Eternal Rivals

Summary: Even with civilization falling to pieces around them, Zim was determined that they continue their deadly game, that Dib never diverted his attentions, and that his young rival remained the same enemy he met so long ago.

(A/N): I think I was feeling very snarky and mean when I named this chapter. Anyone here who correctly guesses what it's from gets an imaginary cookie and a pat on the back for being cool.

Consider this my anti-aging fic. I see so many stories on this site portraying the characters after a time skip and basically drastically altering how the world sees them; this method seems particularly pointless on Zim specifically. Not that I don't like some of these stories, it's just that many use slight age difference as an excuse to make characters act bizarrely OOC. Besides, I have no clue what Zim's real age is, but thanks to Tak's flashback, I know he's well over fifty years old—probably over a hundred years old actually—and I highly doubt that a few measly years on Earth would be enough to alter his appearance or attitude so much. As for Dib himself, well I personally prefer portraying him as his canon age, though this fic places a weird spin on it. I just find it much more impressive for a preteen kid to be defending humanity instead of a teen or adult, and most of his peers—including the ignorant adults—are much less intelligent than he is. But the major driving force here is still the plot line.

Oh yes, the plot. The taste of this impending plot grows ever more delicious in my amazing head.

Anyway, now that my dumb little rant is out of the way, please relax and enjoy the show.

-"It's time to make our move, I'm shaking off the rust. I've got my heart set on anywhere but here. I'm staring down myself, counting up the years. Steady hands just take the wheel. And every glance is killing me. Time to make one last appeal for the life I lead. Stop and Stare. I think I'm moving but I go nowhere. Yeah, I know that everyone gets scared. But I've become what I can't be, oh..." –One Republic, Stop and Stare

Despite growing farther and farther away from the hulking behemoth with every second, to the point where the boy couldn't even see it as nothing more than a dot on the horizon, Dib still couldn't relax quite yet. Knowing Zim, the green-skinned alien was likely plotting a way to recapture or kill him in brutal and creative—if slightly ridiculous—ways. Putting aside what was and wasn't a clever plan and whatever else one could saw about the doubtfulness of the invader's sanity, he was definitely far more dangerous than people had thought about him.

Dib could draw up hefty list of injuries that could prove his point there.

So Dib kept one eye on the sky behind them almost the entire time his spent in that tiny little escape pod, divided attention spread between the aircraft's rear for any approaching pursuit, and back to his sister to observe her more clearly. Even though his glasses were still gone and his vision wasn't any better than before she busted him out of that accursed prison cell, Gaz was closer to him now and the combination of stark fear and adrenaline pumping through the boy's veins had finally slowed down to the point where focusing on smaller details was easier for his brain to process. Dib was still at a loss at how much time had passed since his capture, but observing his sibling's appearance could give him an estimated age and a guess of the relative length of the time span of the incarceration from there.

And so from what the boy saw so far, he did not particularly like what the evidence was telling him.

Gaz was so much taller than he was now, and some subconscious part of him felt slightly pained and affronted by this small insult to his seniority, and was a far cry from being his "little sister" anymore.

If nothing else, she looked...mature and tough, able to take care of herself and make the job look easy too. Dib wasn't exactly the greatest judge of attractiveness, especially considering his own family, but he supposed he could rightly say that she'd come to be a beautiful young woman...in a daunting, intimidating sort of way. Gaz's hair had grown out longer yet still contained the same curved shape that so resembled jaws, spilling over her shoulders in a violet wave, but it didn't really look like she had taken any particular care with it other than letting her hair grow out naturally. Brown eyes like his own, but a few shades darker than he remembered, and lidded gaze cast familiar shadows.

Looking at her like this, he could only assume that she was somewhere in her late teens—despite the haunting gaze making her appear more mature than that—maybe around sixteen or so.

Dib recognized the outfit she wore and with the exception of the size, he'd created a nearly identical stealth suit in past based off of his dad's old model. There was something slightly exciting about the idea of his creations surviving for so long during his absence, but looking directly at her while she was wearing it was rather disconcerting and uncomfortable. The blue tinted goggles on the other hand, were actually his personal pair, as evidenced by the v-shaped glinting crack on the far left corner he'd obtained during the whole fiasco the last time Gaz had to come help him when he was in trouble.

Now that was ironic.

But Dib was far from laughing.

There was something about the idea about his sister having to rescue him that seemed so painful, even though he was well aware that most people were scared as hell of her, it still left a clear impression.

So much for being a big brother.

There were so many things he needed to ask her about and start to climb out of this hole of horrible uncertainty and ignorance he'd been trapped in for so long. Exactly how much time had passed? Why had no one been able to get in touch with him earlier? What condition was his home planet in now with Zim lurking menacingly in the skies above with his metal behemoth? And most importantly, where were they going to go and what were they going to do now?

And then there was the question he knew he was too afraid to ask, one that the boy knew perhaps only Zim himself might be able to adequately answer: how had this happened to him?

Or, if he wanted to be unduly technical about it, how had nothing happened to him?

Dib wasn't without his many scars and bruises; in fact, this had been a reoccurring theme in his life since the first time the alien showed up on his planet. He was accustomed to treating cuts and burn wounds for a long time now and always made sure to keep a first aid kit well-stocked at home whenever he needed it. Who knew if the pack was even still there now, but having it now sure would have been nice.

Lately, the injuries were more sustained and Dib had no real way of treating them. Zim was less than hospitable with his treatment towards his prisoner, but this was one change in particular that Dib had really been looking forward to coming to fruition.

Back when Dib still had access to his own bed at home, he'd participated in a few time-wasting sessions of searching through Irken data files through his captured alien ship one night, before the communication bug he'd planted was discovered and removed, and learned all he needed to know about Irken heightocracy—though the boy was personally amused by the concept of ruling by tallness—and just a few basic culture facts. If anything, Dib was enthralled by the idea of rubbing it in Zim's face when human growth hormones kicked in and he ended up towering over his longtime rival's green head and flashing a smug smirk or two in the process.

He didn't know whether or not the space lizard was even aware of that fact, but to the boy's confusion and anger, he'd managed to stop that victory from ever existing.

But he wasn't without his own brand of suspicion.

Large gaps were missing from his memory that not even the uncountable monotony of his imprisonment could really explain, along with the blurry recollection of red light. There wasn't anything wrong with his memory before his capture, so Dib had a lot of reason to believe it was due to Zim.

But it hadn't all been just sitting in the dark and waiting for the alien to hurt him again. There was the occasional escape attempt, though they were far in between and stopped altogether once he'd been moved into the most recent cell. Before Zim saw fit to send him onboard his destruction spaceship, the boy had to make do with the pitifully disguised base on the planet's surface. The first prison was more simplistic than the glass cylinder—nothing more than the typical steel bar setup really and actually included a window—and Dib picked the locks and broke out within the first week or so, but hadn't managed to make it to an exit fast enough.

However, his second attempt took longer to engineer and put into action, cleverly convincing GIR to smuggle parts to him to create a tool to saw at the metal bars until they were fragile enough to snap under pressure. Specifically pressure obtained from hurling himself at the gate and getting a few painful bruises for his efforts in the process after falling to the floor on top of the broken barrier.

Still, the initial breakout had worked fine up until the point where he'd hijacked the elevator and rode it up to the ground level, racing for the door and his freedom.

It was at that moment that all of the metaphorical horse dooky hit the fan, so to speak.

The silence hadn't bothered him at first, not noticing the total lack of noise that was so unusual to the alien's base as his mind was too solely focused on the task of escape. The house was completely empty on the top floor, devoid of the presence of Zim's robot or the mess that so often accompanied it, and the television screen was silent and dark.

The trash bin elevator he'd just climbed out of was unmoving, and the same was true for the other secret passages around the house. Dib should have taken this as a sign—an early warning from the start—that something was dreadfully wrong, and stopped to think a moment. But he didn't this time.

The boy bolted for the door, rather unconcerned about the prospect of the guarding lawn gnome robots on the other side—he'd outrun the stupid things hundreds of times before—and seized ahold of the knob.

The instant that Dib's palm made contact with the surface, a jolt of pain laced throughout his body, hurling him backwards and landing painfully against the side of the couch. It took him a moment or two to rise and when he did it was only to assume a slouched, sitting position against the lumpy furniture, unable to easily get back up as stars spun in his vision. 'Electrical trap...' he registered this faintly, hurrying to bury the angry red of his singed palm into the folds of his coat, barely able to move as the paralyzing effect of electricity on a human body stunned him still. The lightning coursing through the boy's form was enough to cause his limbs to twitch and jerk spasmodically and he could only grit his teeth and try to block out the pain to regain control of himself. By the time Dib had enough presence of mind to notice the alarm bell blaring above his head, it was already too late to do anything about it.

Zim used the fake toilet entrance this time, stepping out of the elevator nonchalantly and into the living room to inspect his enemy collapsed on the floor, "Ha! idiotic human! Did you enjoy the shocking little trap I left for you, hmmm?"

"Your stupid puns aren't even funny, Zim!" Dib snapped at him despite the static shooting pain up his spine and Zim growled at him angrily, as though the very thought that he could be anything other than a master of comedy was a huge affront to him. "Why didn't you just reinforce the cell then? Look, now you can't even open your own front door!"

Zim actually managed to appear thoughtful for a moment, but he quickly shook it off, waving one hand casually as if a door crackling with electricity was a minor concern. "Yes, yes, but Invader Zim needs no door... And you've failed again, haven't you?"

"Whatever... Just try and cook up another evil scheme, I'll still escape and stop you!"

The alien only smiled maliciously, his stance both arrogant and proud, "Oh, I don't think you will, Dib. Not at all... Computer! Take the prisoner to the new cell!" Immediately, wires erupted from the ceiling and grabbed ahold of the struggling boy as another passage was opened up beneath the floor nearby to drag him through. "Wait, just a moment," Zim stopped the mass with a wave of his hand and stepped closer to the captive and leaned forward. Dib was expecting him to gloat or yell something nasty in his ear, but instead, a gloved claw reached out and snatched the glasses from his face.

That was when he started to panic.

"Zim! Give them back!" Dib desperately tried to force his way out of the wiring that held him, but the metal only tightened further on already burning skin and drew out a pained wince.

The alien just kept smiling, his claws bending the frames just enough to stop from snapping them in his hands, "Oh, do you need them, Dib-worm?" The boy huffed—of course Zim knew, why else would he mess with him like this? He'd overheard it somewhere or looked it up online or something. "Anyway...the great Zim has some conquering to do. I'll hold onto these in the meantime..." And before Dib could shout one more word of protest, he was dragged down into the base.

That was where everything seemed to fall apart.

Dib's experiences in that prison consisted of little more than waiting, forcing himself to eat the disgusting meals he was given, and being attacked by Zim on and off. This pattern failed to change even when the cell was moved to the dreadnaught, only punctuated by times in which gaps in memory inexplicably clogged his thinking.

Dib wanted to speak and break this tense silence, but his trembling hands caught his attention and he had to wring them for a few minutes to steady himself, hating how the cold feeling festering in the pit of his stomach for so long in that cell hadn't faded. He had the sinking feeling that he was ill with something, though intuition rather than any particular symptoms pointed to this conclusion, other than this relentless shaking in his limbs and the pounding migraine that wasn't getting any better.

Dib knew that if he had really been stuck in that ship for as long as he suspected, then there were definitely going to be some issues with his health, taking into account the disgusting food he had to dine on as well as the fact that any opportunities at bathing were far in between. If Zim ever got fed up with the stink—that was completely his fault by the way—and wanted him "clean," he only needed to divert some water into the room to practically flood the cell every so often. Dib had become only partially aware that the idea of letting him just accumulate filth had disgusted the alien as well.

Not mentioning the fact that if he was infected with some twisted alien virus Zim may or may not have intentionally caused, finding a way to cure it would be difficult to say the least.

Of course the searing pain throbbing like a second heartbeat from his wrist was enough for Dib to actually force his scattered thoughts to focus on the most immediate problem at hand. The tattered excuses of clothes he'd been wearing were not exactly the cleanest things in the world, and there was a possibility that he might have just caused an infection all on his own by using them to stem the blood. Granted, the wound had needed to be bandaged and there was nothing else on hand. Unfortunately, there was nothing useful in the escape pod he could use to replace the dirty makeshift bandages and there was NO WAY he was going to ask Gaz to ruin the stealth suit to replace the material.

So he was stuck with a horribly painful, throbbing injury wrapped in tainted bandages.

At least until they finally arrived wherever it was that they were supposed to be going.

Speaking of which...that would be a nice thing to know and one less thing to worry about.

"So..."

Dib's voice was hoarse and ill-used, and he was far more accustomed to using it for threats and insults directing towards Zim or mumbling quietly to no one in particular lately than for actually starting a normal conversation, so ended up coughing a few times to clear it.

If flying around in a stolen escape pod was ground for "normal," he wasn't even going to debate.

"Here we go..." Gaz mumbled under her breath as he started to speak, the usual twinge of annoyance cresting her features and the young woman's hands tightened almost unperceptively over the joystick-like control mechanism. Normally, Dib would be concerned about those little signs, but not today. Gaz had to tell him what was going on, and any information he could get would be worth disturbing her.

"...Where...exactly are we going?" The boy tried to put most serious look on his face, despite the fact that he couldn't really see very well and leveled his eyes on her hands as they were the closest to him and the most focused in his line of sight. "Or is it some kind of secret hideout?"

Gaz frowned a bit at the question, though it didn't seem to be directed at him this time. "Not really... It's not exactly a huge secret or anything. We just move from place to place a lot, I guess." Her tone was rather dismissive, as though it wasn't all that big of a deal what kind of place they were headed to, but her words did give away some very important pieces of information for Dib.

For one thing, the fact that someone had to change locations often meant that Zim really causing a lot of damage and presenting a much bigger threat than ever before, just as he had suspected. Though the fact that he had now obtained possession of a battleship kind of proved the point anyways.

Also, she had used the word "we."

That meant there was actually a larger group working in tandem somewhere against Zim! A resistance movement fighting against alien invasion, just like he'd always encouraged to come into existence in the first place.

Of course, it was rather late for that wasn't it?

For the most part, if someone had decided to believe him earlier, the situation would never have escalated to this point and the skies would be free of that accursed ship. Or, at the very least, he probably would have found a way to counter his nemesis a long time ago. All this was because of the idiocy of his peers and their inability to listen to reason, not how unbelievable things may have seemed. And by extension, his own capture probably never would have happened either.

Trying not to stew on these bitter feelings, Dib sighed and spoke up again, "So where is the base now? Are there a lot of other people there? Is there any sort of secret passcode I need to be let in? I-"

Gaz cut him off with a wave of her hand and grimaced as she returned her brown eyes to the horizon to keep track of their destination, "Dib, just...be quiet for a while until we get there. You learn everything when we arrive, so just calm down already." The boy pouted a bit unconsciously, annoyed by this sudden dismissal of his questions and sighed dejectedly, and honestly thought that he deserved some answers for all the time he was away. But Dib decided to let it go anyway, he was in way too much pain to bother with arguing and knew that trying to probably wouldn't help him anyway. Eventually though, his gaze was drawn back to his sister's face which was clouded with a confusion as though she were remembering something she didn't quite understand. "How did you open the door?"

"Huh? What door?" Blinking uncomprehendingly, Dib waited as Gaz shook her quickly.

"On Zim's ship. You opened the hanger door with a passcode or something," Gaz clarified and the boy almost slapped himself for not really explaining it well earlier.

"Oh, that! Right, well, it's not like Zim would give me access to English text or anything... So I had to learn the Irken lettering through observation and memorization, y'know..." The teenage girl only nodded her head dully and Dib realized she'd tune him out soon unless he got to the point, "Well, I already knew some of the characters from translating using Tak's ship, so rest wasn't hard to figure out. I can read the language perfectly fine, but I can't really speak it well. As for the door, all the passcodes are the same, so I just entered in the one I heard the guards use on my cell during the prison shifts."

Gaz's shifted into a semi-puzzled expression, "Why are all the codes the same?"

"Dunno... Zim probably designed them that way, like an idiot. Though it's not like anyone but the soldiers who serve him really know the passcode anyway so..."

He tapered off, sighing as the girl returned her attention to the sky, going silent and distant once more.

"Fine...so...could you at least answer one more thing for me?" Gaz grunted in response, and though it wasn't much of an answer, he didn't consider it to be a rejection either. So now he could ask the question he was most afraid of putting words to, "How...old am I now?"

For just one more time, his sister's dark eyes left the sky, though her piloting didn't seem to be affected in the least, and fixed him with a dull gaze that lingered between pitying and something else he couldn't quite discern. She hesitated, so obviously not wanting to tell him the truth and the boy's heart started beating faster than ever. After what felt like an eternity of waiting, Gaz opened her mouth and spoke in a dull and nearly emotionless voice that stopped Dib dead still, "It's been...quite a long time, Dib. Happy eighteenth birthday."

(A/N): Wow, not much happened in this chapter huh? Mostly just a revelation and some explanations/reflections. Well, next time will be a different story, I assure you. R&R~