Chapter 3: Genius

Before Skool

Vick casually walked past the smelly dirt children as they frolicked in their stupidity. She yawned, and sat on a bench. "Zim's gonna be late for class." She muttered to herself.

"Hey…"

Vick looked up. "Dib?" She was curious as to why the boy was talking to her, but she then realized that in her human disguise, she was the regular loser of the skool. Dib hadn't anyone else to communicate with.

"Oh, I never really introduced myself!" She said with a smile. "I'm Vick." She held out her hand hoping that Dib was a little nicer than Zim when it came to introductions.

Dib gratefully shook her hand. "Can I. Uh, sit down?" He asked kindly. When he had Vick approval, he took a seat next to her on the bench. "So, uh… How are you?"

"You don't have many friends. Do you?" Vick asked frankly. "They way you talk is so… alien. Like you don't really know how to make friends with someone."

Dib blushed from embarrassment. "Yeah… I mean, no. I don't really have any friends." He looked down at his feet sadly.

Vick put her arm around Dib's shoulder. "Well, you do know!" She said happily. It was in her nature to be sympathetic with others. In most cases, such as this, she could be empathetic.

((To all who do not realize this, sympathetic and empathetic are NOT the same thing. Sympathetic is like, "Oh! I'm so sorry that happened to you! Let me bake you a cake with lots of icing on it!" Empathetic is like, "Oh! I'm so sorry that happened to you! I know exactly how you feel! Let's go talk about it and make a cake with lots of icing together to drown our sorrows!" See? Difference. Moving on.))

Dib looked up at her and smiled. "Thanks." He seemed pretty content, which made Vick feel good too.

Soon, the two were in deep discussion of interglacial sciences and the existence of extra terrestrial beings outside of their solar system. Dib was cautious not to mention Zim at this point in time. He didn't want her to get mad at him or anything.

The skool bell rang soon enough, and Dib and Vick rushed into the building so that Ms. Bitters didn't eat their skulls or something creepy like that. Ewww… Just imagine that… Yuck!

"Okay, class. Today we will be discussing why none of you will ever make anything out of yourselves." Ms. Bitters began.

"Wait!" Zim ran into the classroom out of breath. "I'm sorry I'm late! My scientific experimentation pod exploded and me and my dog had to clean it up and I do NOT trust Gir to do anything by himself!" Zim explained quickly.

"Sit down." Ms. Bitters ordered. Zim reluctantly obeyed. He looked across the room at Dib, and saw-

"Vick!?" Zim cursed silently under his breath as he watched Dib and Vick happily chatting away like old friends. "What is she doing with the enemy?!" Zim felt a twinge of jealousy that Vick would rather sit next to the Dib-pig than her own Master.

Across the Room

"Dib!" Vick handed him a folded piece of paper. "Look at this!" She said proudly, "I drew it myself!"

Dib unfolded it and saw that Vick had drawn a vivid picture of him, a much taller him, in a white lab coat proudly displaying an alien, not an Irken, in a transparent containment unit. It was all anime style. Dib was amazed at the detail on the alien. It was as if she had…

"This is great!" He whispered. He wished he had talent like that, but remembered his amazing scientific genius and dismissed his horrid art abilities.

Vick smiled happily. It was obvious to Dib that she loved to be praised for the things she could do, as most people do. Even he found that his work would be easier to do if at least one person had said, "Good job!" or "Keep it up, it looks great!"

Dib and Vick began to pass a note back and forth discussing the possibility that their teacher was an alien. It seemed likely, you know, the way she just morphed into room and slunk around like a freakin' shadow or whatever. It's just not natural for humans!

The bell rung for lunch to begin.

"Sit with me?" Vick offered to Dib.

Dib nodded.

The two walked out of the classroom together, forgetting that Zim was right there. Vick didn't even realize that he had arrived at skool that day!

In the Cafeteria

Dib went into line to get lunch for the two of them , although Vick had told him that she could get it herself. Vick pouted as she watched him and laughed to herself, "I could have gone up there. Honestly!"

"Ehem…"

"Eh?" Vick turned around to see Zim behind her. "Zimmy! You're here!" She squeezed him as if he had been gone for two years.

"Of course I'm here! I showed up late! Didn't you see me?" Zim snapped angrily. His arms were folded across his chest.

"Uh… No, I didn't… Sorry…" Vick said softly. She could feel Zim's anger and it made her feel small inside. She wished she could crawl into a hole and hide. She couldn't handle guilt too well.

Zim seemed to be seething inside. Well, would you care to explain," He began in a fake calm, "why you were fraternizing with the enemy!?" His body twitched as if he could not hold in all the anger he was feeling.

Vick shrank, afraid that Zim would explode. "Well, Dib is kinda nice… And he doesn't really have any friends, so I though I would-"

"You thought, now did you?! Well, I am the one who will be doing the thinking around here from know on!" Zim snapped. He chuckled as Vick's lip quivered. "What? You thought you could just go behind my back and befriend the Dib-pig, my WORST enemy, and that I wouldn't be mad that you were getting close to…" Zim lit up suddenly. "You're a genius!"

Vick relaxed more. "Well, I could have told you that!" She said frankly.

Zim grinned evilly. "You get close with the Dib human and infiltrate his base and totally destroy him from the inside out while he doesn't suspect a thing!!" He did a little dance on the spot. "You're brilliant!"

Vick laughed uneasily. "Uh, yeah… Thanks, Zim…" She looked down at her feet sadly. She really was beginning to form an actual friendship with Dib. She couldn't just betray him like that? Could she? No. No she couldn't. Unless Dib did something to her that really hurt her feeling or being. But, Dib would never do that, right?