Episode 5: The Sign
Episode Summary- The Renegades attack the last standing Water tower, but will their new Irken Allies answer the call?
Disclaimers: I Do Not Own Invader Zim
Author's Notes: So here we again! Sorry for the long silence, but Life happens you know. Anyway thank you all for reading and please review.
And Happy Thanks Giving!
Yours Truly, RoxieDivine :)
Episode 5-The Sign (Part 1)
(Back with Mia…)
The waiting…
It killed them a little more each day.
And yet she always seemed to find a thread of hope to see them through.
Hope…
The Irken Rebel leader Mia laughed softly at the word, and for good reason.
Hope was not a word that anyone would associate with an Irken, this was of course due to the fact that the Irken race was usually the definition of Hopelessness. Her kind only brought pain and suffering. So why should a thing like her deserve to hope for anything then what she deserved.
Yes, surely if she hadn't been paired with a faulty PAK, she'd never have been labeled a defective. She'd be just like the rest of her kind, evil, cold, cruel, brutal. Mia shivered at the thought. No matter how hard she tried she could never imagen herself in that way. To be like the rest of them made…it made her sick just to think about it.
"They aren't coming." A small Irken male by the name of Kiel spoke softly.
Mia winced at his words, Kiel often reminded her of Taz, for the two males looked similar. Short in statue with dark purple eyes and light green skin. Mia could still remember the last day she spoke to him during their mission to find out the truth about the defectives. She, Taz, Chen, and Vec had gone together to discover the truth, and only Mia had made it out alive.
She forced the memory away, to no avail. Usually she could avoid remembering, but the waiting made it hard to do anything else. She remembered hearing her comrades die over their Comm links. She remembered running to the underground to tell the rest of the defectives what they had learned.
She remembered fighting everyday to survive, hoping for a place to run away from it off. Se soon found their answer in Earth, Zim a defective Invader was fighting back, But he was more than that. He was an Amon, a future leader of the Irken race, a right given to him from the moment he popped out of his test tube.
Zim was their ticket to salvation so, where was he?
"We must have faith." Macey insisted. She was taller then most of them, with blue sapphire eyes, a strange color for a female.
There was ten of them now.
Mia, Tesi, Macey, Kiel, Wik an Irken female with pale green skin and blue green eyes. Rae a fellow cadet who went threw the academy with Mia. An Irken Male with only one good orange eye and dark green skin. Jee, an Irken drone with olive eyes and matching sin, who spoke his mind a little too much. Flex an Irken Male ruby eyes and pickle green skin. Lutz another Irken Male with one pink eye and one blue eye. And finally, there was Trill, Irken female with Red eyes and grassy green skin.
There use to be more of them, but the journey to Earth had not been kind to them…
"They'll give us a sign." Mia cut in, agreeing with Tesi, as she often did.
"When?" Wik asked. She was the youngest of them all, so innocent, so pure. She didn't belong in this cruel situation. Not with her Irken uniform covered in mud and human filth, not with her wide eyes filled with terror and fear.
She was blameless…
They all were, Irk just didn't want them.
They never did.
"Soon." She assured them as she peered outside the tunnel and to the setting sun. The Irken Rebels always came to the tunnel that opened up to a cliff above the wild ocean to watch the sunset. They did this because they had come to find that the Earth's sunset was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen.
And they chose here to do it because no Irkens came near the ocean, save for the few that rarely flew over it briefly to retrieve a sample or two. Apparently Zim had not found out how to beat it's stinging properties, either that or he didn't bother to tell the Tallest.
"He is close." Mia assured them.
"How do you know?" Rae challenged, not out of disrespect, but curiosity. Rae was always asking questions about everything!
"I can just feel it." Mia said, and it was true. It was as if the universe was telling her that her allies were near.
"We should go back." Tesi advised to everyone's dismay.
"Yes, she is right." Mia agreed. "We must allow ourselves to be exposed."
And with those final words the Irken rebels disappeared into the shadows none of them knowing the truth.
That just below them, in the depths of the ocean below lied the secret Dome shaped base of their allies.
Earth's Renegades!
(Back with Zim…)
This was perhaps the most stupidest thing he had ever gotten himself into…
And yet the Irken rebel had never been more excited in his entire life.
Why?
Because today's mission would result in the destruction of the Tallest's most important asset. Sure he had destroyed things before, heck it was part of the reason why he was banished in the first place, but this was different.
And how was it different?
Well, for starters last time he caused this much destruction it hadn't been entirely his fault. And secondly this would be the most destructive act of treason that the Renegades had ever been a part of. Up until now the royal guard had been going easy on them, after all most of the renegades were children! However, that would all change after this. After this latest act of rebellion the enemy would want them all Dead!
There would be no going back after this, and Zim had stressed this to every one of them. And yet not a single member of the renegades backed out. Which was a good thing, because they couldn't afford to have their army dwindle in anyway. Not when the threat of another full out war was sitting right on their door steps.
"I'm not so sure about this." Dib whispered to the Irken that he had known for so long now. The team had split off into groups of two around the tower and were getting into position. Professor Membrane and his fellow scientist had designed four small bombs to be placed on either side of the water factory. The job was to go in unseen and plant the charges. Then get out and out of range to set off the bombs remotely. However the job wouldn't be done there. No, that was just phase one.
Phase 2, would require for the Renegades to stick around the demolished tower dodging guards and patrols in hopes that these defective Irken rebels would notice the sign and come to out into the open. Considering if there really was any Irken rebels to speak of.
It was a risky plan to say the least, and Dib was not the only one to have doubts. Heck, even Zim doubted. The fact that there could be other defective Irkens out there, on the run. No, they had made that mistake with Tak already, to make it again was foolish. Sure Kazar claimed Tak was helping from the inside, but Zim didn't dare hold his breath. The Irken Female was simply a fence hopper. Jumping from one side of the fight to the other. Only catering to the needs of the side that benefited her the most.
What if these Irken Rebels were no different? It could get them all caught or worse KILLED!
And yet here they were.
"Dib we talked about this." Zim whispered. "Tonight is our last night to do this. We move into our new apartment on Zec tomorrow."
It was true, thanks to Joseph's new minion statue Dib and Zim had access to the Tallest, and more importantly Gaz! However, being closer to the enemy did have it's drawl backs. For example, Zim and Dib had no idea how they were going to make it off of Zec and back down to the surface after curfew hours. How would the two renegades be able to meet the others at the Dome if they couldn't get down from Zec to here?
This is exactly why they were doing this tonight. They had no other way, and if there really was a team of potential allies waiting for them then the Renegades couldn't wait any longer. Surely these Irken Rebels wouldn't standby and wait for some kind of sign forever. They had to do this now!
"Look I know you're nervous." Zim said. "I'm nervous too." He admitted.
Oh, he was nervous alright, Dib could see it all over his face; of course, he had every right to be. Every member of the Renegades was here tonight. It was a risky move to have it this way, but it was a necessary risk all the same. Eight members were planting the bombs; of course, Dib and Zim had been chosen, along with Mark who was paired up with Kornelius, James and Rachel who surprised everyone by walking together hand in hand. Yes, apparently the two were dating again, or Zim assumed so, the two hadn't said so. Man, some Humans could be so complicated about their feelings. Finally, Goalit and Elma had paired off for together for the mission.
The rest of the rebels were hiding under the cover of the woods which surrounded the factory. The plan was to use them as extra gun power and security in case they needed to fight. The army, (as Kathy had called them) was being led by Crystal aka the Blind Bandit, who had divided them into smaller groups to surround the factory from all sides.
Rebels Keef, Jamie, and Professor Membrane had been appointed by the Blind Bandit to take charge of each individual group. Finally, the ever hyper, and unpredictable Gir was also scouting out the forest of trees around them for any hidden threats. Of course, he wasn't really scoping them out. No most likely Gir was running around making a fool of himself, which was why he was so far away. If he brought attention to himself the deranged bot would become the perfect decoy.
All and all, there was a lot of moving parts to this mission.
"At least we didn't bring klutz." Mark's voice rang out over the Comm link. "He'd mess up everything."
Of course, the human was talking about Cadet Scamooch, who's code name had been dubbed Klutz. Mark had given him the name since the cadet had "accidently" stubble upon the rebels during Gir's latest mishap.
Naturally Scamooch had wanted to come, seeing this mission as the perfect opportunity to prove his worth to the others. However, Zim had voted against it much to the cadet's dismay. Zim knew it didn't make the child very happy to be left on the side lines, but Scamooch had no experience, and they could not afford for things to go wrong on this mission.
"Zinger." Dib said, using Mark's own code name. Of course, he did so to preserve his identity, that's why they all had code names, just in case the enemy tapped into their Comm links and listened in on their conversations. This way everyone was safe, this was also why everyone wear mask, doing so protected their identities which in turned protected their families.
Yes, caution was the key to their success, or at least it had been so far, to throw that away now would be suicidal, and yet!
"I still think this is a bad idea." Dib repeated. He didn't know why but he had a bad feeling about this plan ever since Zim came up with it. And it wasn't because he didn't trust Zim, no Dib had gotten over that since of paranoia a long time ago. No, this was something else…heck it was almost as if the universe itself was warning him that this was a very bad idea.
A very bad idea indeed.
The factory was heavily guarded, but no more so then it had been for the past week.
Yes, it had only been a week since the body switching fiasco between Zim and Scamooch. Maybe that's why Dib was on edge, this plan had been thrown together far too quickly, and with the previous attack on the first water tower still fresh on everyone's mind… Surely every one of them knew this was a bad idea, and yet not a single Renegade voted against it, and Dib knew why.
They all did.
The Tallest had crossed a line during the Science Camp execution, dropping humans from the top of the camps tallest building for the whole planet to see was more than brutality. No this was cruelty on a whole other level for that day cut deep into all their minds.
Why?
Because it was that day that every one of them were forced to see the cost of their actions. The enemy reminded the hard way that this wasn't some game in school yard, this was war! And innocent people would get hurt. The Tallest made them feel a pain that they had never felt before, one that was all consuming, and the Renegades wanted to return the favor.
They wanted to make the Tallest hurt too!
'Is that all this is?' Dib wondered. 'Are we all simply looking to get even? Or are we doing this for the cause?' He wanted to say it was the latter, but deep down he knew that was a lie. This mission wasn't about getting more troops. Sure, they said it was, but Dib knew, they all did.
This was about revenge, plain and simple.
And yet it was far too late to back down now, they were here, and this was happening.
It had too.
This act of terrorism would do more then bring the Irken rebels out of hiding. No, tat was only the first domino, others would fall into place along with them. This act of betrayal would show the Tallest that the Renegades were still going strong. It would sow the Resisty and Lar Nard that now was the time to declare war on the Empire at an intergalactic level!
But most importantly it would show the Ancients that Zim was serious about breaking away from the current toxicity of the Irken race and bring them back to their roots. They could be back in the good graces, Irk could become better. And once better it could start fixing the harm it had caused to Earth and other planets that had fallen to their brutality.
Yes, this was the cause!
And yet Dib couldn't shake the feeling that this was all so terribly wrong.
"Something's coming." He whispered to quiet for the others to hear.
But what?
"A storm." Zim answered gesturing to the dark clouds above as the lightning began to flash around them, and the thunder rolled.
"Did you bring your Glue?" James asked over the Comm Link.
"I will be fine." Zim assured him. "Wiseman how about you?" He asked referring to Goalit who was given that codename due to the fact that he was indeed very wise.
"All good." Goalit said, causing Zim to breathe sigh of relief.
"Okay let's go in." Rachel advise.
Zim nodded they had been watching the guards take shifts and change off with others every four hours. However, those going off shift didn't wait for their replacements to show up before they took off. Leaving the facility unguarded for at least 10 to 15 minutes. Which was plenty of time to slip past unnoticed. The Irken soldiers had built a fence around the factory as some sort of protection, no doubt it was electrocuted. Once they got passed that they'd have to break in and set their charges at four different weak points within the facility.
"We get in, set the charges, get out and then blow this place up to smithereens." Mark said making it sound so simple. And it was, bringing this place down would be easy. The hard part would be holding their ground against the Irken army while they waited for their rebel friends to show.
'If they showed.' Dib pushed the thought away, they had to focus. Nothing could go wrong tonight, to much was at stake.
"We're ready." Blind Bandit said.
"Then let's do this." Zim ordered taking the first step forward.
His fellow Renegades followed suit, none of them knowing that tonight would be the longest night of their lives.
Episode 5- The Sign (Part 1) END!