YES! Finally an update on this beloved little story from me. As I said in my other story 'While the Cat's Away' (it's a ZAGR story if you guys wanna check it out) I took a rather long sabbatical from writing to do coursework, travel to see my beloved and basically get Christmas and New Year over and done with.
Now that they are over and done with, I can hopefully get back on track with updating at a semi-regular basis.
I really, REALLY dislike the beginning of this chapter... I actually think my writing utterly failed through most of this, but I kept on going. I do like the ending though.
ANYWAY, I'll leave you dudes to read on. enjoy!
Dib couldn't believe it. Standing before him was an alien, a real alien. It was as if all of Dib's world had just shattered around him like a stone hitting a film of ice over a lake. The air seemed heavy in his lungs and he wanted to be sick. This was a shock to the system so great that he could barely keep himself standing.
"W-w-what are you?" the question seemed stupid beyond belief, but he had to hear it from Zim's mouth.
The alien looked at Dib with a mixture of anger and confusion. However, he did not address the human, instead, his eyes turned to Gir standing beside him. "Gir! Detain the intruder!"
Before Dib could react, he heard a vicious sounding, "Yes my lord!" and a strong pair of metallic arms wrapped themselves like rope around the councillor.
"GEDDOFFME!" Dib shouted, immediately struggling against the robots way-too-tight hug. It was fruitless however, and he quickly found himself toppling over.
He let out a loud 'agh' as he fell to the ground, Gir's arms digging deeply into his sides. He looked forward, only to see the solid black boot of Zim.
As he turned his eyes upward, he found himself looking into the eyes of his alien captor, who only grinned viciously down a him. "I told you to leave me alone, human." He chuckled in a remarkably evil manner. "Now I guess I'll have to destroy you."
Dib heard some mechanical thing move from behind him, and suddenly he felt several hundred bolts of electricity go through him like his entire body was being set on fire.
Then he knew only darkness.
When he awoke he opened his eyes slowly. There was a very bright light above him, making his eyes burn. He groaned as suddenly the feeling in his body kicked back in and every inch of him ached.
He squinted and turned his head... Or tried. He found that he could barely move. It seemed Zim had strapped his body down completely.
Zim! What had that vicious alien done to him? He didn't feel like anything was wrong, but he couldn't be sure what with his every limb strapped to a table.
Suddenly, blocking the shining lamps above him where a pair of bright, wide cyan eyes. "Mastah! The big head man's awake!"
Dib blinked again, trying to force his eyes to focus. They'd taken his glasses, dammit, he could barely see a few feet ahead of him. Gir's metallic face was clear enough though, cold metal skin and a big wide grin.
"Ahh, good," from somewhere behind him Zim's harsh cackle was heard, "We can begin the experiment."
"Z-Zim?" Dib called out almost hopelessly, "What are you doing?"
The fear in his voice was obvious, but he knew he would never be able to hide it even if he tried.
"I'm going to replace your brain with that of a squid," Zim explained with an undeniable malicious glee, "making you harmless."
The very idea sounded insane, he couldn't really expect this to work could he? Well, he had been counselling him for several weeks so... Yeah, he was pretty sure Zim would go through with it.
"Stop!" Dib cried out fruitlessly, straining against his straps, "Don't!"
"Oh poor filthy human," Zim seemed to chuckle poisonously, "Do you think anything can save you? You're alone in my lab with no allies and by irked rules of war I can do whatever I wish with captured prisoners."
"Can't you just make me clean up the place or something?" Dib offered fruitlessly.
"Hum, maybe," the alien, apparently called an Irken, answered in a weirdly harmless tone before he snapped back to his cruelty, "NO! Prepare to have a squid brain, Membrane-monster!"
However, as if gifted by pure providence, a disembodied digitalised voice suddenly called out, "Master Zim, there is someone at the door."
"Let the robo-parents deal with it," the Irken cried out, infuriated at being interrupted.
"They both put their heads in the oven and are out of commission." The computer replied with what Dib could have sworn was a note of laughter.
"Uuugh," Zim muttered something under his breath about 'building good robots' and Dib could hear the Irken begin to walk away, "Gir, guard the prisoner until I return."
There was a quick, "Yes my lord!" and Dib suddenly felt something land on top of him, almost knocking the wind out of him.
The large cyan eyes of Gir appeared before him with a tongue lolling out of the robots mouth. "Hiya!"
"Erm, hi," Dib managed to breathe out. Wow, this robot was heavier than he looked.
Dib had to think of a way out of this. He couldn't just let himself get brain-swapped by some crazy little green alien. A tiny part of scolded him for that internal remark, Zim wasn't crazy, he was just troubled.
No, focus on getting the hell out of here. He tried struggling against the bonds again but he was held down way too tightly. The original panic was settling now, his one seventy five IQ kicking back in and telling him the key to escape was not through struggle but through exploiting the little robot sitting on his chest.
"Hey, Gir," Dib managed to say after a few breaths, "We're friends, right?"
"I dunno," Gir replied, oddly scratching his metal head in thought, "We is?"
"Yes we is!" The councillor said quickly, matching Gir's speech quickly, "And you know what friends do? They don't tie 'em to tables!"
"They don't?" Gir replied again, his eyes growing wide at this information.
"No they don't," Dib managed a small smile, "So why don't you untie me?"
The robot seemed to think about it for a moment before grinning, "Hokay!" Gir then jumped of Dib's chest and quickly began tearing, literally, the bonds off Dib's body.
The moment he was free, Dib scrambled off the table and moved away from it, looking at his surroundings and eventually, through the haze of the world around him, spotting a small table with his glasses and keys on it. Grabbing them both, he put the keys in his pocket and the glasses on his face, finally looking around the room. It was some kind of examination room, but filled with, sickeningly, pickled specimens of random animals. Thankfully none of them human.
Dib wished he had a camera, all of this was incredible, he could become famous overnight with just one picture, hell, even a picture of Gir would suffice.
No, right now he had to escape out the base before Zim got back. Again Dib knew his best chance was with the small robot.
"You're my best friend now, Gir!" Dib explained with a forced happiness.
"YAAAY!" the small robot seemed utterly overjoyed win this news and practically leapt onto Dib to hug him. "I love you big head man."
Were all invading robots from space as dumb as this one? "I love you too, Gir, and I'm going to home and make you a big cake, okay? So why don't you show me the exit?"
"Okay!" the robot dropped off Dib and quickly began marching towards the door. Dib had to wonder if this was a trap, was the robot honestly That stupid? But he realised that he had no choice, it was follow Gir or get lobotomised.
The robot was honest and soon they were arriving in Zim's front room. Dib however did not breathe a sigh of relief, rather, he wanted to close the distance between himself and that door as soon as he possibly could.
However, his hand barely hit the door before he heard to loud crashes behind him and he turned, seeing the robo-parents once again.
"He's leaving without giving us a hug!" The dad shouted in a clearly annoyed voice.
"How rude!" The mother shouted before her arms shot forward, "COME HERE!"
Dib threw open the door and began legging it down the garden, the sound of the two insane robots chasing after him. He didn't turn his head however, years of running from bullies in high school had got that one into him. He could hear the robots practically destroying the door behind him and throwing themselves like creatures possessed down the driveway.
The therapist grabbed his keys out of his pocket, unlocking his car, practically diving into it and slamming it just, just in time for the two robots to crash into the side of his precious car, making two huge dents into the metal.
Dib didn't wait around to see what they'd do, and he floored it, the car leaping into action with a slight roar and skidding down the street, hoping to God that he'd never ever see that house, those parents, that robot or, dare he say it, Zim ever again.
However, already ten minutes down the road Dib's mind began to reel. How could that have happened? Was any of it real? Did he dream it? Surely that troubled little boy couldn't be some kind of crazy psychopathic alien bent on killing people? If so, why was he still here and not vaporised by now, it had been months since Zim had landed after all.
The questions exploded in his mind, flooding his being with a forgotten sense of wonder and investigation. He had to know, he had to find out. Next meeting he was, wait, next meeting?
He frowned to himself, he was pretty sure that Zim was never coming to another one of their sessions ever again, not after that.
So what now? He finally slowed his car, convinced that he wasn't being followed. He was almost home anyway, it'd only be a few more minutes. His apartment was small, but suited for his needs and besides, it wasn't like he could get anything else on his budget.
Dib frowned slowly to himself, looking back over his shoulder. He was pretty sure Zim would try and get him again tonight, he had spent enough time on the fringes of Zim's mind to know how the young boy... alien felt about revenge.
As he turned into the parking lot under his apartment block, he frowned to himself softly. Dammit Zim... why did he have to go and be an friggin alien?
Have fun with that guys? I know I didn't! I had a huge case of writers block on this chapter, and I probably dealt with the whole 'Zim being an alien' thing wrong, but I did like the way Dib gets out of this and all. I'm also going to quit writing chapters to this on my itouch because it's HELL to edit later on.
Anyways, please tell me what you liked, didn't like, what you thought I could have done better on etc. FEEDBACK IS ALWAYS GOOD.
See you next update!