (Pat-The-Kitsune)
Enjoy! =3
QQQQQ
His pride was hurt. As silly as it sounded, it really was. Although he maintained an immutable wariness of the other's empty promises, there was no denying that for a single fleeting moment, Dib had nearly convinced himself they were competing on a level playing ground. Did the other truly take him to be such a gullible idiot? If persuasion was Zim's greatest strength then his over-confidence was his Achilles heel. Certainly the Irken couldn't think he'd actually be stupid enough to simply take him on his word. Dib frowned at the Irken's almost laughable proposal before shaking his head in a somewhat disappointed manner. "No way, you're lying to me." he said despite Zim's persistence on the matter.
"Oooh, come on! How will you know if I am or not unless you let me go and see?!" Zim whined, a part of him finding Dib's distrust of the situation a bit galling, to say the very least. He could be trustworthy! In fact, he'd prove it to the other just as soon as he could touch the ground with his own two feet again, he told himself as he pointed a single toe downwards, as if to see whether he was any closer to his goal than he had been a minute ago.
Catching the other's nimble attempts to locate the floor out of the corner of his eye, Dib shifted the Irken's weight in his grip again and hoisted him up even further off the ground so he had no choice but to try and balance himself on the human's shoulder. "I just know you, Zim. You always lie to me!" he countered, certain that as soon as Zim got his way, he'd take off down the hallway and into the crush of bustling high schoolers that would no doubt be flooding out from the cafeteria soon.
Nearly losing his balance at the unexpected shift, Zim caught himself against the human's backside before angling a frustrated glare in the boy's direction. "Oh, Cooome ooooooooon! Aren't you at least a LITTLE curious?!" he half-feigned boldly despite having not a clue himself what to give the other in exchange for his freedom. Anything would do, he supposed, just so long as it was SOMETHING to prove he wasn't lying. The last thing he needed was to give the paranormal investigator any more reason to doubt him. So he'd give him whatever came to mind first upon being let down.
Dib stopped in his tracks at the sting of the other's tone, his words no longer playful or exaggerated as they had been before. Rather, there had been a temporary but vicious heat behind them, similar to what he'd experienced in the past when he could sense the other's temper rising. Perhaps he was taking things a bit too far now.
Loosening his grip on the extraterrestrial, Dib reluctantly lowered him back to the ground, a subtle ache in the back of his throat quickly replacing the unsettling desire he had to hold on to the Irken. "Fine...You can go." he released his arms from around him. "I already know you're not going to give me anything in return though no matter how interesting you try and make it sound to me!" he then snapped before he could allow his voice to crack with emotion, an overly hurt look accompanying those words as he turned to shuffle away quickly.
A wave of shock crashed over Zim at the other's unanticipated surrender, and for a moment, he could only stare after him in stunned silence for how easily he'd just given in. Was the Dib-human feeling unwell? He struggled to find his voice again, a feeling of paralysis gripping his insides agonizingly until finally a sharp jolt of panic brought him back to his senses. He couldn't just let the human walk away from him like that! He'd already concluded that he would prove his trustworthiness to the other as soon as he was free! Even if it meant coming up with something on the spot, he'd be damned if he allowed the human to think otherwise, thus proving his point.
The nerves in his arms were the first to fire up, then his fingers as he reflexively grabbed Dib by the arm again and whipped him around to face him. "HEY! Zim did not lie, pathetic meat child!" he barked angrily before plunging in headfirst with the first idea to spring into his mind. Had he allowed himself time to properly think about it, he probably would have approached the situation differently. But there was no time for thinking, no time for devising plans or hatching excuses. Only time for action. Perhaps instinct, in fact.
Zim's lips met Dib's in a crushing manner, seemingly unconcerned with consequences or loyalties in that moment. All that mattered was this urge he felt bubbling up inside him, this passion he couldn't dare deny any longer. It had been building within him for longer than he even knew, subconsciously turning hate into rivalry and rivalry into acceptance. Acceptance of their circumstances, acceptance of their similarities. Beyond that though, he couldn't see the end of the tunnel; only feel himself being swept away by the crushing force of a feeling he couldn't define. Was it respect perhaps? Friendship? He furrowed his brow in concentration. They were both feelings he'd experienced on only a very few occasions during his lifetime. But this current feeling seemed altogether different. It was new. Exciting and terrifying all at the same time. Was it 'affection?' His insides tightened at the thought before he finally pulled away.
For a long stretch of time, Dib could only stand there perfectly shell-shocked, his eyes wide and mind racing. It was like the wind had just been knocked out of him completely and catching his breath was nothing short of an uphill battle. He blinked once and felt a single tear gliding down his face, then another and another as he struggled to comprehend what had just happened. Pulling away from the Irken once he had just about managed to draw in a breath of air, he then looked away to the ground shyly, his fingers twitching and trembling until finally they came to rest against the surface of his lips. "Wh-Why did you kiss me? Y-You could have just left without giving me anything." he spoke in a surprisingly calm voice despite the ball of chaos currently unraveling within him.
For a mere moment, the question caught Zim off his guard before habit set in again and his eyes narrowed back to a glare automatically. "Hmph. ZIM is not a liar like YOU are." he answered without hesitation, crossing his arms and pouting back at the human as though insulted.
"What?! I'm not a liar!" Dib snapped his eyes back to Zim at that statement, his eyebrows slanting downwards into a glare to match Zim's own. "In fact, YOU'RE usually the one who lies to ME! Remember the time when you lied to me about Ultra Peepi?" he reminded the other, not about to let Zim get away with accusing him of being something he wasn't.
Opening his mouth to protest that claim with the same impulsivity he'd so blatantly referred to the other as a liar with, Zim then stopped himself upon recalling that fib in a single fleeting moment of unanticipated clarity. "Oh yeeeaaahhh..." he conceded in a long and drawn out reply before merely shrugging the memory, and accusation, off carelessly. "Oh well...HAH! I'M FREE!" he exclaimed triumphantly, raising two fists to the ceiling victoriously before then scurrying off with the same energy that often preceded a chase from Dib.
Dib didn't follow after the fleeing Irken however, his mind still reeling with the weight of the other's unfathomable advances on him. They left him standing motionless in the middle of the empty hallway, an irrepressible confusion his only companion in that moment all up until a feeling all too akin to regret seized his insides amidst the lingering turbulence the Irken's kiss had left him in. "Why DID you kiss me, Zim?" the words left his mouth as a quiet whisper to himself, his arms drawing themselves inward to clutch at his sleeves tightly.
QQQQQ
As the next few hours stilled into the mild hush of an early spring evening, it wasn't until they were completely alone in their respective homes that both Dib AND Zim found themselves wondering about that kiss they had shared.
Zim couldn't help but fidget restlessly on his couch. "Hmmm...The Dib-human didn't follow me today..." he mused rather tensely, having expected the large-headed human to come crashing through his door as he often times did in his routine attempts to expose him. He guessed the teen must still be freaking out over their earlier moment of intimacy. As unexpected as the gesture had been, even for him, Zim tried not to let the thought twist his insides up even more. Surely the human wasn't avoiding him just because of THAT. Perhaps he was just busy plotting his revenge or scheming about how best to expose him as an alien. The thought settled his nerves to a tepid simmer as he stared out the window with ill-concealed apprehension.
Meanwhile, back at Dib's house, the raven-haired teen laid staring at the ceiling to his darkened bedroom mindfully. He'd gone straight home after school that day, unable to focus on much else following the other's unexpected "gift" to him. For something that had likely been just a spur of the moment gesture, it certainly had carried more weight to it than just a simple peck on the cheek might have. There had been an underlying heat to it that he just couldn't rid his senses of. Bringing a single hand up to trace the exterior of his lips with, he then closed his eyes to relive the moment again. "I wonder...what he's doing right now..." he said aloud to himself before opening his eyes and going to sit up in his bed.
For some reason, the nature of Zim's earlier nonchalance had his temper rising sharply. Did the Irken even realize the implications of such an intimate gesture? The thought that the other might just be going about his everyday business without a care in the world had his heart speeding up erratically and his eyes darkening into a scowl on his bedroom door. He debated on whether to go over there and give the other a piece of his mind over it but settled on taking a walk instead, if not to clear his mind then to put him more at ease.
Zim, meanwhile, stood braced against a wall in his base's living room, single-minded apprehension having turned itself to frustration the more time went by with no sign of Dib coming to thwart his evil doings. "Where! Ow! Is! Ow! He!? OW! He ALWAYS follows me!" Zim threw out between consecutive knocks against the wall with his head. It was driving him mad waiting for the human to show up, and when it finally hit him that the other may very well be avoiding him after all, Zim pulled away to begin pacing the length of his living room floor. "Ahhh! Where is he!?" he exclaimed one final time before suddenly hearing the proximity alarm go off and gasping out breathlessly. "IT'S HIM!" he burst out instantaneously, scrambling up onto PAK legs so he could scale the walls to his base.
Squeezing himself into the wires hanging from his ceiling, Zim then peeked out his topmost window to get a better look outside. What met his eyes had his face falling in an instant though. There was no Dib approaching his base like he had hoped. "Awww...It's just a STUPID cat." he grumbled out forlornly, turning off the alarm and plopping down onto one of the hanging wires with a disgruntled pout. "He doesn't care anymore, does he...? I shouldn't have kissed him! WHY DID I HAVE TO DO THAT!?" he exploded out dramatically before slamming his head into yet another wall. Losing his balance just a split moment later though, Zim then went plummeting back down to the floor beneath him, along with the heavy mechanical wiring he'd been using as his only source of support in that moment. Little did he know that a certain paranormal investigator was currently approaching the purple and green house from afar now.
Standing on the outskirts of Zim's base tentatively, Dib stared at its looming exterior for what felt like an eternity before finally peeling his eyes away from its oddly-shaped structure. "What am I even doing here?" he sighed out to himself hopelessly. It wasn't like he could just barge in and demand an explanation from the Irken, nor did he think said invader would actually give him one even if he did. Surely the other was too proud to ever admit whatever motives may have been driving his earlier actions that day.
Turning in his spot to head away from the perimeter, Dib then stopped in his tracks upon noticing a temporary flickering of lights coming from within his nemesis' base. "What the...?" Dib looked back at the house in question, one brow lifting automatically. Was the other possibly up to something in there? he mused as he revolved on his heel to face the abnormal dwelling again. "P-Perhaps I should just check and make sure he's not up to anything evil in there." he then reasoned to himself before hesitantly taking a step forward to enter through the opening in Zim's fence.
The absent stares of Zim's lawn gnomes turned to focus in on him, though this did little to hamper the teen's current approach. Although they served as a first line of defense to Zim's Earth base, experience had taught him that they'd only attack if they registered him as a legitimate threat. He took another step forward towards the doorway and then another until he was nearly at the edge of the single-step threshold that framed the dwelling's front door. Dib breathed out a relieved sigh before a sudden crash from within the base's interior had his head snapping upwards with alarm. A faint whirring drifted to his ears as if on cue to the disruption and Dib turned to survey the six garden gnomes currently firing up their lasers with a look of unease on his face. "Uh-oh..." the two syllables left his mouth on a note of expectancy before the sound of open firing could be heard from outside, followed by the teen's panicked screams for assistance.
"AAAHH! STOP IT!" Dib bellowed out as he turned to pound at the door separating him from Zim's living room, hoping the repeated hammering would be enough to draw the other's attention. He'd come up with a reasonable excuse for being there as soon as he escaped the assault, he told himself, certain that if Zim actually answered the door as he hoped, he'd have no choice but to explain his current presence there.
Unbeknownst to Dib however, his frantic knocking fell on nearly deaf antennae, the almost distant clamor of desperate commotion outside hardly vibrating against the Irken's feelers from beneath the arresting haze of unconsciousness that was quickly taking over him. Zim had hit his head hard against the floor that had come rushing up towards him, and with the wreckage that had come down with him, he remained pinned beneath what felt like a mountain of heavy coils and wires. The slightest of twitches animated his antennae in response to the raven-haired teen's cries though, and before his vision dimmed to complete darkness, he just barely managed to utter an incoherent command to open the door before passing out completely.
And so with a soft click that came with the computer disengaging the front door's internal lock, Dib burst through the entrance with hardly a second thought, his haphazard dive through the open entryway foregoing a sudden loss of balance as he careened his way to the floor and shoved his foot at the door to force it shut behind him. A stream of rapid panting filled the empty silence as he struggled to regain his composure against a gamut of gradually decreasing heart palpitations. Once he had more or less recovered though, it was only then that his eyes trailed away from their focus on his knees, the lack of a timely response to his intrusion drawing his attention to the scene he'd failed to notice upon his entry into the other's base. The gasp that escaped his lungs in response nearly rendered his heart motionless in the wake of his unsought discovery.
"Zim!?" he wheezed out helplessly as he scrambled to gain his footing once more. With no other thoughts left to overthrow his body's natural response, he rushed to the Irken's prone figure and wasted no time at all in shoving aside the debris that served as Zim's current prison. How had this even happened? And what would he do if the other failed to wake up? Could this have even been HIS fault somehow? he questioned frightfully as a single chorus of begging pleas jumped from his mouth in breakneck succession. "Oh please, God, no! Oh please, God, no!" he mumbled ceaselessly until finally he had managed to toss enough of the rubble to one side that he could disentangle the unconscious Irken.
Pulling the invader in towards him, Dib then cradled the lifeless body securely against his lap. If the other died then surely it would be his fault, he told himself as panic accelerated through every nerve in his body. Despite the niggling reminder that they were enemies and therefore shouldn't be concerned by the thought of death claiming one or the other, Dib couldn't rid himself of the sick feeling rising to the back of his throat the more he continued to digest the possibility. Had he even ever given it any real thought in the past? Since the time of Zim's arrival on Earth, he knew he'd wanted the other exposed, but the thought of never seeing him again, despite his many threats towards him, had never truly sunk in. If anything, he'd imagined their rivalry would continue for years to come, the almost single-minded and seemingly indestructible nature Zim maintained having become something more of comfort to him in the face of the ridicule he'd faced by nearly everybody in his life. Zim was real and he'd clung to that fact so desperately as a means of preserving his sanity. But now...Now he could see his reality slipping away entirely as he drew in a quaking breath against an onslaught of unanticipated tears.
With a steadying breath, he gathered the tiny alien into the curve of his trembling arms. He couldn't let things end this way. Carrying the other towards the couch, he then eased the Irken's still form into its lavender cushions. "Zim?" he tried again to rouse the comatose alien, his fingers reaching out of instinct to touch the other's face but stopping themselves short as they wavered uncertainly a mere centimeter from Zim's cheek. He couldn't do this. It wasn't like a single tender touch would actually change things between them. So returning his hand to his side, he then looked away to reestablish his next course of action. He needed to find some way of determining the extent of Zim's injuries. He imagined the other might be sporting some broken bones, though his true concern remained fixated on a heavily bleeding gash to the extraterrestrial's head.
As he contemplated how best to treat the afflicted area, it was only then that one of Zim's minions came skipping into the room with his usual, carefree glee. The tiny, turquoise-eyed android gasped at the sight of Dib. "HI, MARY! WHATCHU DOING!?" he squealed as he bolted over to the boy in question before latching himself onto Dib in a suffocating manner. Twisting his head down to stare at Zim, he then hopped to the floor beside him with yet another giddy shriek. "D'awwwwz...Is Master sleeping!?" he continued in oblivious notes of enthusiasm.
Frustrated by the inanity of the S.I.R. unit's aloof words, Dib turned on Gir in an instant as emotion slipped back into his consciousness. "No, Gir! He's not!" his answer was short and clipped by impatience. "H-He's hurt...Badly...A-And I think it might be my fault..." his voice softened to a less intense pitch, knowing already that there would be no point in taking things out on Gir as he knew that the android was anything but astute in such situations.
Turning away to face the opposite direction, Dib then closed his eyes wearily as a fresh lash of pain stung at his insides. He registered a handful of tears beginning to slip on down his face and shivered in response as he couldn't fathom their reason for being there. "Huh?...What the-?...Th-This is so...weird...Why am I?" he tried to find the words that would properly explain what he was feeling in that moment but fell silent as more tears only continued to cloud his vision. Was it possible the other meant more to him than he realized?
As Dib pondered this, Gir could only smile sweetly before piping up once more. "Awww...I'll go get him a band-aid then!" he insisted before skittering off to go search for the mentioned medical patches.
Watching in silence as the insane little robot turned to leave the living room area, Dib then lifted his gaze to the ceiling of Zim's abode. "Well, can't YOU do something about this, Computer!? He's your master too!" he exclaimed to the invisible entity, having nearly forgotten about its existence entirely. While he doubted Gir's band-aid solution would do anything to actually help in this situation, he knew the computer was FAR more competent and he wanted at least ONE of Zim's "minions" to offer some valuable assistance.
The computer merely responded back with a voice laced in ill-concealed indifference however. "No...Not really...Zim broke the section of the house that I can control from up here. You'd have to bring him to the lab if you wanted me to do anything about this." it informed him in its usual tone of lackluster monotony.
Dib's eyes widened regardless.
Flying back into the room with a band-aid that was purple with little pink bunnies printed on its exterior, Gir stuck it against Zim's forehead before turning back to face Dib with an accomplished look on his face. "There! All better!" he exclaimed childishly, the illuminating smile on his features speaking volumes to the pride he felt for having done his part to "help."
Ignoring this however, Dib picked Zim up in his arms again before turning to look down at the little android. "Gir, where's the elevator in this base?" he asked seriously, deciding right then that now was no time for crying.
"Oh, that's easy! It's in the kitchen!" Gir pointed to what appeared to be a regular old refrigerator, said appliance whirring to life at Dib's approach before opening its outer doors to grant the teen access to an interior that appeared much larger than the outer shell containing it. Thankfully for Dib, the Irken had long since replaced the toilet that had once served the same purpose after one too many attempts to descend into his lower base had resulted in Zim getting his head stuck.
"Hold on, Zim. I'm going to do whatever it takes to make things right again." he pledged as he stepped into the lift with the still out cold invader and awaited its downward glide to the lab beneath the earth's surface.
Meanwhile, in his still unconscious state, Zim's mind remained partially aware of his presently paralyzed state. He wanted to get up but felt the weight of a substantial mental fog deterring his efforts to do so. 'I should get up now...' he thought helplessly as his mind's eye drifted to thoughts of Dib. He pictured the human sneering down at him, all the while exhibiting photographic evidence he'd obtained of him without his disguise on. 'Dib...' a twitch in his features fluttered across his face momentarily. 'Why didn't he come? He ALWAYS came before...' another spasm rippled over his features. As the mental image of the human began to change, his once threatening expression now smiled down at him with warm acceptance. 'When did things change?' he questioned himself further as the apparition his mind was showing him offered a hand down to help him. The gesture stirred a feeling inside him that he neither knew nor wanted to let go of. And so reaching a hand up tentatively, he grasped at the emotion in question and let it sweep over him like an awakening he couldn't possibly escape.
Laying the extraterrestrial down onto what appeared to be an examination table of sorts, Dib looked about the foreign environment with detached interest, his primary concern in that moment being Zim's recovery as he scanned the surrounding area for anything that might be of use to him. "Alright, computer. We're in the lab. You can help him now, right?" he addressed the audible voice that had lead him down there once more.
"I guuueeessssss..." the computer droned passively, annoyed by the human's persistence on the matter but following through with its word regardless. As Dib stood back to observe its conduct, the computer then shone a light over the length of Zim's entire body, scanning it for injuries before finally delivering its analysis. "He's got some broken bones and a concussion from the fall. Although his PAK should be able to resolve these issues on its own, you can apply a cooling gel to the worst of his afflictions if you wish to limit the swelling and control any pain he may are also some bandages in the cupboard behind you if you wish to apply a splint, though I doubt that will be necessary. It's not uncommon for Irkens to encounter such injuries in battle. Unless an injury is more severe, the accelerated healing process provided by his PAK should bring him back around by morning." it informed him, hoping this information would appease the human's request for any further assistance with this matter.
A/N: And there you have it for Chapter 002. Until next time~