A/N: Sorry for the late update, but I'm also working on a special for Halloween, which I hope you'll all read upon my posting of it. But anyway, I hope this chapter will be enough to make up for the wait, as the GESS are finally given their long awaited introduction. Read on!
Disclaimer: The GESS and all non-canon characters are mine. Everyone else belongs to Jhonen Vasquez.
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The High Skool, Three Days Later
The weekend had proved to be surprising for both Zim and Dib.
The Invader discovered, after another series of tests run by his computer, that his fast healing was indeed another result of the accelerant affecting his DNA. The accelerant had reactivated his natural healing genes (which had also been deactivated by the Control Brains due to redundancy), as well as several related genes, vastly increasing his healing abilities. Combined with the already highly advanced healing factor provided by Zim's PAK, the computer theorized that his body's ability to heal itself would have been increased exponentially… essentially making him invincible.
Meanwhile, Dib tried to use the backdoor in Zim's Electronic Security Field to reactivate his spy cameras and keep an eye on his nemesis. However, when he attempted to hook up with Zim's computer, all he got from his cameras was static. This brought on intense confusion, until he found one that was still working – just as one of Jana's spider drones filled its vision, and seconds later it too went to static. This resulted in clearing up Dib's confusion, but replacing it with panic; he now had no way of tracking how Zim planned on unleashing the GESS. His only hope now was that his plan to expose Zim's plot to kill the Tallest would pay off, and that the other Irkens would deal with him themselves and leave Earth alone afterwards.
These thoughts and more passed through the minds of the two mortal enemies as they both arrived at the High Skool Monday morning. Zim strolled down the hallways, resisting with every step the urge to use his new powers to tear the building down around him. Dib, on the other hand, nervously chewed on his lips all day and jumped at every slight sound, half-expecting it to be a GESS released early and sent after him.
Zim noticed his adversary's anxiety throughout the day, but wasn't bothered by it, and didn't bother to read his thoughts to find out the cause. As far as he knew, Dib no longer had any way of stopping him; of course he'd be increasingly terrified as the day of the GESS's awakening approached… and Zim was going to enjoy every last minute of it.
Case in point: the two of them were currently in the cafeteria; Dib half-heartedly eating the slop handed out that day, while Zim watched from across the room. The mutant was completely ignoring the food on his tray – which appeared to be lamb chops served in sewage – and was focusing entirely on his archenemy. He slowly twirled his plastic fork in his fingers, gaze hardly wavering from the young human who had caused him so much misery over the course of the last six years of his life. Zim would make Dib pay for every moment his destiny had been delayed – and it seemed Dib knew that, from the nervous twitches he gave off as he stirred the food on his tray. Feeling the need to rub it in, Zim got to his feet and strode over to the young human's table.
Dib noticed Zim walking over and glared at him, the action being returned in kind. The Invader reached the table and leaned over, placing his hands against the edge to support himself as he stretched out to look Dib in the eye. Dib flinched slightly, but soon returned the glare in kind.
"Well now, don't you look nervous?" Zim asked mockingly, lips curled up into a sneer, "What's wrong? Has the fact that there's nothing you can do to stop me this time finally sunk in?"
Dib's glare increased. "You're not going to win, Zim. I don't care what it takes, I'm going to stop you."
Zim chuckled darkly. "Your foolishness never ceases to amaze me, dirt-worm. Speaking of which, what was your big plan? Were you going to show the inspection team that I plan on assassinating the Tallest and hope that they would deal with me?"
"Something like that," Dib muttered, breaking eye contact for a moment as he pondered something. After a few seconds, he turned his gaze back to Zim's contact covered eyes.
"I always knew that you were a self-serving bastard, Zim, but killing your own leaders? That's low even for you."
Zim's eyes narrowed to slits. "I will not allow myself to be judged by a mere human. It is my destiny to rule the Empire, and if Irken blood has to be shed for that to happen, then so be it."
At this point he paused, most likely for dramatic effect, and then added, "Too bad your only proof of it has been destroyed, eh?"
Something Zim didn't recognize momentarily flashed through Dib's eyes, but before the Irken could process that the human spoke up.
"How'd you know about the recording?"
Zim merely grinned evilly. "Zim knows all, Earth-Monkey. I knew you were plotting against me, just as I know that after the GESS have been unleashed to destroy this world, I shall destroy you myself."
Dib raised an eyebrow, and a small smirk appeared on his face. "You know, I've noticed that you never bother to fight me on your own, without something backing you up. What, are you afraid that I'll beat you in a fair fight?"
Schreech!
Dib winced as Zim's claws dug several furrows into the metal tabletop. The Irken's lips were pulled back in a snarl, baring his zipper-like teeth as one of his eyes twitched. Dib, visibly unnerved, edged backwards in his seat as Zim began ranting.
"You filthy little monkey! How dare you insult my bravery! You think I'm afraid to fight you? I could fight you right here, right now, and I would win!"
At this point, Zim was starting to foam at the mouth, and the air around him started shimmering as he began to lose control of his pyrokinesis. He seemed to have realized this, as he suddenly took a few deep calming breaths, reasserting control over his power. After taking a few moments to fully calm down, and wipe his mouth off, Zim once again glared at Dib, who looked extremely disturbed.
"Like I was saying," Zim continued after a few seconds of silence, "I could kill you at anytime, human. However, I first want you to suffer; I want you to see all your efforts to stop me still end in my victory. Only then will I kill you."
Any further comments either of them could make were interrupted when a beeping noise emitted from Zim's PAK. Cursing under his breath, he gave Dib one last glare.
"Mark my words," he said, "This isn't finished."
He then turned on his heel and quickly marched out of the room, in order to answer his communicator in private. Dib gazed after him for a moment, before his curiosity over the incoming message overpowered his fear at Zim's display of hate, and he took off after the Invader.
He made sure to move as quietly as possible, but still fast enough to keep up with Zim. Seeing him turn around a corner at the end of the hall, Dib sped up, but paused as he reached the corner and peeked around it.
"This had better be important," Zim was saying into his communicator, "You know it's risky for me to receive calls at the Skool."
"Apologies, master," Jana's voice came over the communication line, "But this is urgent. The computer has detected an Irken frigate entering the solar system. It will reach Earth in approximately one hour."
Zim's eyes widened. "The inspection team… frag! They're early! I'll be right there, we need to get ready."
With that said, Zim deactivated the communicator and took off down the hall. Dib, meanwhile, was frozen in shock. He'd been hoping to use the remaining time until the inspection team arrived to fine tune his plan – now he had no choice but to rush in with his proof and hope they didn't kill him before he could show it to them. He also took off down the hall (though he made sure to head towards a different exit than the one Zim was going to use) and tried to mentally prepare for what would probably be one of the most important confrontations of his life.
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Zim's Base, Hanger Room, An Hour Later
Zim stood at attention, arms clasped behind his back, as he waited for the inspection team to arrive. GIR stood to his left, temporarily in Duty-Mode (though how long that would last was anyone's guess), while Minimoose floated just above the robot's head. As for Jana, she had been standing just behind Zim and slightly to his right a few moments earlier, but then had activated her cloaking field. Zim wasn't sure where she was at the moment, but he assumed that she was now in a strategic place to attack, should things go sour.
He was pulled from his musings when the computer announced the frigate's arrival and opened up the roof, allowing the ship to enter the hanger. It was a moderately sized ship, capable of comfortably transporting several passengers (as well as several more uncomfortably), and yet still small enough to fit in the hanger… barely, Zim noticed with a frown, as his Voot was pushed off to the side by the larger bulk of the other ship.
After taking a few moments to completely settle in, the frigate fell silent, its engines deactivating as the roof closed above it. As soon as that was done, a panel slid away from the ship and lowered to the floor, becoming a ramp. Seconds later, a dozen members of the Elite Guard marched down the ramp, weapons at the ready, and fanned out into a semi-circle facing Zim and his minions. After they were all in position, Gor exited the ship, escorted by two more Guards.
"Third Tallest Gor," Zim greeted with a forced bow – he and Gor had attended the Academy together, and had absolutely despised each other ever since.
"Hello Zim," Gor replied, sounding about as happy to see Zim as Zim was to see him.
Zim cast a glance at the soldiers accompanying his violet-eyed counterpart. "A bit of overkill, don't you think? This is over twice the number of escorts you'd ordinarily need for a routine inspection."
"Except this isn't a routine inspection," Gor snarled, narrowing his eyes, "This is you we're talking about Zim. Everything you ever create has a tendency to blow up in your face and do more damage to your allies than your enemies. I'm just making sure I'm protected."
Zim glared at Gor, trying very hard not to let his anger get the better of him. This was easy once he noticed that Gor was being forced to tilt his neck back slightly in order to look him in the eye; Zim was a good two inches taller than he was. Gor seemed to have realized this as well, as a frown formed on his face.
"How'd you get so tall, anyway?"
The Invader smirked, enjoying the envy he was causing.
"Just lucky, I guess," he said, before gesturing to the elevator, "Shall we?"
Gor glared, but then turned to the two Guards who had walked out of the ship with him.
"You two stay here and mind the ship," he ordered, before turning to the rest of the Guards, "the rest of you come with us."
With that settled, Zim walked towards the elevator, his robots and Gor close behind while the Guards marched after. Meanwhile, up in the cables that lined the ceiling, the air shimmered as Jana deactivated her cloaking field, relying on the dark material of her clothing and the shadows surrounding her perch to keep her hidden from the pair of Irkens remaining below her.
'Elite Guard my c'horta,' she thought with disdain, as she watched the two of them pull out a deck of cards to play the Irken version of poker, 'You would never see a Shadow slacking on the job like this.'
Shaking her head, Jana turned to look at the spider drone perched on the cable next to her; if it weren't for the faint glow of its optic, she wouldn't even know that it was there.
"You know what to do?" she whispered.
The drone nodded its body in confirmation.
"Then get to it."
The drone nodded once more, then scuttled off along the cable, eventually disappearing into the darkness in the corners of the room. Jana watched it go, and then momentarily turned her attention back to the Guards below her before reactivating her cloak and also taking her leave from the room.
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The GESS Lab, A Few Minutes Later
Due to the size of the elevator, only three of the Guards could ride down with Zim and Gor, but the Third Tallest insisted that all of them be present when the GESS awoke. So, Zim, GIR, Minimoose, Gor and the three Guards were currently in the antechamber outside the GESS chamber while waiting for the rest of the Guard squadron to arrive.
"I never took you to be paranoid, Gor," Zim commented as he leaned against the wall, arms crossed over his chest.
Gor glared at him. "First of all, I'm not being paranoid, I'm being cautious. Secondly, you seem to be forgetting that you do not address me by name; you call me either by my title or 'sir'. Got it?"
GIR blinked in evident confusion, his red eyes fading to blue. "But Mastah's taller than you, Mr. Purple Man. Don't that mean he's better than you?"
"Squeak!" Minimoose added.
"Who asked you two pieces of scrap?!" Gor snarled.
Zim chuckled. "They have a point, Gor," he said, stressing the other Irken's name, "I am taller. I should be telling you what to do."
Gor's hands clenched into fists. "You may be taller, but I still outrank you, remember?"
The Invader merely smirked as he said, "For now. But bear in mind, Gor, that once my mission here is complete, the Control Brains will give me new rank worthy of my achieved height… and from the look of things, that will be above you."
Before Gor could respond to that, the elevator opened and the remaining Guards arrived. Zim glanced at them, and then moved away from the wall towards the lab entrance, his minions following.
"Come, let's get this formality over with."
Gor frowned at Zim taking the lead, but motioned for the Guards to follow them. The whole group marched through the doors into the GESS lab, and all of them but Zim (who'd obviously already seen it) and his robots (who'd either seen it or were too oblivious to care) froze at the sheer size of the room and the number of containers held within it.
"A-All of those," Gor stuttered, before swallowing and trying again, "All of those are GESS?"
"Each and every one." Zim smirked once again, "Impressed yet?"
Without waiting for an answer, he summoned a hover platform and stepped on, joined soon after by Gor and two of the Guards. The rest stayed on the main platform, GIR pulling out a rubber pig to keep himself occupied.
"Computer, take us to the most complete GESS and begin awakening procedures for it," Zim ordered, earning a confused look from Gor.
"Most complete?" he asked.
"You're early, remember?" Zim practically snapped, "A few more days and they would have been completely grown. Currently they're mostly somewhere in the high 90s of the percent range. So, among other things, they'll most likely not have quite as much muscle mass as they should, or be quite as agile as I designed them to be, but all in all they should still serve their purpose."
Gor barely had time to let that sink in before the hover platform came to a halt and descended to the floor in front of one of the GESS tubes. As they landed, the liquid within the tube began bubbling as it was drained out, being redirected through a network of tubes up into a chemical waste incinerator – Zim didn't want to take the risk of dumping the used genetic accelerant into the sewers and seeing what effect it had on the local wildlife. He'd learned his lesson about creating mutants that he couldn't control, thank you very much.
After the fluid was all drained away, there was a hiss of rushing air as the glass-like material of the tube split apart into pieces and slid into the ground, exposing the form within to the sight of the Irkens present. As the others stared in shock at the monstrosity before them, Zim merely grinned evilly as he closely studied his creation.
The body of the GESS was primarily that of a mountain gorilla, though it lacked the distinctive fur; this was because its skin was the tough hide of a rhinoceros, to make it less vulnerable to harm. The head was also slightly malformed, due to sporting a pair of ram horns – these were more for psychological effect than combat, as Zim knew enough about humans to know that they would, on a subconscious level, make the theological connection to demons, thus increasing their fear when facing the GESS.
The hands and feet barely qualified for the terms, being distorted versions of lion paws that had been altered so that the GESS could make use of them in addition to the claws. The feet had had extra mass added in order to give them the strength to hold the GESS up in a bipedal position at all times, while the digits in the hands had been extended and given extra joints so that they could be useful to the same extent as human fingers.
Rounding out the wholly unnatural appearance of the GESS was the pair of bat wings nestled on its head underneath the ram horns. Combined with a slight modification of the GESS's vocal cords that allowed it to emit high-pitched sounds, these ears gave the GESS a type of echolocation, which Zim just knew would come in handy when tracking enemies.
Gasping sounds brought Zim back to the present, and he watched as the GESS awoke and slowly pulled itself to its feet as it took its first breaths. Its body mass was irregularly shaped, with lumps or dents in various places, but Zim wasn't too surprised by that – as he'd explained to Gor, the GESS weren't completely grown yet, and were therefore bound to have some slight disfigurements. However, it didn't seem as though these deformities would be a deterrent to the GESS's combat abilities in any serious way.
After pulling itself upright, the GESS cast its curious gaze around the room, before its nearly human eyes locked onto Zim and the others. Said eyes then narrowed and its lips pulled back, revealing the teeth of a shark, as the predatory and defensive instincts encoded into its various DNA strands kicked in.
"RRRAAAWWWRRR!!!" the GESS roared, raising its claws as it charged towards its targets. Startled out of their shocked stupor by this action, the Elite Guard members fumbled with their weapons; however, Zim beat them to the punch.
"Stop," he ordered calmly, and the GESS froze mid-charge, lowering its arms and settling into a relaxed but slightly on-edge pose.
"…How'd you do that?" Gor asked, as he quickly stepped back, putting Zim and the Guards between him and the GESS.
Zim smirked. "As I explained to the Tallest, I have perfect control of the GESS. Of course, I suppose I should have mentioned how I control them, eh?"
Once again not giving the Third Tallest a chance to speak, Zim clasped his hands behind his back and began slowly circling the stationary GESS.
"Despite what everyone thinks, Zim is no fool. I knew that creating an army of super soldiers is pointless if you don't have a means to control them; I've seen enough movies to show what happens when that is done. So I devised a means of insuring the GESS' loyalties – after each one's central nervous system was fully developed, I had the computer implant a control chip into their brains, which spreads nano-wires throughout the cerebral cortex. These allow the chips to control the GESS's every action, and the chips themselves are already preprogrammed with various orders that the GESS will follow without hesitation. For example…"
By this point, Zim had completely circled the GESS, and now came to a stop directly in front of it. Narrowing his eyes slightly and stiffening his shoulders, he coldly asked, "Whom do you serve?"
There was silence for a moment, and then the GESS slowly lowered itself to one knee. It then raised one clawed hand, clenched it into a fist, and placed it against its chest.
"Zim…" the GESS hissed out, its primitive vocal cords barely managing to form the word as it bowed its head in submissive respect.
The Invader grinned, turning to look at Gor once more, noticing that the violet-eyed Irken was giving him a suspicious glare.
"Something wrong Gor?" he asked.
"Let me see if I get this straight," Gor said slowly, "You've bred an entire army of super deadly monsters, that is loyal only to you – not to the Tallest, mind you, as they should be, but to you."
"But I am the Tallests' loyal servant," Zim said with an overly dramatic bow, using that to hide the hate on his face during that statement, "And since the GESS are loyal to me, then they are by extension loyal to the Tallest."
Gor frowned, but shrugged it off for the time being. He then glanced around the room, having noticed something of interest.
"Hey, how are you planning on getting the GESS out of here, anyway?" he asked, "Because in case you didn't notice, genius, the only way in or out of this room is the elevator, and I find it hard to believe that you plan on pulling off an invasion with three or four GESS at a time."
"You underestimate me, Gor," Zim sneered, "You see, ever since I began growing the GESS, I've been constructing a secret tunnel that leads from this chamber directly into the middle of the city."
"By which he means that I've been constructing it," the computer commented. Zim gave the ceiling a glare before continuing.
"As I was saying, the tunnel leads from this chamber directly into the middle of the city. After awakening all of the GESS, I shall send them through the tunnel and unleash them onto the humans. This city shall be the first to fall, and from here the GESS will spread out, while I grow even more to aid in the slaughter. So, do I meet you standards of approval, sir?"
Gor glanced once again at the kneeling GESS, then at all of its slumbering brethren still contained in the tubes throughout the room. As much as he hated to admit it, Zim's plan did seem pretty foolproof; there was no reason for him not to approve of the Armada's aid.
"You win, Zim," he muttered, "Take me to the communications room, and I'll tell the Tallest that it is safe for them to come."
Zim donned a Cheshire Cat smile. "Right this way," he said, gesturing to the hover platform.
As the group got on the platform, the GESS got up and started walking towards them.
"No. Stay," Zim ordered, "I'll return for you when the time comes."
The GESS didn't understand most of that, but it understood the order to stay, so it sat down on its haunches, obediently awaiting new instructions. Zim watched it out of the corner of his eye until it was out of the range of his sight, basking in the feeling of victory.
It was done. The Tallest would come, and the strength of the Armada combined with his own personal army would devastate this world. Then, he would eliminate the Tallest and take their place; his destiny would be secured, and the galaxy would be his to rule.
Forever.
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A/N: I once again apologize for the wait, but I hope that the length of this chapter makes up for how long it took to post. And I hope that you all didn't mind all the exposition – we're nearing the climax of the story, so there will be plenty of action very, very, shortly.
Next chapter: Zim's plan seems to have succeeded, but Dib may have something to say about that.
Read and review!