"What?" Kor stared at Zim with a confused look.
"You have Zim! Me! The Ultimate Invader!" Zim said.
"So you're saying to use you as a sacrifice for the larvae to attack, then we find somewhere safe to hide. That's the plan right, cause I really want it to be right now."
"Snark on all you want but my plan is amazingly brilliant! Now it requires you all to work nonstop, especially you, Gaz, since I still can't move, but first, to get this vile smell off us. Gaz, you'll have to scrub soap on me then rinse me with glue."
"No, no way! I'm not going to give you a bath! Get like Dib to do it or something," Gaz said.
"Dib is going to run errands to prepare for the coming day."
"I swear, I'll kill you when this is all over."
"Yeah, yeah, and I'll send your particles flying into space. Dib-worm, there are a lot of syringes in the storage area, go gather blood from the Fefians whenever they revive. Tinkerer, there are blueprints and parts in the room next to Dib's, go build whatever is on them. We shall meet again in five Earth hours! Now to my room, Gaz!" Gaz spitefully obeyed Zim. Dib and Kor were left in the powerless Dibship covered in filth.
"Well, time to get to work then," Kor said.
"Hey, I'm just curious, but why do you care so much about this? I mean, you're invincible yet you're so aversive to dying," Dib said.
"Is there something wrong with not liking to die?"
"Well no, but still..."
"If you really want to know then it's going to have to be in flashback form."
"That's fine with me."
"Well, if you're so eager to hear a story then fine. You see, Dib, it starts with the issue of our planet's population's unique characteristic..."
The beings here are immortal, so never having to fear death, they became perpetually happy. Originally, everyone felt pain and at least tried to avoid obvious death, however, as time went on and dying became more commonplace, the Fefians evolved to never having to feel pain. Or at least, most of them, a few are born with the ability to feel pain, me for instance. It feels so great, watching everyone live in such joyous glee while you're left there to feel the pain they never will.
Before I continue on with that, I believe that one question you might have is how can our planet maintain a functioning population if everyone is immortal. To counter this, the planet functions on a one-to-one death:birth ratio, as in for every birth of a new Fefian, one must die. To streamline the process, one of the parents are killed, using the only method known to Fefians: eating, usually done by the spouse. However, my situation was once again a bit different. I was only six, playing with my mom and dad.
"Who's got your nosey? Who's got your nosey?" my dad was holding his hand like a fist.
"Daddy, give it back, it hurts!" I said.
"Now dear," said my mom, "you can't always have what you want."
"But it's my nose! I kind of need it."
"Kor, the only thing you need is your hopes and dreams."
"That has nothing to do with this situation, mom!"
"I love you, Kor, never forget that."
"Did you look up standard aesops parents say to their child or something? Seriously, I just want my nose back!" The doorbell rang suddenly, my dad tossed the nose for me to catch. He opened the door to reveal two Fefians, dressed in black trench coats.
"Blarb! How you doing budd?" said one of them.
"Matty! Chucky! Great to see you again," My dad greeted. "What brings you herey?"
"Oh nothing seriouso, Blarbo," said Chuck, "Justo routino checko results from lasto weeko."
"Oh nowy, don't tell me I'm terminally."
"Ahahaha, Blarb you kidd, you know that's impossi!" Matt said.
"Of coursey, I was just jokey, now what's the resulty?"
"Well, accord to our results, Kor there has two parents. One of you has to die."
"This wasn'ty brought up beforey."
"Oh yeah, we forgot! Hahaha."
"Oh you guys, hahahaha." My dad motioned to mom to come to him.
"What is it dear?" mom said.
"One of us has to diey now. I forgoty about this when Kor was born."
"Oh, me too, hahahaha! Hey, lets play Rock, Fefian, Zotis Larvae to decide who dies."
"I love that gamey, deary!"
"Rock, Fefian, Zotis! Zotis Larvae!"
"Fefian survive everything, you lose again deary."
"Oh, I always lose. Well, to the victor the spoils, dear." I watched as my dad unhinged his jaw and started eating my mom. They were no goodbyes, no "I love you"s, nothing but the sound of laughter from everyone, including my mom.
But that didn't end there, several of our games require bodily dismemberment, AND THEY WOULDN'T LEAVE ME OUT OF THEM. When I refuse, they just took my arm. I was forced to play pin the leg of the Fefian, dodge spinning saw blades, and musical bodies! How these beings ever got the idea to remove their heads for fun is beyond me!
As time went by I became more aware, the people around me couldn't feel anything, no pain, no sorrow, just unending happiness. It was sickening. With this lack of emotion and pain they no longer cared about each other. Stupidity grew rapid as they never felt the fear of danger. Motivation was nowhere as they couldn't taste the despair of failure.
I, too, no longer cared for any of them. I made it my goal to leave this cesspool of joy by learning how to build ships. I would gather parts from destroyed ships that happened to be caught in our planet's doom day weather. However, sometimes the crew and ship survive and they would ask for me to repair their ship, always I asked to leave the planet with them, but after spending time on the planet and witnessing the native's odd diet, the crew would always leave on their ship without me, believing that I was just like them. I would be left alone to suffer on this planet until another ship came by.
"So that brings me here, to you, the most recent crew to land on this planet. And I will either leave with you guys or watch as you burn on my planet's surface," Kor finished her story and took a breath of air after talking so much.
"Wow, that was really...dark," Dib said.
"You expect a happy story with unicorns from a goth?"
"Hey, what's going on out there!" Zim had yelled from his room. "I don't here any work being done for my stupendous plan! I only here flashbacking! Get to work, non-Irken filth! You too, Gaz, scrub harder!"
"I'm going to shower also," Dib said, "I'll see you in a few hours."
"Whatever," Kor started walking towards the room that held the blueprints. Harvestia was going to be more lively this year, and despite how stupid she thought Zim's idea was, she couldn't wait to destroy some of those larvae.
"So how was it, Gaz?" Dib teased his sister, beside him were several syringes of Fefian blood. The task was easy once they had regenerated, and due to their lack of care and overwhelming sense of joy, they happily gave Dib their blood.
"It was disgusting, so shut up about it," Gaz answered back. Kor walked towards them with a large crate in hand and what looked like a battery in the other.
"This is the only battery I could get my hands on, however, to have enough power for flight it'll need a 24 hour charge period, so we have to survive that long tomorrow," Kor then placed the battery to be charged, "Harvestia will begin two hours before it'll be done, it'll take one hour before they notice the hill and attack. So we have to live for one hour, after that we blast off and eliminate any remaining larvae."
"Yes, a plan of perfection, because it was made by me, Zim!" Zim, who had regained the movement of his right hand, pointed at the crate. "Now open the crate to reveal the rest of my genius, Tinkerer." Kor ripped out one of the sides of the crate, causing the fruits of her labor to come tumbling out.
"Gnomes? Seriously, Zim?" Dib said, "You're putting your faith in your five-year old lawn gnomes?"
"Gnomes of Doom, Dib-monkey, Gnomes of Doom!"
"You realize that your Gnomes have failed on several occasions before, right? I HAVE been able to sneak past them."
"Just go plant the gnomes on the hill, big-headed, Earth monkey, you too Tinkerer." Dib and Kor grabbed the Gnomes and headed outside the Dibship, Dib muttered something about his head not being big as he left. "Now for you, Gaz."
"Please don't tell me I have to change you or something," She said disdainfully.
"Even better! You will be my assistant for the creation of a new weapon, if it works, we live! If not, we're doomed!"
"After washing you, I already feel doomed."
"Grab the syringes, human, and onward to the lab!"
"I hate this trip."
"Do not worry, Gaz, by the time this is done, I'll make you a bringer of doom who weaves destruction as you walk, hahahahahahaha!"
Everyone watched the clock with the attention of a child watching the candy store from a window after the parent had to pry them out of it. The Dibship was now a makeshift fort, complete with barricades from Kor's last Harvestia survival attempt. It was the best defense that could be made given such short time. The cold air had settled in as dusk blanketed the planet. A shiver...
"What are you doing?" Gaz had appeared from the lab looking strangely at Dib.
"Nothing," Dib said awkwardly, "Just...just setting the atmosphere."
"Fine, whatever, but who are you talking to?"
"Uh..."
"The psychologist was right, you are crazy."
"Those tests had no scientific basis and you know it! Anyway is Zim done?"
"Yeah."
"Then where is he?"
"Oh, right, he's still paralyzed. I'll go get him." As Gaz was getting Zim, Kor came with a still paralyzed Skoodge and still lifeless Gir.
"I brought the dead bot and this..."
"Skoodge," he said.
"That sounds more like something I scrape off my shoe than a name,"
"Cease the blabbering of Skoodges and shoes!" Zim was being dragged by Gaz who was also holding a basket. Despite still being paralyzed Zim maintained his maniacally gleeful look. "Tonight our fleshy heads live, minions! Behold, the manifestation of my succulent genius!" Gaz opened the basket and poured out its contents.
"These look like water guns," Dib remarked.
"They are, but better! I've analyzed the properties of Fefian blood to find their happy gene, then I bonded a chemical reagent to the glutaminic properties of the blood cell's mitochondria. The reagent causes a bursting effect when exposed to atmospheric pressure. I based it on an experimental happy goo project I was working on years ago. Now each gun contains these liquidic solutions that will be consumed by those larvae, causing them to explode into doomy pieces!"
"There was not a single scientific word in there."
"Meh, I'll take it," Kor said, "Besides, even if it does fail I'll have at least one use for it."
"Fine, just give me one also. Now, it's important that they don't get into the Dibship, or else we'll be flying with larvae for a while."
"Ha, chances are those barricades won't last five seconds. Closing the glass would only mean more holes in ship to fix. The best plan is to leave it open, then close it once we get airborne. We blast a hole while in space, the larvae get flushed out into deep space and we block the hole."
"I don't know about that..."
"I like it!" Zim shouted. "We just need to make sure we have something big enough to block the hole." Zim thought for a bit before looking over at Dib.
"OH WILL YOU SHUT UP ABOUT THE BIG HEAD JOKES ALREADY! MY HEAD IS NOT THAT BIG! IT'S JUST AS BIG AS ANYONE ELSE'S! I'M SO SICK AND TIRED OF EVERYONE SAYING MY HEAD IS BIG! IF WE TOOK A MEASURING TAPE IT'LL HAVE SAME CIRCUMFERENCE! MY HEAD IS NO BIG! NO! NOT! ME NO BIG HEAD! DIB NO BIG! AHHHHHH!"
"Well, someone's delusional."
"You done, Dib?" Gaz said.
Dib took a moment to regain his breath, "Yeah, it felt good to get that out."
"Well, while you were playing prima donna over there, those larvae just ate through the first barricade."
"Quick, start the timer!" Kor set the timer to countdown one hour. Gaz and Dib quickly started shooting the goop onto the larvae. Gaz was a good shot, hitting larvae left and right. The goo had about a one second delay before larvae guts flew everywhere. Dib, however, was a lousy shot.
"Come on, Dib, learn to aim already!" Gaz shouted.
"I'm sorry I didn't waste my life playing videogames," Dib responded.
"At least I didn't waste it being a raving lunatic."
"Will you two shut up and just keep shooting!" Kor shouted. It's been ten minutes, so far that's the longest time Kor had survived at Harvestia. It was great to finally have people help her fight this, instead of being too happy to care or too scared and ran away.
Twenty minutes. The chemical warfare method was also a nice touch, she was never good with anything that wasn't mechanical but watching those larvae blow up brought a smile to her face.
Thirty minutes. Time does move faster when you're having fun, Kor thought. She moved quickly from target to target, each shot being just enough to cause the larva's doom. She took aim at a really fat one and pressed the trigger, but nothing was shot. "I'm out!"
"Just grab another one, we made a lot." Gaz pointed to the pile of guns by Zim. "Dammit Dib! That one was Bloaty-sized! How'd you miss that?!" Kor turned back and ran for another gun. Zim, Gir, and Skoodge were still piled up and useless.
"Hahaha! Foolish Fefian worms! You cannot stop the onslaught of superior Irken intellect!" Zim laughed as he watched on, wishing he could be on the attack as well. Kor just grabbed another gun and ran off.
"Sir, I know how much you want to be there," Skoodge said.
"Of course, Skoodge, nothing makes me laugh like the rupturing of bodies." Skoodge wanted to help too, he was feeling useless while on his commander's journey. He wanted to serve his commander as the soldier he was. Skoodge tried with his thought power to move, but nothing. There was no feeling, he didn't even feel his fingers wiggle. It went by unnoticed, by everyone but Zim who just smiled cunningly.
Before Kor took aimed she looked at the larvae as a whole. It wasn't stopping, they weren't even stalling them anymore, it was just slowing the larvae down, but what made her scared wasn't their speed. The larvae had almost multiplied, she'd never seen such a large gathering.
"No, that's not possible, why are there so many?" Kor said in terror.
"Stop worrying about that and shoot them!" Gaz said. Kor stopped for a moment and stared at what they were shooting.
"The guns! I can't believe I was so stupid to overlook such a big detail! The larvae are attracted to the Fefian blood in the guns!"
"So what, that just means more targets and bigger groupings."
"But I've never seen a swarm this large, something is making my blood run cold. I..."
"Hey, do you hear buzzing?" Dib interrupted. Kor's fears were realized when out of the swarm came... "FLYING LARVAE!"
"Well, this is new," Kor said.
"You never said these things could fly!" Gaz said.
"No one's ever survived this long to find out, usually we'd all be incapacitated by the larvae by now."
"Damn, they're moving too fast! There's not nearly as much fliers but still."
"We can't split our focus, otherwise one of the two elevations will advance," Dib said.
"Which one do we focus on!?"
"HOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-HAAAAAAAAAA!" The shout came from a top the Dibship, it was an non-paralyzed Skoodge with two guns. However, he had outfitted some sort of shower-head like nozzle to the end. When he shot the goop stormed down hitting the flying larvae as they entered the deadly rain. "The Tallest Zim entrusted his only two spread nozzles to me, I will not fail him. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-HAAAAAAAAAA!"
"The blood must've finally worn off, couldn't have better timing too," Kor said. Skoodge's assistance was greatly needed. He was able to prevent the flying larvae from advancing while the others stopped the huge swarm on the ground.
Only ten minutes left. We're actually doing it, Kor thought, We're actually able to stall these larvae. Not only that but we're...pushing them...back? "Something's not right."
"HOLY COW! WHAT IS THAT THING!?" Dib screamed. The larvae weren't being pushed back, they were getting out of the way. There formation revealed a monstrous, larvae that was not even close to the size of the others. I was yellow with drill-like teeth, in layers throughout its body. It was oozing something all over itself but its most unique feature with the four, long, squid-like tentacles protruding from its back. The four were flabbergasted, speechless, wide-eyed, and their mouth open.
"Foolish servants!" Zim's voice had broken their frozen states, "If you're going to let yourself get eaten by some obese worm than you have no right following the great Zim! I do not need weak, sloppy cowardly cows in my armada! I need courageous...couragey creatures of doom! Now if you want to serve me then show me DOOM!"
Everyone, aside from Skoodge, would rather have shot Zim than serve him at this moment, but they all came to a consensus that the larvae was the bigger priority. Giant larvae or not, they were going to live today.
The other larvae were still and formed an open path for their leader to feed. The group tried to shoot everything at it but its size prevented any splattering of guts, but it was slow. The group looked at the clock, if they could just slow the thing down a little, they'd make it away. Closer and closer it moved, its tentacles stretched forward trying to grasp the morsels in front of it. It was so close, the ship almost within its grasp...
3...2...1
"Launch the ship, fools!" Zim yelled. The group rushed back inside, Kor scrambled for the launch button and pressed it. The ship began to light up, the electricity from the battery flowing through the Dibship's veiny wires, but it didn't move. "What's this?"
The screen lit up showing a red battery with a line through it. "Not charged, what?" Dib shouted.
"Crap, these bugs must've came early this year, it still needs more time!" Kor was frantically pressing buttons in vain to start the ship.
"Your planet sucks at timing, Kor!" Gaz yelled as she fired at the giant larvae.
Suddenly, the tentacles of the giant larvae breached the Dibship. Kor, Skoodge, and Gaz each handled a tentacle to keep it at bay while Zim watched helplessly and shouted orders.
"Shoot that thing! And that thing! And that over there!"
"Sir, I don't know which direction you're referring to!" Skoodge said.
"Just shoot it! AHHHHH!" During Zim's shouting, a random jolt of electricity from Gir electrocuted Zim. Immediately he felt a numbing in his hand which made direct contact. Wait, I felt that...
Dib saw the fourth tentacle near the battery. He rushed it while shooting at the same time, fazing the tentacle, but it lashed out and hit Dib, causing his gun to drop. The tentacle then grabbed the battery from its socket. Dib grabbed it and tried to hold on, but the tentacle was trying to shake him off. Gaz jumped onto the tentacle when she got the chance and sprayed the goop in her gun in a circular path around the tentacle, causing it to tear off. A large roar of pain came from the larvae as Dib held up the battery in victory.
"We did it, ha-ha!" He shouted, but the tentacle that Gaz had shaken off to help Dib swept through the ship causing the battery to fly out. Gaz punched Dib for his stupidity, however the tentacle swept back and slammed Gaz, making her dizzy. Her senses were as boggled as monkeys on caffeine, she couldn't get a grip on her gun, much less aim it. She felt the tentacle grab her and started to lift her, she was about to become a chewy gummy bear to a fat bug.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" Gaz heard the scream and saw someone on the tentacle with her. He shot his gun like Gaz did earlier, the appendage became detached, and they both fell to the floor. He stretched out his hand to help her up. Still dizzy, he began slapping her until she came to.
"Glad to see that paralysis finally worn off, Zim," Gaz said to her savior. She then proceeded to punch him just like she did Dib, except harder.
"AHHH-What was that for!" Zim yelled.
"Don't ever make me bathe you again."
"I shall -ARGH- be the bringer of your pain for this human!"
"NOTHING is more painful than bathing you."
"If you two are done, we still have problems over here!" Kor yelled. Skoodge and Kor were still struggling with two of the tentacles, Dib also regained his composure and tried to help.
"Sir, what do we do?" Skoodge said, "We have no energy source and there is still an armada of larvae out there!"
"Keep fighting, Skoodge! We're Irkens, we destroy things, and invade things we can't destroy, then destroy them later!" Zim said, "Oh, and you guys are Irken servants, so...um...sacrifice yourselves or something."
"This could go on for hours! How do we possibly survive that long?!" Kor screamed.
"All great plans began with a spark, Tinkerer."
"How does that even apply to our situation?!"
It felt hopeless for the group, they were running low on guns and that huge larvae was getting closer. However, Zim's words were true, all they needed was a spark, but from a certain dysfunctional robot.
Gir didn't just spark, he sparked thousands of times. Electricity was traveling around his body, he glowed a bright white and started shaking. "I can feel it!"
Zim, though glad to see his servant rise up, was distressed at his timing, "Gir! I don't need your haphazard comments now!"
"Woo! There's an earthquake in my belly!"
"What?" Gir began shaking crazily, moving his body even more randomly and weirdly than he usually does.
"WheeeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEE-barf-" Gir had coughed up a shining blue orb, "*Gasp* I made a baby! Give me presents!"
Kor looked back at the commotion and couldn't believe her eyes. "That's a Hyper Reactive Cell Core! How in the universe did you get one and why didn't you tell me earlier?!"
"What? Gir ate that thing back at Fuelia Portia, I didn't know it still worked!" Zim said.
"Whatever, just place it in the socket already!"
"Gir you heard her!"
"Okeydokey," Gir said as he casually walked towards the energy socket, however, when he got there, there were two sockets, a spherical one and a cubed one. Meanwhile the others were struggling with the remaining tentacles which kept on hitting them. Gir pondered deeply on which hole to choose. The conundrum was eating at him like woodchucks chucking wood if they could chuck wood. Several questions raced through the circuitry in his head. Does he play it safe with the round socket or risk it all with the square? Does he choose the sphere of power or cube of wisdom? Does he take the road less traveled? What is the square root of pie? Deal or no deal?
"JUST PUSH IT IN ALREADY!"
"Okay!" Gir shoved the orb into the square socket.
"NOW PRESS THE RED BUTTON!"
Gir looked at the big red button that said launch on it, he stared for minutes before having a confident look on his face, "Master, this is hard!"
Gaz couldn't believe the stupidity that was about to get her killed. She grabbed Dib and threw him at the button, causing the ship to launch into the sky. The tentacles tried to hold down the ship but with only half its power, it couldn't stop it. Zim scrambled and pressed the button to close the screen, the pain causing the tentacled larvae to let go. They were now out of reach, and the group yelled in glee.
"Mission accomplished, sir," Skoodge said.
"Thanks for saving me, Zim," Gaz said.
"Can't have sacrificial goats go to waste now, can I?" he responded.
"I'm still going to destroy your soul for making me do all that stuff though."
"I can't believe we actually did it, I actually escaped a Harvestia, I'm actually in space and away from my dad," Kor looked back at the shrinking landscape, "FINALLY! SCREW YOU FEFA!"
"I saved the day! Yay!" Gir said, "I want a parade, with a pig balloon!"
"Yes, yes, you'll get your balloon eventually Gir," Zim motioned for a shaken Dib to get up, "Now look, Dib-human, as my invasion armada grows even more and thus, MORE DOOMY!"
"Head spinning," said a disoriented Dib, "can't...feel...toenails..."
"Now rest my legion, we'll be drifting in orbit until the next day, where we begin our next step in conquest!"
After much rest, Dib walked out of his room to find Gir and Skoodge eating some weird, pink stuff while Gaz was playing her games. Kor was making some sort of package, signed for her dad and everyone else.
"What's that?" he asked.
"Oh just a little something for them to remember me by. Zim let me use the leftovers for this little thing," she said with a malicious grin on her face. "Now, where's an escape pod?"
Dib motioned to a far corner. "So you're fine with this whole invasion thing right? We are going against the Irkens, strongest species in the galaxies, tyrants of unspeakable oppression."
"Meh, anything is better than living on Fefa," Kor began punching numbers on the pod. She placed the gift inside, closed the hatch, and it left the ship. "Now lets watch."
On Fefa, everyone had reawaken with huge larvae in their heads, waiting for them to explode. Blarby, with that everlasting smile on his face, was unfazed by his daughter's leaving. The pod Kor launched earlier landed next to him, causing a small crater just out of his area. The hatch opened to reveal Kor's present.
"Hey, everyoney! My daughtery sent me a presenty! Gather roundy!" Indeed everyone gathered to see what it was. Blarby opened it to find a timer counting down from ten seconds. He lifted it out, "Aww, my daughtery got me a watchy,"
As soon as the time reached zero, goop exploded on Blarby, which caused him to explode. Every started laughing at Kor's antic but after a moment it became silent. They noticed Blarby wasn't regenerating, the native Fefians looked with shock.
"Wha-what's going on? Why isn't he regenerating?"
"The goop, it must be messing with our blood regeneration somehow!"
"O-OH MY! HE DIED! HE ACTUALLY DIED!"
"Holy, you know what this means?"
"Oh-no..."
"WE CAN DIE BY NON-DIEGESTIVE CAUSES!"
"NO NO! THAT CAN'T BE!"
"Th-this is a joke ri-right? I mean it's imposs..."
"LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES!"
"Blarb, wake up, this is just a joke, right?"
"I DON'T WANT TO DIE! I HAVE SO MUCH TO NOT DIE FOR!"
"MY IMMOTALITY! WHY'D IT HAVE TO BE MY IMMORTALITY!"
"NO! I NEED LIFE INSURANCE! GIVE ME INSURANCE!"
"IF I KILL THEM ALL THEN NO ONE CAN KILL ME, RIGHT?"
"Hey, there's another timer in this box."
A large mushroom cloud of goop was visible to the group.
"Yay, exploding death genocide," Gir clapped.
"...and thus I become death itself and give my people the gift of fear, may it drive them to hell. Oh, and SCREW YOU DAD!" Kor screamed.
"Wasn't that a little...harsh?" Dib said.
"He ATE my mom and PHYSICALLY ABUSED me,"
"Point taken."
Zim emerged from his room filled with victory after yesterday events.
"Loyal pawns," he said, "We must continue to increase our armada if we hope to rain vicious doom onto all! So lets select our next destination of enslavement! Skoodge! The twister spinner!"
Meanwhile, a shadowed figure listened joyfully to Zim's words through a bug. His servants onscreen, also listening.
"Si, Zim, make un armada grande, make my plan that much easier to execute. Jajajaja!"