#15- Pets

At first Dib's heart jumped into his throat. "Bek. Oh God Sarah, did anything happen to-"

"No! Sarah had screamed, causing Dib to jerk the phone away from his ear. "She's the cause of all this! Come get her now!" With that the phone had slammed down and Dib only heard dial tone.

Slowly, Dib set the phone back into the receiver. "Who was that, Dib-stink?" a familiar voice asked from behind him.

Dib turned to see Zim sitting at his kitchen table and his eyes narrowed. How the hell did the alien keep breaking into his apartment!? "It was Sarah," he growled, walking to the front door and grabbing his coat out of the closet.

"Ah, that horrible mate of yours. What did she want?"

"None of your business!" Dib shouted, struggling into his boots. "Get the hell out, don't touch anything, and for God's sake Zim, don't try to kill Spock!"

Zim's eyes narrowed at the mention of the cat's name. "Disgusting feline…" he muttered, fist clenching. "When will you be back?" he called after Dib as the human opened the front door.

"I don't know!" Dib growled, slamming the door shut behind him and making his way to the elevator.

"My evil plan can wait," Zim sighed, leaning back further into the wooden chair and putting his feet up on the table. Well this was boring. Zim had come for a grand adventure and battle. Not to waste time in the human's apartment by himself. Out of the corner of one eye Zim spotted Spock entering the room and taking a drink of water from a dish. He grinned widely. "Here kitty, kitty, kitty…"

-

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Sighing heavily, Dib rang the doorbell felling nervous. He had just driven for almost twenty four hours straight, speeding the entire way, and now that he was actually here he didn't know what to do. What if something had happened? Whenever he had tried calling Sarah she had refused to give him answers. Instead she had demanded how long it was going to take him to get there and hung up without another word.

It wasn't like Sarah to be so brief. In the entire time he had known her, Sarah had always been one to carry one for hours instead of being curt and to the point. That more then anything else made him worry. However, since she had told Dib to come straight to the house instead of a hospital had slightly reassured him that nothing had happened to their daughter.

The door opened and Dib almost got a greeting out before Sarah forcefully shoved a suitcase into his stomach. "She's in her room," his ex-wife said shortly. "Take her and leave. I never want to see either of you ever again."

Dib's eyes widened as Sarah turned and stormed away, leaving the front door open. Take Bek? Just like that? After Sarah had spent thousands of dollars (all courtesy of Dib) fighting him tooth and nail in the legal system for Bek's custody? After Sarah had screamed and raged over the fact that Dib was even able to see his daughter on holidays? Just take her?

Picking up the small suitcase, Dib set it carefully by the door before stepping into the house. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.

He found his ex-wife in the kitchen, chain-smoking with a large bottle of whiskey at her side. As he watched, she finished a cigarette, lit the new one with the end of the old, and took a long swig of whiskey, coughing after it went down. "Sarah…" he said gently, entering the room. "What's going on?"

Sarah looked up at him weakly, defeat in her eyes. "I can't take it anymore," she finally said, bowing her head and beginning to weep. "I just can't take it anymore. I divorced you to get away from all that, but now it's even worse then before!"

"Sarah-"

"Just take her Dib! Take her and get the hell out of my life!" She took a long drag on her cigarette and turned to stare into space. "I'll mail the rest of her stuff to you once you're both gone. But please Dib. Just take the little brat and go!"

Dib stared at his wife for another long moment then turned to go. "Alright," he sighed softly.

"Oh and Dib?" Sarah called as the man stepped out of the room. "Be sure to take those monsters of hers with you too."

Dib put the suitcase in his car, feeling a weight settle on his chest. Take her monsters too? What on earth had happened here? He slammed the trunk shut and leaned on his car. One Christmas Bek had arrived at the local airport in tears, throwing herself into his arms as soon as she got off the plane. After crying the entire car ride to his apartment, she had tearily told him that she had found a baby two headed dragon and that Mommy had made her get rid of it.

Sarah hated lizards. In fact, the woman hated all animals so the news of the loss of Bek's pet didn't really surprise him. What had surprised him was that Bek had managed to find a two headed lizard somewhere. But then again, Bek was always finding weird things like that. They had once gone to the park together, back when he and Sarah had just started having problems, and his daughter had managed to find a regular old red fox with three tails. She called it a kitsune. Dib knew it was some sort of horrible mutation, probably caused by all the chemicals in water these days, but since it was so passive he let Bek play with it a short time before bringing her home.

So what had Bek managed to find this time? Probably more mutated lizards since she had already found the one close to home. Or maybe she had brought home a bird or a rabbit with a broken leg or something. He hoped that whatever her new pet was that it wasn't too big or he would have problems with his landlord about it. That greedy bastard was already charging him an arm and a leg for the 'privilege' of keeping Spock in his apartment and he didn't want to have to pay more for whatever Bek may want to bring with them.

Caught up in his thoughts, Dib almost didn't notice the alien spacecraft hovering above him. However he did notice the roar as it started to land, a familiar figure jumping out before the craft had fully settled on the ground. "Zim!? What are you going here!?" he demanded, eyes narrowing.

"No time, human!" Zim shouted, running up and grabbing Dib by the shoulders. "You must come with me at once!"

Dib's eyes narrowed further as he noticed the many scratch and claw marks that adorned Zim's skin. "You jerk," he growled lowly. "You've been messing with Spock again, haven't you!?"

Zim let out a shout of frustration. "This is not the time to discuss that HORRIBLE feline's evil ways! You MUST come with me!"

"Why?" Dib demanded, taking a step back and eyeing Zim wearily. "You let loose some sort of doomsday device that needs to be stopped and I am the only one who can?"

"Don't flatter yourself, Dib-stink," Zim growled. "The event about to befall us is infinitely worse then any 'doomsday device.' The news is all over the Irken channels! The Resisty has somehow managed to destroy the Massive and the Almighty Tallest are missing!"

Blinking, Dib regarded the alien curiously. "How is that bad?" he asked. "That sounds like a good thing to me."

"RrrrrrRRRAGGGGH!" Zim screamed, yanking at his antenna in frustration. "You don't understand, Dib-stink! We must find them! Or at least one of them! Their escape pod was tracked to somewhere within this system and we must discover them before the Resisty does! Now get into my ship so we may go gather your ship and search!"

"No," Dib said, turning to walk back into the house. "I have other things to take care of, Zim."

"Mating with your woman can wait!"

Dib felt his face flush, and he turned upon the alien angrily. "That's not it, Zim! I have to pick up my daughter Bek so she can live with me. I don't have time to find your stupid leaders. In fact, I hope they're dead! If they are then Earth will be safe."

"But if the Tallest are not found, then the next Tallest Irken shall become ruler! We can't allow that to happen, so we must find them! You can bring the child-filth with you, but you must help me search!" Zim yelled, glaring at Dib.

"Why should I care who your new leader will be?" Dib demanded, crossing his arms.

Zim sighed, bowing his head and running a hand over his antenna. "Because the next in line for Tallest is me," the alien said, glaring at a spot on the floor.

Dib blinked at Zim. Then he blinked at him again while shifting his weight. He opened his mouth to speak, thought better of it, then uncrossed and re-crossed his arms. "You're the next Tallest?"

"Yes. Now do you understand why we must find my Almighty Tallest?"

"Oh yeah." Zim becoming the leader of a vast interplanetary system? That had the words 'Oh Shit This is Bad,' written all over it. "I'll get Bek and we'll go."

Nodding eagerly, Zim leapt into the cockpit of his Voot Cruiser and began warming up the engines. "Hurry Dib-stink! Time is of the essence!"

Running inside the house, Dib took the stairs two at a time while shouting Bek's name. The little girl met him at the top of the stairs and he knelt down, grabbing her hand and putting a rough kiss on her forehead. "Hey there sweetie," he said, panting slightly, "ready to go?"

Bek pouted and refused to look her father in the eyes. "I guess," she sighed unhappily.

"Great," Dib said, standing back up. "Come on, honey."

"Wait!" Bek said, pulling at her father's hand. "We gotta take my new pets with us!"

Oh lord, the new pets. The 'monsters' Sarah had told him about. "Mommy can send them to us later, baby. We have to go."

"No!" Bek said stubbornly. "Mommy hates them! She'll get rid of them if we leave without them!"

"Honey, you don't understand. We don't have room for your pets right now and we really have to go."

Still holding her hand tightly, Dib made a move to go down the stairs but Bek dug her heels into the ground and refused to move forward. "No!" she shouted again, kicking her father in the shins to make him let go. "I'm not leaving Reddy and Pur-Pur!" Free of her father's grip she ran down the hall and into her room. Dib followed, just in time to see his daughter throw himself into the arms of the tallest Irken he had ever seen and start sobbing.

The Irken glared at him with bright and clear purple eyes surrounded by dark… mascara? It looked like a demented clown had a field day on the much taller alien's face. Face almost painted white, dark red smudges around it's mouth and on it's cheeks… What had been going on here? "You better have a good reason for making her cry, alien filth," it spat, holding Bek tightly to its chest and stroking her hair as Bek cried into it's neck.

"For Irk's sake, Pur," a second Irken said from further into the room. Dib looked to see the purple Irken's twin done in red sprawled out on his daughters bed, staring with disinterest at a pop up book. If anything, this Irken was worse off. Its face was covered with badly drawn doodles that somewhat resembled flowers and butterflies."It cries at everything! It's not a big deal."

"It's totally a big deal!" the purple Irken shot back, turning to glare at his fellow alien. "It's just a smeet!"

"And smeets cry at everything."

"Well they wouldn't if they were happy!" the purple one shouted, then sniffed angrily. Angry expression melting away, he looked down at Bek and smiled softly. "Hey little, Earth-human? Wanna play with the puppets?"

Looking up at him, eyes red and puffy, Bek nodded as the tall Irken put her down. Capturing her small hand with his long fingers they walked together to one corner and sat down. Dib stood frozen in the doorway, staring until the red one sighed deeply and got off the bed. Walking over to the doorway he stood in front of Dib for a long moment, arms crossed. "You look familiar," it muttered, then shook its head in disgust. One of the butterflies seemed to flap its wings as he did so. "But all you humans look alike." With that it shut the door in Dib's face.

Dib stared at the white door for a long time then slowly turned and walked back down the stairs. Sarah was there, cigarette in hand. "You're still taking them all," she growled threateningly then marched back into the kitchen.

"Yeah… sure…" Dib said absently, making his way to the front door. Opening the door slowly, he shut it softly behind him before collapsing on the front steps. A crooked grin crossing his face, he stared blankly at his hands. This was…

"Dib-stink!?" Zim leapt down from his Voot Cruiser, running up to Dib and glaring down at him. "Where is your short offspring, human? We must be off at once!"

Shaking his head, Dib rested his head in his hands and began to laugh. This was… It was..

Growling in frustration, Zim grabbed Dib's shoulders and shook him while the human continued to laugh. "You stupid human!" he shouted. "Why have you not collected your offspring so we may go! My Tallest await us!"

Dib pulled away, shaking his head and laughing harder. "Upstairs," he choked out between sobs. "Upstairs…"

One eye larger then the other, Zim threw his hands up in disgust. "Fine! I will collect the worm-baby!" he shouted, brushing past Dib and throwing open the door. "But then we must go, Dib-stink!"

Dib laughed hysterically as Zim entered the building, tears streaking down his face as he heard Zim goose step up the stairs. Taking a deep breath, he managed to calm himself down long enough to hear the startled shout of "MY TALLEST!?" and "ZIM!!!????" come from upstairs before breaking down into hysterics again.

Only after hearing the sounds of crashing and shouts go on for more then five minutes was Dib able to wipe the tears from his eyes and get to his feet again. Still chuckling, Dib ascended the stairs to see what all the ruckus was about. He snorted loudly. His daughter had the strangest taste in pets…

This story was inspired by my roomate's little cousins who I showed Invader Zim to in order to make them shut up. When watching 'Backseat Drivers' they said; "Man, I wish those dudes were babysitting us instead," while watching Red and Purple pig out on donuts. This led me to imangine how the two would be if they were completely OCC and babysitting some kid which led to the demented clown makeup which led to the obvious conclusion that Zim would have to catch them at it.

This story's mystery questions: 1) How did Red and Purple crashland on Earth?

Answer: ALIEN MAGIC!!!!

2) Why are they even putting up with little Bek?

Answer: ALIEN MAGIC!!!! (and Purple is really really OCC so he adores children)

3) Why doesn't Zim want to become Tallest?

Answer: ALIEN MAGIC!!!! (Noticing a theme yet?)

4) What would Dib really do if he found the Tallest looking like that?

Answer: He'd attack them of course! With ALIEN MAGIC!!!! (Actually I'd like to think he'd laugh hysterically at them like I had him do...)

5) Why does Dib have a cat named Spock?

Answer: Because of ALIEN MAGIC and the fact that Star Trek is the shizznat and Spock is my homie.

6) Why does Zim hate said cat?

Answer: Because of ALIEN MAGIC of course! Plus he's Zim! And it's a cat! It's like the two coolest things in the world going after each other!

7) How does Zim keep breaking into Dib's apartment.

Answer: ALIEN MAGIC!!!! Plus I really wanted him there so I could do the "Here kitty, kitty, kitty," line.

8) Speaking of that line, is poor Spock alright?

Answer: Of course he's alright! He's a cat named Spock! Poor Zim didn't have a chance against him...

Next up: Who knows? I hate to promise anything considering how random I've been feeling lately...