ZADR Orange Chapter 122

Warnings: Extreme OOCness

Rating: M for later chapters

Disclaimer: We do not own Invader Zim, nor any of the characters from it. We do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Zim: Notgonnadie

Dib: Me

Enjoy. =3

Just as Jack finished up preparing a large batch of pancakes, Dib's antennae twitched before falling back as Zim carried him into the kitchen.

Turning as Zim, Dib, and Rose entered the kitchen, Jack smiled. "Hungry?" he asked, leaning forward to kiss Rose on the cheek before carrying the plate of waffles over to the table where Stella and Kira were still waiting.

Seeing Stella, Zim almost instantly changed demeanor, bearing his teeth and growling at her.

Stella glared back at him. "What are you looking at, you jerk?!" she snapped when she noticed him taking a defensive stance across the room from her.

Noticing this also, Kira looked up at Zim with scared eyes before letting out a small screaming yelp as she scrambled out of her seat to hide behind Stella.

Zim merely continued to glare at them, making sure they kept their distance from Dib.

Staring up at Zim with his own wide eyes now, Dib shrank down in his arms a bit.

Confused, Rose looked back and forth between Stella and Zim before returning her gaze to Stella, sending her a stern look. "Stella, that's a horrible thing to say to Zim. Why would you say something like that?" she said, wanting an explanation.

"He shoved Kira off a bed!"

Blinking her eyes open more at Stella's words, Rose looked back at Zim and Dib then over at Kira, hiding behind Stella. "Kira...Sweetheart...Can you come over here for a second?" she asked, kneeling down and holding out her arms for the girl.

Still on guard, Zim backed away as Kira approached, Dib remaining in his arms all the while.

Stopping a few feet away from Rose, Kira glanced up at Zim before running the rest of the way to her aunt and burying her face in Rose's shirt, clinging tightly to her.

Rose hugged her close. "Kira, is that what happened?" she asked before pulling away slightly to give her a good look up and down, just to make sure she was alright.

Nodding scared, Kira clung tighter to Rose.

Rose looked back at Zim a second time. "Well, Zim? I'm afraid you're a bit outnumbered at the moment. Are you sure you don't remember anything at all about what happened? If Dib had just dreamed the entire thing up then Stella and Kira wouldn't have known anything about it." she said, the whole situation confusing her greatly at this point.

His eyes remaining fixed in a glare on Kira and then at Stella and then back again, Zim didn't hear Rose at all as he slowly backed away from the two, holding Dib close and growling.

"Zim?"

When Zim squeezed him just a bit too tightly, Dib let out a small, pained whimper. "Ow...Zim..." he felt the tears coming again as he struggled to pull free but to no avail, Zim seeming to be lost in his glare.

Continuing to back out of the room in a daze, his hateful glare never lessening, Zim held on to Dib as if someone would take him and the smeets away if he loosened his hold on him.

"Z-Zim!" Dib yelped out, struggling even more when the other only continued to tighten his hold on him. "Y-You're hurting me!" he exclaimed as he then began trying to twist himself out of Zim's grip.

Not responding until he was out of the room and away from the girls, Zim's grip then loosened on the other and he stared at Dib in a daze. "What happened?" he asked, confused now as he could have sworn he had just been on his way into the kitchen.

Shaken by the other's reaction to Stella and Kira, Dib stared up at Zim with wide, fearful eyes, breathing shaky as he was afraid to pull away for fear that the Irken would squeeze him even tighter again.

Zim looked at him confused. "What's wrong?" he asked, not understanding why Dib was sending him such a terrified look now.

Pulling back and letting out another small sob as he curled in on himself, Dib could only shake his head as he held his stomach where the other had squeezed him so hard.

Zim pet Dib gently. "Oh, Dib, tell me what's wrong?" he tried to coax the hybrid into telling him what had upset him so much.

"You're not yourself anymore!" Dib exploded in an upset tone, not liking the way Zim had been acting all morning. "You're not..." he let out another sob, just wanting Zim to go back to way he was before.

Zim stared at him confused. "...What do you mean?" he asked in a fluster of his own now.

"You're hurting everybody! And you don't even care! A-And it scares me when you get mad...I-I don't want our smeets to see that side of you..." Dib cried some more, coughing into his hands hoarsely when he found himself unable to get his breathing under control.

Zim's antennae wilted. "I don't..." he was lost and didn't know what was going on. All he knew was that Dib was crying.

Exiting the kitchen after a few moments to find Zim and Dib back in the living room area, Rose sent them both a concerned look. "Zim, what happened back there?" she asked as she approached close enough to run a soothing hand through Dib's hair. "Why did you so suddenly just leave the room like that?" she asked, having expected Zim to at least say something before leaving.

Zim stared at her. "What are you talking about? I haven't entered yet..." he said, not remembering the encounter despite how he tried.

Rose sent him a confused look at that. "Alright...Something's wrong, Zim. We were just in there. You seemed to get really mad at Stella and then you left without saying a word. You wouldn't even let any of us near Dib. And when I tried to get your attention, you didn't hear me at all. You just...backed up out of the kitchen." she said, knowing something wasn't right about that reaction.

Zim looked at Dib worried. "I-I did...?" he said as though he needed the other to verify that for him.

"Perhaps we should ask Purple about this. Maybe he'll know what's going on with you and why you can't seem to remember anything this morning."

"O-Okay..." Zim nodded and set Dib down gingerly.

Whimpering softly, Dib went to curl up on the couch away from him when Zim set him down.

"Come on. I think he went out to hide in the backyard when Dib started crying earlier." Rose said, deciding not to lead Zim through the kitchen again and instead out through another door to find Purple.

Taking holding of Dib's hand, Zim urged him back onto his feet before he followed closely behind her.

As Rose led them both out to the backyard, Dib couldn't help but shake slightly as they searched around to locate Purple, who currently sat on a small bench, staring up into the sky almost longingly.

Looking up to Purple upon finding him, Zim swallowed nervously. "P-Pur... Can we talk to you?" he asked, breaking the other's concentration.

"Hmm?" Purple seemed to snap out of his little homesick daze before bringing his gaze to land on the three. "Oh...Of course..." he smiled almost sadly at Zim, knowing that the morning had been a fairly confusing one for everybody.

Fidgeting, Zim decided to let Rose ask for him.

Rose sighed. "Purple, Zim seems to be having episodes of amnesia lately. You wouldn't happen to know what might be causing them, would you?" she asked, figuring he'd be the most likely one out of all of them to realize what was going on, given his earlier knowledge about Dib's heat and what had caused it.

"Amnesia? What kind of amnesia? Like...What is he forgetting?" Purple asked, turning in to face them better as he needed more info about the episodes than just that.

A/N: And there you have it for Chapter 122. =3 Until next time~