A/N: Hello everyone. Once again, it's been a while, I know. But between commissions for friends, wanting to also update my other ongoing stories, and even dipping my toes into the Owl House fandom, I had plenty of other stuff to work on. Still, I hope as always that you feel what you're about to read was worth the wait, and enjoy it.
As at least one reviewer guessed from last chapter's "next time on" advert, this chapter sees the return of Arnold Quis, aka Agent Spider Monkey, last seen in Episode 5 of this season. If you don't remember him, that's fine, it's been way too long since that chapter was posted. So, feel free to go re-read it for a refresher on the character before reading this one.
Also, a special shout-out to EndeavorT, who wrote a good chunk of the first scene and submitted it to me in order to address a plot point we discussed privately some time ago.
Okay, I think that's everything that needs to be said. Read on!
Last time, on The New Adventures of Invader Zim: An average day for the three teams was followed by a horrifyingly unaverage night as a demonic Nightmare Weaver left behind by Norlock as a dead man's switch was unleashed to torment the people responsible for his death by trapping them in nightmares. It was up to the unaffected Gaz and Nyx to go into their dreams and free everyone, before confronting the Weaver itself and destroying it, everyone agreeing afterwards to just pretend the whole thing hadn't happened.
Now, another unexpected threat is coming for Dib and his friends, one with a grudge that they don't even know about.
Disclaimer: I do not, have never, and will never own Invader Zim, which is the intellectual property of Jhonen Vasquez.
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The New Adventures of Invader Zim
Season 2
Episode 14: Revenge of the Unknown Rival
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Team Save Earth were once more gathered in Dib's house, gathered around the kitchen table. Having just beaten Zim's latest scheme (an overly-complicated plot involving potatoes and a giant microwave), they were now unwinding, with Dib telling the twins about how it compared to some of the Irken's older plans. Specifically, he was recounting the entire incident where Zim had tried to fly Mars into the Earth, and Dib had had to fly Mercury to stop him.
"…and since it only proved the existence of an extinct species, the Eyeballs said the public wouldn't bother to care about it," Dib was saying, explaining why no one had heard about the situation after the fact.
"That doesn't make sense, if there's an extinct species, then that means there might be more alien races out there," Steve reasoned.
"Key word 'might'," Dib said. "Darkbootie said the public wouldn't care for theories. At least even after GIR destroyed my video evidence, I still had Mercury to show the Eyeballs so they knew I wasn't making the whole thing up. Probably helps that Darkbootie helped me get it."
"Now if only you'd stayed up there," Gaz snarked from the living room on her spot on the couch watching TV.
Before Viera could try to snark at Gaz in Dib's defense, the sound of the front door caught all four of the preteens' attention. The door opened to reveal Professor Membrane walking in with a box in his gloved hands.
"I'm home, children," Membrane greeted, as Dib and the twins looked into the living room.
"Not counting his alternate universe counterpart, this is the first time we've actually met your dad in person," Viera whispered to Dib.
"He's been appearing in person a little more since spring break ended," Dib whispered back, "At first I thought it might've been a robot or a clone, but it's actually him."
"Son, are these the new friends you've told me about?" Membrane asked as he entered the kitchen and set the box on the table.
"Yeah, these are Steve and Viera," Dib said as he gestured to the twins.
"I understand that you all share the same hobbies as Dib," Membrane said as he opened the box and brought out large bracelets that had screens and the logo of his company on them, "While I don't believe in para-science works, I'm sure that as you outgrow it when you get older, the three of you will be able to shoulder each other."
"It's not fake, Dad," Dib said with a groan, "It's all real, not a childish obsession that is outgrown."
"We all have one, son," Membrane said as he examined the bracelets, "For example, your sister is as passionate about video games as you are about the paranormal."
"What?!" Gaz exclaimed from the other room, causing Viera to giggle at her outrage.
"And when I was a boy, I used to think sharks were my friends," Membrane continued, before he took off one of his gloves, revealing a robotic arm that shocked the twins. Dib already knew his dad had robot arms, so he wasn't surprised.
"I know better now," Membrane darkly said, before putting the glove back on.
"Ahem, so Professor, what are those devices?" Steve asked, hoping to change the subject.
"These are the Membracelets," Membrane explained, "The next generation of smart devices. They'll be ready for the public next Peace Day, where they will be used to- Wait a minute. What are those?"
The Professor's attention was caught by two devices he'd never seen before. Specifically, Dib's plasma gauntlets, which were poking out of his backpack on the other side of the kitchen table.
"Nothing! Nothing at all, Dad!" Dib hastily said as he grabbed his backpack.
"They don't look like nothing," Membrane said as he held out his hand to his son, "Please allow me to look at them, son."
Dib didn't want to, but there was no point in hiding the gauntlets any further, so he reluctantly handed his backpack over. Membrane took out the gauntlets and closely examined them on the table.
"Obviously weapons, but I know you well enough that you wouldn't pick fights, so clearly you use these for self-defense," Membrane said, "Did you make these by yourself, son?"
"Y-yes."
"I have to say, I'm impressed," Membrane said as he put the items back into Dib's backpack and returned it, "I always knew you could do great things."
"Yeah, cause it's 'real science'," Dib said sarcastically.
"Son?" Membrane asked, confused by his son's behavior.
"You've been disappointed in me when I try to prove the supernatural to you, Dad," Dib explained, "But when I do something you know is real, you suddenly give me the time of day?"
"Is that what you think?" Membrane asked, "While it's true I've never believed in the paranormal from the lack of evidence, the reason that I'm not inclined to believe it because of how you've been in everyone's face with it since you were 3. I still get a lot complaints from people about you."
"Say what now?" Viera asked.
"I may have been a little aggressive with my research," Dib said nervously.
"When you were 9, you chased a hairy boy that you said was a Bigfoot up a dangerous jungle gym, and last year you said the father of one of your classmates was a yeti," Membrane clarified.
"Dude," Steve said with narrowed eyes at Dib.
"Okay, but I'm not like that anymore," Dib said as he closed his eyes, "I just want you to be proud of me for my passions. I want to prove it to you."
"Son, you don't have to prove anything. I'm always proud of you," Membrane said.
Dib opened his eyes in shock hearing this, and saw his dad kneeling in front of him.
"I know I may seem distant with my work, but that's because I want you and Gaz to have a better world to live in," Membrane said as he put a hand on Dib's shoulder, "My parents had each other when they ran the company, I was never married, I made you and Gaz in test tubes."
"What!?" Steve and Viera exclaimed, as they didn't know Dib and Gaz were genetically grown in vats.
"I'm proud of you because of how driven and intelligent you are, Dib," Membrane explained, "I know you took one of my quantum flux capacitors to make that fake spaceship of yours fly, and only a genius could've made those gauntlets. Whether you're crazy or sane I love you and Gaz both equally."
The twins watched a little teary-eyed as Dib hugged his dad, who then returned it with a hug of his own. For her part, Gaz stared for a few moments, then scoffed and looked away disdainfully from the heartwarming moment she didn't know how to process.
"Thanks, Dad," Dib said when the hug broke shortly after, before giving his father a slightly annoyed look, "But it's not a fake spaceship, it's real."
"Of course it is, son," the Professor said, patting Dib's head in a way that was somewhere between affectionate and condescending, "Anyway, I'll let you get back to spending time with your friends and focus on my work. Oh, and Gaz? Are you wearing a dog collar?"
"It's a fashion statement!" Gaz snapped back in a rare moment of directing her anger at her father. For no reason, of course, obviously she wasn't jealous of what she'd just seen, after all.
"Is it? Hmm, I suppose unlike science, I'll never understand fashion," the Professor muttered, picking up his box and soon disappearing down into his basement lab. For a moment after he was out of sight there was silence, before Steve broke it.
"Well, that was an unexpectedly touching moment. Kinda makes me feel like we were intruding on it," he admitted.
"Yeah… but seriously, you two were made in tubes?" Viera asked, giving Dib an incredulous look.
"You guys didn't know that?" Dib replied with an arched eyebrow, "Dad hasn't ever made any effort to hide it. Heck, every now and then he publicly brags about it."
"First we're hearing about it," Steve stated, looking morbidly curious about the subject. Seeing this, Dib sighed in resignation and started recounting how he and Gaz had been created.
However, unnoticed by anyone in the house, they were being watched. Perched on the ledge of a partially opened living room window was a small spider-shaped robot, a camera mounted on its back and aimed squarely at Dib and his friends.
Elsewhere
Arnold Quis, the ex-Swollen Eyeball Network member formerly known as Agent Spider Monkey, sat in his darkened room, staring at the bank of computer monitors in front of him. Most of them were currently displaying the same live feed transmitted by his spy camera, but several were paused on the image of Dib and Membrane hugging. Quis glared at this, grinding his teeth in envious anger at the parental moment that for all its briefness still outshined anything he could remember ever experiencing in his life.
Needless to say, Quis' petty grudge against Dib hadn't faded any over the course of the last several months since his haunted house scam had backfired and gotten him kicked out of the Network. If anything, it had only gotten worse, as he stewed in indignant rage over getting banned for something that he refused to see as his own fault. And it definitely didn't help that without access to the Network's forums, he didn't have his old means of venting. Instead, he was stuck with lesser conspiracy boards full of people who he couldn't take even remotely seriously – anti-vaxxers, flat-earthers, paranoid nuts who thought the government was spying on them through their microwaves, that one whack-job in Connecticut who thought Martian demons wanted to steal his teeth… basically, the dregs of the internet. He might as well be one of those losers who trolled fanfiction sites with anonymous reviews, for all that he was accomplishing these days.
So, with nothing to distract him from his anger, it had only grown in a vicious downward spiral as he plotted his revenge. Fortunately for Dib, though, he was pretty bad at executing it, something he was lamenting at the moment.
"Personal log of Arnold Quis, entry #3509," he spoke into his recorder, "So, if it wasn't bad enough that Dib's life was already better than mine, now he's suddenly reconciling with his father, practically rubbing his better family status in my face, the smug bigheaded bastard!"
As Quis ranted, he punctuated his point by picking up a nearby dart and throwing it at a dartboard with a photo of Dib's face taped to it, nailing it right in one of the eyes.
"Ooh, how I'd love to finally crush him like the pest he is. If only any of my plans to do it would actually work out!" he growled under his breath, reflecting on his many failed efforts – he'd tried to harness the cosmic energy of the Stellar Shower to obliterate Dib and his friends with, but before he could finish collecting enough, they and the Irkens had disappeared into that interdimensional portal, and his energy collector had burned out during the time it took for them to come back. He'd tried to ambush them in Fantasy Con with a disintegration beam gun disguised as part of a mountain troll costume, only to get caught up the riot caused by the Ikiwikinomicon and trampled. He'd created a targeted subsonic wave generator to keep them from being able to sleep and drive them insane from sleep deprivation, only for this to happen while that nightmare demon was tormenting them, making it impossible for anything to wake them up; not knowing this at the time, Quis had kept trying to dial up the power of the generator to get results until it had literally blown up in his face.
And those were just the ones that had gotten off of the drawing board. Dozens more had never made it past conception, as he'd realized that what initially sounded like it would make for an excellent plan often fell apart once he thought it through.
So, as one could imagine, Quis' already frayed self-control, not to mention his arguably fragile sanity, were well on their way to snapping by this point.
"If my latest plan doesn't work, I think I might just set his house on fire in the middle of the night," he grumbled, before shaking his head to refocus on the situation at hand, "But it doesn't matter, because my new plan is completely brilliant and foolproof, and guaranteed to let me finally get my revenge!"
Tapping a couple of keys, Quis changed one monitor to display the blueprints for his newest plan. His eyes roamed over the designs, a sadistic smirk growing over his face as he did so.
Yes, this was going to go perfectly…
A Few Days Later
In the woods just outside of Doomsville there was a clearing. It was normally a perfectly ordinary clearing, with nothing special about it. Now, however, there was definitely something out of the ordinary in it.
"Well, that's not exactly natural," Dib commented, looking at the large stone structure sticking out of the ground in the middle of the clearing. It was shaped roughly like a house, albeit one made of large slabs of rock slapped almost haphazardly together, giving it the look of a modern attempt at recreating something very old. In any case, it stuck out in the clearing as clearly being out of place.
"And that tip you got said that it just showed up here?" Viera asked as the three of them examined the structure from a safe distance, just in case there actually was something dangerous about it.
"Pretty much overnight, according to the email," Dib said, mind already whirling as he went over possibilities for what they were dealing with. Something fairy-related, maybe?
"I'd just like to point out that the last time we took an anonymous tip, we ended up in that weird fake haunted house," Steve stated, eyeing the structure warily.
"Yeah, but what are the odds of that happening again?" Viera asked, "Though now that you mention it, did we ever find out what the deal was with all of that?"
"I think Agent Darkbootie said something about it being a prank and the person responsible being punished for it," Dib said offhandedly; honestly, he'd had more important things to worry about than that pretty minor adventure, so he hadn't pushed for details, "Anyway, we're not going to figure anything out just standing around out here. Let's head inside and check it out, but stay on guard just in case."
The twins nodded in agreement, and then the three carefully approached the structure's empty doorway. They hesitated at the entrance, glancing inside and seeing that the interior was just barely lit enough by the doorway and several gaps in the roof to navigable without flashlights. This allowed them to see that the structure only appeared to contain one room, which looked to be empty except for a large stone table in its middle.
Taking this all in, Dib and the twins cautiously made their way inside and approached the table. To their moderate surprise, it was devoid of any sort of decoration or markings or anything that might explain its purpose.
"Is this it?" Steve asked, arching an eyebrow, "That's kind of a letdown."
"It also doesn't make any sense," Dib commented, not noticing his foot passing through a sensor light as he stepped a bit closer to the table, "This looks like almost a ceremonial setup, but if it is, there should be something marked here to explain what it's all for… do you guys hear something?"
The group all listened carefully, and heard the muffled but still distinct sound of what appeared to be gears shifting. Before they could process it, however, the floor underneath them suddenly shifted, dropping to a sharp 45-degree angle. Caught off guard by this, all three fell and landed off their feet, causing them to start rolling uncontrollably down the new incline towards the center of the room, which happened to be under the table – which, as they approached, suddenly popped up and slid aside to reveal a large hole, directly in their path. They didn't even have a chance to recognize this or panic about it before they fell into the hole, dropping with panicked yells.
They fell for about a dozen feet before landing on hard-packed dirt, which was still a harsh stop but thankfully still better than if it had been something more solid.
"Ugh, are you guys alright?" Dib groaned out as he sat back up.
"Ooh, I'm going to be feeling that in the morning, but I think I'm okay," Steve moaned in response.
"Ditto," Viera added, looking around with an arched eyebrow, "Where are we?"
Looking around, the three saw that they were in a large chamber, twice the size of the room they'd dropped down from. It was circular with open doorways at each cardinal point, and otherwise empty of anything except for the oddly out of place dirt floor, which didn't even take up the entirety of the room, forming a perfect circle surrounded by the stone flooring that otherwise spread outwards and out of sight.
"Alright, I don't know what this is, but-" Dib started to say, only to be cut off as a booming voice suddenly called out.
"FOOLISH MORTALS! YOU HAVE TRESSPASSED UPON THE MAZE OF LOST SOULS!" the voice exclaimed, none of the three able to tell where it was coming from, "IF YOU WISH TO ESCAPE WITH YOUR LIVES, YOU MUST FIND YOUR WAY TO THE CENTER, SURVIVE ALL THE DEADLY CHALLENGES ALONG THE WAY, AND DEFEAT THE CHAMPION OF THE MAZE IN COMBAT!"
There was a moment of silence after the voice stopped speaking, mostly due to the ringing that the team all had in their ears afterwards. Eventually though, Steve broke it.
"Well, that all sounds unpleasant," he stated, "You two are the magic experts. Either of you ever hear about this place?"
"Doesn't sound familiar to me," Viera admitted.
"Ditto," Dib nodded, "So, we're going to have to go into this this pretty much blind. And I'm not liking the sound of these 'deadly challenges' that voice mentioned."
"Eh, compared to everything we deal with on a regular basis, how bad could they be?" Steve shrugged.
As if on cue, the floor started shaking under the group's feet, before bursting open in several spots as large shapes emerged from the dirt to loom over them. They appeared to be trees shaped vaguely like people, if those people happened to be 10 feet tall.
"Treants!" Dib exclaimed in shock, "But those are normally only found in rainforests!"
"Complain about them apparently migrating later, fight now!" Viera snapped, launching a stream of fire from her amulet. It engulfed several of them, leaving them shrieking in pain and rage, and grabbing the attention of the others, pulling their focus away from the boys. They were quick to take advantage of this, rapid fire plasma bolts from Steve's blaster and waves of it from Dib's gauntlets slamming into them and causing their wooden bodies to burst into flames as well.
The entire fight lasted less than two minutes, before the treants were reduced to piles of ash sticking out of the ground.
"…That was easier than I thought it'd be," Dib said, poking one of the ash piles with his foot, just in case anything was hiding in it.
"Let's not complain about that, and hope that everything else down here is that easy too," Steve commented, "And on that subject, any idea where we go from here?"
"Considering we have no point of reference or any other clue to start with, not really," Dib replied, scratching his chin in thought, "I guess our best shot is to just choose one path at random and then follow one wall until it eventually leads us to where we need to go. I think I read somewhere that that's a good way to beat mazes."
"Yeah, but we should also mark our path somehow, in case we lose our way or get turned around," Viera added, "The last thing we need is to be walking in circles on top of everything else."
"Got us covered," Steve said, pulling a pen out of his pocket.
With that all settled, and with no better way to choose their path, they picked one of the doorways at random and walked through it.
And all the while, they were unaware that they were being watched…
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Elsewhere, Quis sat in the control room of the maze complex, smirking as he watched the monitors displaying everything that had happened since Dib and his friends had entered the maze.
"Hehe, can't believe they actually fell for the whole anonymous tip thing again," he laughed to himself, "And they didn't even notice that those were summoned treants, not the natural kind! Not so smart after all, huh bighead?"
It had cost Quis a not-insignificant chunk of his family's money to construct this maze, and for once he was glad for his parents' negligence so that they wouldn't notice and question where the cash was going. But even that had been easy compared to filling it with a variety of supernatural beings, all summoned by means of spell drives and ancient tomes that he'd spent months tracking down. He'd learned his lesson about relying on robots and animatronics last time, after all.
If there was any irony in the fact that he'd had more luck gathering paranormal objects since getting kicked out of the Swollen Eyeballs than he'd ever had while with them, it didn't register with him. He was too busy thinking about all the horrible monsters he'd let loose into the maze; even if Dib and the twins could find a path through it, they'd never survive. His disproportionate revenge was guaranteed!
Now he just had to sit back, relax, and watch to see what got to them first.
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Back with Team Save Earth, they had been wandering the maze for several minutes without further incident. They'd taken several twists and turns, Steve marking each one as agreed, though so far, they hadn't needed it, having yet to come across any dead ends or sign of doubling back. In fact, they hadn't come across anything at all.
"Not that I'm complaining, but for a place called the Maze of Lost Souls, this place hasn't been all that threatening outside of those treants," Viera commented as they turned at another intersection, still following the left-hand wall.
"Yeah, if that overly-dramatic voice hadn't mentioned there being 'deadly challenges', I'd think the only potential harm of this place would be not finding the way out," Steve added, as he marked the corner they'd just walked around.
"Let's not tempt fate," Dib said, "It's been easy so far, sure, but for all we know, we could be walking right into something horrifying any moment. Like a giant dragon, or a pack of mutant yeti, or- what the?"
The trio had walked through a doorway at the end of the latest corridor without realizing it, and now found themselves in another chamber like the one they'd started in. There was no dirt floor, though, and it was devoid of anything else except for its sole occupant, who stood in the middle of the space, facing them down in what probably would have been a threatening manner if not for one impossible to ignore detail.
Namely, that said occupant was a mime. A French style mime, specifically, with the white face paint and black clothes and even the matching beanie hat.
"…Okay, last time it was a freaky clown, now it's a mime?" Steve asked in disbelief, "Does this count as being similar, or the exact opposite?"
"I don't know, but this is definitely creepier," Viera said, shuddering as the mime continued to stare fiercely at them.
"You think mimes are creepier than clowns?" Dib asked.
"At least clowns talk!" Viera protested.
As the boys rolled their eyes at that, the mime started to silently move, making motions like he was rolling up his sleeves without actually doing so, then raising his fists and facing them in an exaggerated fighting pose. This caused the trio to raise their eyebrows in confusion.
"Is he seriously offering to fight us?" Steve questioned, "I'm sorry, but if this is meant to be one of those 'deadly challenges', I'm very disappointed."
"Yeah, creepy or not, he's not exactly a threat," Viera commented, still slightly unnerved but not necessarily worried.
"Okay, uh, Mr. Mime?" Dib spoke up, taking a step towards the mime, "I don't know who you are or why you're down here, but we really don't want to fight you. So, why don't you just step aside so that we can get past you?"
In response, the mime thrust one arm out, as if punching, despite there still being several feet between him and Dib.
WHAM
And Dib was knocked off of his feet, sent flying through the air to slam into the twins, leaving them all in a heap on the floor.
"What the hell was that?!" Steve exclaimed as they untangled themselves.
"I don't know, it felt like I got hit by something," Dib groaned, wincing at the feeling of a fresh bruise forming, "I think this guy might have some kind of telekinetic ability to act out whatever he's miming."
"Oh, that is such a cliché power," Viera muttered in annoyance as she looked at the mime, who was looking at them far too smugly for her liking, "So, what now?"
"Well, we can either double back and hope that that doesn't send us in the wrong direction, or we can try to fight our way past this guy," Steve concluded, "And knowing our luck, this probably is the only way to the right path out, so even if we try to backtrack, we'd probably just end up here again and have to fight him anyway."
"Right," Dib agreed with a nod, slipping on and activating his gauntlets, "I'll take him head on and try to keep him busy, you guys flank him when he's distracted."
The twins nodded in agreement, then took off for opposite ends of the room. The mime tried to watch them both at the same time, head darting back and forth between them, only to have to focus on Dib as he charged him. A plasma-coated metal fist swung at the mime's face, only for the mime to hold up his hands, palms out towards Dib.
WHAM
And Dib's attack bounced off of the air several inches in front of the mime's hands, feeling like he had just hit a wall. And before he could recover from that, the mime brought his hands together like he was holding a baseball bat and then swung his arms out as if hitting a home run. Dib brought his arms up defensively, and while the mime's arms came nowhere near his, he still felt the impact of a bat on his gauntlets, which was enough to knock him back on his heels and nearly topple him off his feet.
Dib gritted his teeth at the tingle of pain that ran up his arms from the blow, and caught the mime smirking smugly at him… until a plasma bolt hit him in the shoulder. Mouth popping open in a quiet yell of pain, the mime stumbled away and glared in the direction the attack had come from, seeing Steve pointing a blaster and him and giving a smirk of his own. And before the mime could react further, a fireball slammed into his back as Viera attacked him from the other side.
The mime dropped to the floor and rolled around rapidly to put the flames out, all while still not making a noise.
"Is he seriously that dedicated to his act, or is he just legitimately mute?" Viera asked in confusion as they all watched this.
"I honestly can't tell," Dib said, watching as the mime finished putting the flames out and stumbled back to his feet, "Look, I don't know what your deal is, but we just want to get out of here. So, how about you just get out of the way and let us pass before this gets any worse?"
Having put out the flames, the mime got back up and glared at them. He then held out one hand as if he was gripping something, and held his other hand over his head and started spinning it around in circles. The three stared at him, not comprehending what he was doing, before Steve blinked and snapped his fingers in realization.
"Ooh, I get it, he's spinning a lasso!" he said, only for his eyes to widen as the mime threw his arm in his direction, and he felt an invisible rope wrap around him, "Ah, cra-AHHH!"
Steve's swearing was cut off as the mime swung around, dragging him off his feet and sending him flying into Dib, who was knocked off of his feet. Steve kept going, nearly hitting his sister as well before she managed to throw herself to the floor in order to avoid him. Scowling at this, the mime kept spinning Steve around through the air, clearly intent on trying again to hit Viera, only for her to jump up and launch a fireball at him, the mime jumping aside to dodge it and letting go of his "rope" in the process, causing Steve to drop to the floor with a thud.
"This isn't the worst fight we've had, but it's definitely one of the ones I hate most," Steve groaned, pushing himself back up.
"Yeah, and this guy doesn't look like he's planning on giving up," Dib said as he got back to his feet as well, watching as the mime composed himself and took a fighting stance as well, "Anyone got any ideas?"
"I've got one, assuming this guy's powers work like how I think they do," Viera commented, stepping forward and grasping her amulet tightly. The boys arched eyebrows at that but didn't object, instead moving to cover her as the mime started making the movements of grabbing more weapons of some kind. But before he could, Viera thrust her amulet at him, unleashing a wall of flames that quickly encircled and closed in on the mime. Eyes widening in panic, he threw his arms up and quickly pressed the air around himself in every direction, putting up walls that blocked the flames before they could reach him.
"Oh look, he's in an invisible box, that's a classic," Steve said dryly, watching as the mime stood in his safe zone, smirking at them, "Now what?"
In response, Viera gave a smirk of her own and called out to the mime, "Hey, Marcel Marceau! If those invisible barriers of yours are so impervious, does that mean there's no airholes?"
The mime blinked at that, then his eyes widened as he looked around in mounting fear, realizing that he did in fact need to drop the invisible walls to get air, but couldn't without getting burned by the fire still raging around him. He was trapped and he clearly knew it, as shown by how he started running around in a blind panic, scratching at his barriers as if that would do any good. But ultimately, this just used up his air faster, and he soon collapsed in an unconscious heap to the floor. When he did, the flames started closing in again, his invisible box evidently having disappeared when he was knocked out, but Viera dispersed them before they could actually burn him.
"…That was really cool, and also a little disturbing," Steve commented after a few moments of stunned silence at the sequence of events.
"Yeah, well, I didn't feel like dealing with this creep longer than we had to," Viera stated, watching as Dib walked over and prodded the mime with his foot, "Uh, he's not dead, is he? Cause I wasn't trying to go that far."
"Nope, he's definitely still breathing," Dib replied, watching the mime twitch on the floor, "But I don't know how long that'll last, so let's get out of here before he wakes back up."
The twins were happy to agree with that, and after a few moments of contemplation, they chose one of the doorways at random and exited through it, leaving the mime behind.
XXXXXXX
"Dammit, that's the last time I hire superpowered thugs from a help wanted site," Quis muttered to himself, having watched all of this in the control room.
Honestly, the only reason he'd wanted a mime had been in case another random clown showed up to mess up his plan again, since he was pretty sure clowns and mimes were sworn enemies and would cancel each other out (and no, that belief was not ridiculous, thank you very much). Finding one with magical powers was just a bonus, or so he'd thought at the time. But frankly, after that display, he was starting to think he should have bought a dragon or some ninjas or something instead.
"Hmm, let's take things up a notch," he decided, tapping a series of commands into his console, unleashing several of the denizens of the maze from their respective rooms and into the corridors, and sending them off to hunt down Dib and his friends.
This should be fun…
A Short Time Later
"Why would werewolves even know how to use giant wasps as mounts?!" Dib screamed as the team ran down a corridor, being pursued by a swarm of horse-sized wasps, on top of each of which was an anthropomorphic wolf that was snarling in their direction as they chased after them.
"Question it later, just run!" Steve snapped back as he and Viera fired back at the pursuing monsters, plasma bolts and fireballs knocking many out of the air, but many more still managing to keep after them.
They'd gotten cocky after the mime, the three of them realized. Besides being weird and unexpectedly strong, he'd still only been slightly more dangerous than the treants, and between those two easy wins, the team had decided that this maze's threat level was not as bad as the voice had presented.
Then they'd run headfirst into a chimera that had almost eaten them before they'd even seen it coming. Fortunately, Dib had instinctively punched it with his gauntlets, knocking out its main lion head, leaving the snake tail head hissing impotently at them as they'd fled. And then they'd barely had a chance to process that before a bunch of zombies had rounded a corner and tried to pounce on them… "tried" being the operative word, since they moved so slow (unknown to the team, Quis had bought them wholesale from Slab Rankle), allowing the team to easily evade them and dash down another corridor.
From then on, they'd mostly been running nonstop, a new monster appearing around almost every corner. They'd long since lost track of where they were, obviously not being able to mark their path as they ran for their lives. So, they'd now be hopelessly lost, even if they managed to get a moment to stop and think about where they were going.
As it was, though, they were currently in no position to consider their location or path, ducking around another corner with the wasp-riding werewolves still chasing after them. As the monsters turned the corner to follow, Viera turned and summoned a wall of flame to block them, causing them to rear back and roar in pain from the heat.
Taking advantage of the momentary relief, the team bolted down several more twists and turns in the corridors to try and put plenty of distance between them, before finally coming to a stop and nearly collapsing in exhaustion.
"We can't keep going like this," Steve panted as he gasped for breath, "Even if we keep fighting off every monster we come across, sooner or later we're going to be too worn out to even move."
"And even if that doesn't happen, we're still completely lost," Dib groaned, "We need to find some way to get to the center of the maze, but-"
WHAM
"Oh, now what?!" Viera exclaimed in exasperation as something dropped down from the ceiling a few yards further down the hall they were currently in.
It appeared to be an ogre of some kind, 8 feet fall and with sickly green skin pulled taught over bulging muscles, and a horn sticking out of the middle of its brutish face. Most importantly, however, was the fact that it was holding a boulder bigger than it was over its head, which it promptly smacked down onto the floor and started rolling in their direction.
"Run! Again!" Dib yelled, the team quickly turning and running back the way they'd come, the ogre and its boulder right behind them. They ran past one of the corners they'd previously turned, just barely avoiding being jumped by the wasp-riding werewolves as they finally caught up and started chasing them again.
SQUASH
On the bright side, they were immediately run over by the boulder, so the team didn't have to worry about them anymore, at least. But that was a hollow relief, considering that this didn't even slow the ogre down.
"Can't… keep… going…" Steve panted, starting to lag behind the others, only for them to grab his arms and pull him after them.
"Keep moving! We've just got to- Oh, COME ON!" Dib started to say, only to yell in disbelief as they emerged into another room and skidded to a halt.
The reason for this was that this room didn't have another monster or opponent in it. Instead, there was a large trench bisecting the room completely, making it impossible to go around it and requiring anyone who wanted to cross the room to pass through it. Which was a serious problem, as the trench was full of what appeared to be molten lava.
"Are you kidding me?! We're not far enough underground or near enough to any volcanos for lava to pop up naturally, so how did they get it here?! How is this happening to me again?!" Dib shouted in exasperation, flashing back to that time that he'd broken into the Swollen Eyeballs' library.
"Again?" Steve echoed in confusion.
"Incoming!" Viera shouted, glancing back to see the ogre-propelled boulder come barreling into the room. She and Steve bolted to the sides to get out of the way but Dib, eye twitching from the sheer level of frustration he was feeling, merely turned around to face the oncoming threat. Cranking up the power of his gauntlets, plasma crackling over them, he gave a battle cry and ran forward to meet the attack, slamming his metal-coated fists into the rock.
CRACK
And the boulder smashed apart, pieces going flying and leaving the ogre to stumble forward on momentum. The monster blinked in confusion, but was unable to stop in time to prevent itself from slamming into Dib, knocking him over but also losing its own balance and falling forward into the trench, vanishing with a pained yell in the lava. The fragments of the boulder, meanwhile, all landed in the lava as well, forming a loose bridge clear across it to the other side.
"…Did you do that on purpose?" Steve asked, blinking at the sight.
"Honestly, I don't even know how I did that," Dib admitted, also confused at what had just occurred, before shaking it off, "But never mind. The good news is, now we have a way across."
"What? You want to hopscotch across rocks that are sinking into molten lava?" Viera asked incredulously.
"Yeah, I'm with Viera on this, why don't we just double back and…" Steve started to say, only for a series of howls and growls to echo down the hallway they'd emerged from. From the sound of it, a huge horde of monsters were heading their way.
"On second thought, me first!" Steve exclaimed, turning and running towards the edge of the lava. Reaching it, he leapt onto the nearest rock, and then from it to the next nearest one, and kept doing this all the way across.
Dib and Viera were quick to follow after Steve, all three well aware of the fact that the rocks under their feet were rapidly dissolving into the lava that was uncomfortably close already. Fortunately, they all managed to reach the other side and land on solid, non-molten ground, before the rocks dissolved completely, leaving the part of the room they were now on once again cut off from the side they'd first entered. And just in time too, as dozens of monsters of all types flooded out of the hallway and filled that half of the room, stopping at the lava's edge and screeching in rage in their direction.
"Okay, so that was terrifying, but it worked," Viera admitted, "And it at least got us some breathing room so we can actually take a minute to breathe and think."
"Yeah… think about screwed we are," Steve added disgruntledly, "We lost any path we might have been following so far back, that we'll never be able to find it. We're back to square one on finding our way out of here, which would be bad enough if we didn't have a nonstop wave of monsters chasing us!"
"Okay, yes, this is bad, I'm not gonna lie about that," Dib admitted, "But we've been through worse. So, we're not going to give up, right?"
There was a moment as the twins processed that simple but effective statement, before they nodded in agreement. The team then left through the nearest door, the assembled monsters still on the other side of the lava still screeching angrily after them.
They made their way down several more twisting corridors, keeping a careful eye out for surprise attacks by any more monsters. They didn't encounter any, but what they did stumble across was still noticeable – a massive pair of golden doors, marked with engravings of screaming skulls.
"Now that's just tacky," Viera deadpanned, "But considering this is the first actual door we've seen since we got here, should we just go ahead and assume that this is the center of the maze?"
"If it is, then I take back all my nihilism from a little bit ago," Steve said, cautiously relieved, "That said, any ideas what we're about to be going into here?"
"Considering how random this place has been, not really. So be ready for anything," Dib said. Carefully approaching the doors, he reached up to open them, only for them to suddenly swing inwards on their own, revealing a massive dark chamber beyond.
"Yeah, that's not creepy at all," he muttered as he entered the room, the twins right behind him, and all three having their weapons at the ready.
WHAM
And as soon as they were past the threshold, the doors slammed shut behind them, plunging the room back into total darkness. The trio all jumped in surprise at this, but before they had a chance to even process that, the room was filled with light, momentarily blinding them.
"SO, YOU HAVE MANAGED TO SURVIVE TO REACH THE CENTER, HAVE YOU?" the same voice from the beginning of this mess declared, "CONGATULATIONS, BUT DO NOT REJOICE! TREMBLE IN FEAR, FOR NOW, YOU MUST FACE THE CHAMPION OF THE MAZE!"
As the spots cleared from their vision, Dib and the twins were greeted by the sight of the apparent "champion" – namely, an eight-foot tall, bronze-furred skinned minotaur, ivory horns curving over its head and a massive battle axe held in one hand.
Rather than trembling as the voice demanded, however, they all just stared flatly at it.
"The champion of the maze is a minotaur? Seriously?" Viera asked, deadpan.
"I gotta say, that's kinda a letdown," Steve admitted.
"Total cliché," Dib stated.
"NO IT'S NOT, IT'S A CLASSIC!" the voice shouted, sounding oddly petulant, causing the team to all blink in surprise.
"What the…?" Dib muttered, eyes narrowing in confusion. Before he could question why the ominous voice suddenly sounded so childish, it gave a booming cough.
"AHEM… NEVER MIND YOUR FOOLISH BELIEFS. NOW, YOU SHALL DIE!" the voice declared, before the minotaur roared and charged them, swinging its axe wildly.
Team Save Earth scattered as the minotaur bared down on them, managing to dodge out of the way as the axe hit the floor and smashed into it with a sharp crack. In fact, the axe bit so deep into the stone that it got stuck, leaving the minotaur grunting in anger as it tried to yank it free.
As the minotaur tried to liberate its weapon, the twins opened fire at it, plasma bolts and flames striking it all over its body. None of these attacks did more than lightly scorch its fur and the skin beneath, but that was enough to piss it off. Giving a mighty bellow, it tore the axe free in an explosion of stone fragments and turned to face the twins… and then Dib ran in and slammed a gauntlet into the back of its knee, causing it to bend backwards with a roar of pain.
The minotaur spun around to try and swing at Dib, only for its injured knee to spasm in the process, causing it to miss him by a wide margin even without him rolling out of the way and leaving it to stumble several feet as it tried to reorient itself. And while it was distracted by doing that, Viera concentrated the magic of her amulet, shooting out a thinner but more intense stream of flame that hit the axe. Heat quickly spread throughout the metal of the weapon, leaving it red-hot and burning the minotaur's hands, causing it to drop the axe with another scream of pain.
As the axe hit the floor, Steve took that as his cue to attack again as well, this time aiming for the minotaur's face. None of the plasma bolts that hit the face itself seemed to do more than annoy it, but then one managed to hit it in the eye.
"RRRAAAAAAGGGGGHHHH!" the minotaur screamed in pain and rage. Clutching it damaged eye with one hand and turning a furious gaze from its good one on Steve, the beast charged towards him, simple mind focused squarely on revenge.
And as such, it didn't register Dib coming running forward to meet its charge. He waited until it was looming over him, then leapt up and slammed his plasma-coated gauntlets into its chin as hard as he could. This caused the minotaur's head to snap back, throwing off its balance, which caused its charge to break and it to fall over, hitting the floor with a smash.
By happenstance, the minotaur landed right on the spot that its axe had previously broken. This had weakened the floor enough that when the minotaur impacted it, it fell apart completely, caving in and dropping the minotaur into a surprisingly large empty space beneath.
"…Didn't see that coming," Dib admitted, blinking as he and the twins stared at the hole.
"Wait, what's underneath us?" Steve asked in confusion, stepping forward to glance down the hole, only to freeze as the cracks surrounding it suddenly spread out in every direction, including under the feet of the three of them before they could even consider trying to outrun it.
"I think we're about to find out," Viera said in a resigned, 'this is gonna suck' tone. She and the boys winced in anticipation, and then they were screaming as the floor collapsed underneath them and they fell into the darkness below.
It was thankfully a short fall, no longer than the one that had first brought them into the maze. Which isn't to say that it wasn't still an unpleasant experience, however.
"Ugh, twice in one day?" Steve groaned as they sat back up.
"Yeah, this is definitely one of those…" Dib started to say, only to trail off as he looked around and actually took in their surroundings. Because in contrast to the ancient-looking layout of the maze, this room was very high tech. Cables and wires ran everywhere over the metal floor and walls, all centered around a console containing a series of screens, showing video views of various parts of the maze.
And seated in front of that console, hunched over a keyboard and a microphone, was a guy their age, staring at them in shock.
"Ah, crap," he muttered, which was picked up by the mic and repeated with a booming tone in the room up above.
"Hey! You're the guy who's responsible for this mess? Who are you?!" Viera demanded, the team all standing defensively and glaring at him. In response, he composed himself, sitting up straight and glaring back at them.
"Well, I suppose it's time for the mastermind to come out from behind the curtain," he said dramatically, "My name is Arnold Quis, but you know me as, Agent Spider Monkey!"
"…Who?" Dib asked, he and the twins blinking in surprise. Quis' eye twitched at that.
"Agent Spider Monkey," he repeated in annoyance, "Your nemesis from the Swollen Eyeballs? Remember?!"
"Uh, no?" Dib replied awkwardly, not sure how to respond to that. Which only seemed to make Quis angrier, though before he could say anything, Steve suddenly spoke up.
"Wait, hang on, I remember you!" he said, which caused Quis to perk up, only to deflate at Steve's next words, "You were that jerk who kept trolling us for a while, then you just disappeared. I honestly forgot about you."
Quis' eye twitched even harder as Dib and Viera made sounds of acknowledgement at that, apparently coming to the same dismissive recollection.
"Are you kidding me? How can you not remember me, after you got me kicked out of the Network!" he demanded furiously.
"We did? When?" Dib asked incredulously, "I think I'd remember that!"
"The fake haunted house, you morons!" Quis yelled, "My brilliant plan to frame you for faking paranormal activity and kicked out, which you exposed and turned around on me, getting me kicked out instead! That ringing any bells?!"
"Wait, that was you behind that mess?" Viera demanded, "We could have been killed there… hell, we could have been killed here! What's wrong with you?!"
"Calm down, hot stuff, you and your brother were just secondary targets anyway, it's just your bigheaded boyfriend over here I want to suffer," Quis replied offhandedly, as if that was meant to be comforting. Which, obviously, it wasn't.
"Hot stuff?!" Viera repeated indignantly.
"I'm not her boyfriend!" Dib added simultaneously, "And what the hell did I ever do to you?"
"I just told you, you got me kicked out of the Network!" Quis snapped.
"That sounds like it was more your own fault," Steve stated, only for Quis to keep talking as if he hadn't heard him.
"And that was after months of making me look like a fool!" the orange-haired boy ranted, "Not to mention constantly rubbing in how much better your life is than mine!"
"…What?" Dib asked flatly. Literally no one had ever accused him of having a better life than them before, and he could not remember a single time that he had ever rubbed anything about his life in anyone's face.
"Oh, but you're going to finally pay!" Quis cackled with a deranged laugh, hand hovering over his console's keyboard, "All I have to do is send the command, and every monster up there in the maze will come flooding down here to tear you all apart!"
"Are you nuts?! You'll die too!" Dib exclaimed.
"Worth it!" Quis cackled, "Now, prepare to die at the hand of your archenemy!"
"That position is filled, impertinent stink-pig!"
Everyone's head snapped around to face the unexpectedly familiar voice, and found Zim dropping down from the hole in the ceiling, Nyx and Skoodge right behind him, Ying and GIR clinging to their respective masters.
"Zim? What are you doing here?!" Dib demanded, feeling a headache coming on.
"Oh, we've been following you guys since you entered the forest," Skoodge replied nonchalantly, "Originally, we were going to ambush you, but then you entered this place and we decided to just discretely follow you to see what was going to happen."
"Okay, but how did we not see you?" Steve asked, "You guys wouldn't know 'discrete' if it hit you in the face!"
"Ha! That shows what you know, Not-Dib! I've had Minimoose following you the whole time!" Zim declared, pointing to the side of the room… and Team Save Earth and Quis all blinked and stared at the sight of Minimoose floating there, wearing a camouflage-patterned ghillie suit (tailored to fit his unusual body shape) like he was an extra in a Vietnam War movie.
"Nyah!" Minimoose squeaked.
"Has he been here the whole time?" Viera asked in disbelief.
"That camo pattern doesn't even match the walls down here!" Steve protested, while Dib was flashing back to that time that he'd somehow failed to notice GIR clinging to the back of his head.
"Never mind all of that!" Quis yelled, glaring at the Irkens, "Scram, space bugs! This doesn't concern you, it's between me and my sworn rival!"
"We literally just met!" Dib stated, only to be ignored.
"Tch, a sworn rival, you?" Zim scoffed, "Zim has just met you, and I can already tell that you're a nuisance at worst! Zim is the Dib's one true archenemy, you couldn't even give him a lousy day, fail monkey!"
"Oh yeah? We'll see if you still think that when my monsters are eating you!" Quis snarled, hand going to his keyboard-
ZAP
BOOM
Only for Zim to almost casually deploy his PAK legs and blow up the console, leaving Quis' hand hovering over the charred remains of the keyboard.
"You were saying?" Zim sneered.
"…" Quis just stared silently, eye twitching even harder, to the point of a full-on body spasm. Then he gave an animalistic snarl and lunged at Zim with a psychotic look in his eyes.
"How dare you ruin my revenge plan, you green bastard! I'm going to kill y-ACK!" he yelled, only to be cut off with a choke as Zim grabbed him by the throat.
"How dare I? How dare you? You are nothing but an insignificant pest, and you dare try to claim Zim's enemy as your own?" Zim snarled, "Now, feel Zim's wrath for your interference!"
Quis whimpered in fear, and then his screams of pain were filling the room.
"Wow, he's, uh, he's taking this pretty personally," Dib commented awkwardly as he and the others watched the painful events unfolding.
"Yeah, he takes the whole idea of anyone else possibly killing you seriously. You should have seen how he reacted that time I put a hit on you," Nyx replied nonchalantly, "Huh, I didn't know that human spines could bend like that."
CRACK
"AHHH!"
"Um, I don't think they can," Skoodge said with a wince.
"Should, uh, should we do something about this?" Steve asked.
"From a moral standpoint, probably, but this psycho kinda deserves it," Viera said, before frowning and adding, "Also, I'm pretty sure he was being sexist when he called me 'hot stuff', so I don't mind seeing him get a beatdown."
"Er, so, I think we should just go," Dib said after a few more moments, gesturing towards a nearby door he'd noticed, which was conveniently labeled "Exit".
"Okay, buy," Nyx said offhandedly, not looking away from Zim twisting Quis around like a human pretzel while also punching him in the face.
"Bye, bighead!" GIR said more cheerfully.
"My head's not… ah, screw it," Dib started to protest, only to trail off, not in the mood to deal with this nonsense any more than he had to.
With that Team Save Earth left, staying in an awkward silence all the way up the flight of stairs on the other side of the door, none of them saying a word until they were emerging out of a camouflaged bunker doorway hidden among the trees of the forest, overlooking the fake stone structure that they'd entered the maze through.
"So, are we going to talk about any of that, or just add it to the pile of things we agree to never talk about again?" Steve asked as they started walking back towards town.
"Honestly, I just want to forget it ever happened," Dib replied, "I mean, I've dealt with a lot of weird stuff, but that was just messed up."
"Speaking of which, should we be worried about this Quis guy coming after us again? Because he seems like the crazy stalker type who doesn't know when to quit," Viera pointed out.
"Yes, he does," Dib admitted with a wince, but shook it off, "But now that we know about him and his insane little vendetta, we can keep an eye out for him while focusing on more important things. Besides, after what Zim just did to him, he has to have learned his lesson."
"Yeah, you're probably right," Steve said, wincing as he remembered seeing what Zim had been doing to Quis.
That settled, the trio headed home, convinced that today's events could be written off as just another random, unimportant adventure.
They had no idea how wrong they were…
Deelishus Weenie Building, Next Day
Tak and Tenn stood in the large space that acted as a vestibule to their base, MIMI standing next to her mistress as the two Irkens glared at the intruder who had just somehow managed to hack open the base's ground floor entrance.
"Human, you have exactly 10 seconds to give me a reason not to vaporize you," Tak growled in annoyance. She'd tried to use her mind control implant to wipe his memory and throw him back out on the street, but he'd shrugged it off, clearly being one of the rare humans too strong-willed to be affected.
"My name's Arnold Quis, and we have common enemies," Quis replied stiffly. He had a neck brace, one arm in a sling, and the opposite leg in a cast, leaving him leaning on a crutch. Despite this, he was standing firmly, with an almost manic look in his eyes that left both Irkens on edge.
"Oh? And who might that be?" Tenn asked, eyeing Quis carefully.
"That bigheaded bastard Dib, his friends, and that interfering jackass Zim," Quis stated, immediately gaining the two females' attention.
"Go on," Tak said, eyes narrowing in interest.
"Dib ruined my life, and Zim ruined my chance at revenge," Quis snarled, "I want to make them both pay. And since obviously doing it on my own isn't working, the logical choice is to team up with you. Enemy of my enemy, and all that."
"And what makes you think we even need your help?" Tak demanded, sounding offended at the idea. Quis only scoffed in response.
"From what I've seen, at best you're in a stalemate," he said, "You stop Zim from winning, but either him or Dib stop you at the same time. I can be the outside factor that gives you an edge."
"How so?" Tenn asked, intrigued despite herself.
"I have a family fortune I'll happily give you access to that you can use in addition to whatever all this provides you," Quis said, gesturing with his good hand to wave around the building they were standing in, "And my family also has connections to social elites, which could give you major in-roads you can take advantage of for infiltration purposes."
"Hmm, not a bad offer, but we can do all that on our own," Tak replied haughtily.
"How about magic, can you do that on your own?" Quis asked rhetorically, "I've been studying the paranormal my entire life, I have access to things you couldn't begin to imagine!"
"Well, that is tempting, I'll admit," Tenn said, "But to be clear, you do realize we intend to conquer this planet and enslave your people, right?"
"If it means crushing Dib's bighead like an overripe piece of fruit, it's worth it!" Quis cackled, mouth curling up in an unhinged grin.
"…Right," Tenn said slowly, one eye narrowed at him, before glancing at Tak, "Can I confer with you for a minute?"
"Of course. MIMI, watch him," Tak said to the SIR, who nodded in confirmation back at her before turning to stare down Quis while the Irkens retreated to the far side of the room.
"This human is insane," Tenn said flatly once Quis was out of earshot.
"Agreed," Tak replied without hesitation, "But that said, he makes some good points. His resources, especially the mystical ones, could be very useful in our hands. And if nothing else, we have a meat shield to throw at Zim and the humans."
"All true, but something about him makes me easy."
"What, you don't think we can eliminate him if he becomes a problem?" Tak scoffed.
"Of course I'm not worried about that, it could just end up being a distraction when we don't need one," Tenn said, before sighing, "Whatever. The benefits seem to outweigh the costs, so I suppose we can at least give this a shot."
"Good, I concur," Tak said with a nod, before the two returned to Quis, "Alright, Quis-human, we'll give this shot. But if this turns out to be some kind of trick or long-term plan to betray us, I'll make whatever suffering put you in this pathetic state seem like a skinned knee by comparison. Understood?"
"Sure, no problem," Quis said without a second thought, before giving another mad laugh, "Yes, I'm finally going to make that jerk suffer, hahahahaha!"
"Shut up before I change my mind," Tak snapped.
And on that day, a new alliance of evil was born.
XxxxxxxxxxxxxxX
End Episode 14
XxxxxxxxxxxxxxX
A/N: Well, bet you all didn't expect that last scene, did you? Honestly, the entire reason I created Quis was to have a human character selling out to the Irkens. In fact, there's even foreshadowing to this action in his name – "Arnold" references Benedict Arnold, the greatest traitor in American history, while "Quis" is a shorthand reference to Vidkun Quisling, the chief Nazi collaborator in Norway during WWII (fun fact, after the war the Norwegians reinstated the death penalty just for him).
Now, will Quis play a major role in this story as Tak and Tenn's accomplice, or did I just want to give them their own butt monkey the way Skoodge is to Zim? Guess you'll just have to wait and see, won't you?
Again, want to thank EndeavorT for fighting the first chunk of the first scene, which was just meant to address the canonical plot hole of why Dib couldn't use Mercury's ship form as proof of alien life, but ballooned into the whole scene with Membrane. Sorry if it feels a little out of place compared to this story's usual style, but it felt too good not to use, and I think I made it work as the latest thing for Quis to twist to fit his insane view of his "rivalry" with Dib.
And on one final note, I hope everyone on this site who's had to deal with certain trolls over the years caught and enjoyed that little jab I threw in during Quis' first scene.
I think that's all I need to say for now. Hope you all enjoyed the chapter.
Next time: A big event is coming to Doomsville, with potential consequences for everyone.
Until then, please review!