The New Adventures of Invader Zim: Season 2

by Zim'sMostLoyalServant

Norlock might be gone, but the adventures continue. New action, new laughs, new allies and enemies, and more! Newest: Dib and his friends face a revenge plot by… wait, who is this guy?

7. Through the Looking Glass

A/N: As always, sorry for the long wait. But, my side projects are out of the way, and I worked past the writer's block so here's the next chapter. And after the arc-important events of last chapter, this is just going to be some fun filler stuff. Particularly, this is a chapter I've been looking forward to for some time (I know I say that a lot, but it's true), and I hope you all have fun reading it.

Oh, and here's some exciting news — this season recently passed 10,000 views, while Season 1 has passed 30,000. It always amazes me how popular this series is.

On a more sober note, I hope everyone is taking care of themselves in the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Stay safe and healthy everyone!

Nothing else to say beyond that. Read on!

Last time, on The New Adventures of Invader Zim: The Consulars, the Irken Empire's secret police force, came aboard the Massive in search of Irkens who had been converted to Miz's subversive message. Following an assassination attempt on the Consulars' leader Darth, a Miz devotee was exposed and killed, causing the Tallest to declare the Consulars' mission a success and kick them off the ship. All according to the plan of the Miz cell's leader, Table-Headed Service Drone Bob, who wanted the Consulars gone so that he could further his group's goals.

Goals that will come to fruition another time. For now, let us turn our attention back to Earth…

Disclaimer: In some alternate universe, I own Invader Zim. In this one, however, the series still belongs to Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon, with me only owning this story and the OCs in it.

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The New Adventures of Invader Zim

Season 2

Episode 7: Through the Looking Glass

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It was a bright day in Doomsville, or at least as bright a day as it ever got in this city. In the City Park, Team Save Earth were sitting at a rundown picnic table, upon which they had set up an array of recording equipment, most of it pointing up at the sky.

"So, what is this thing we're waiting for called again?" Viera asked as she watched the boys set everything up.

"The Stellar Shower," Dib replied as he tinkered with several sensors, "It's a cosmic energy storm that passes by Earth every 857.3 years."

"That's… oddly specific," Viera commented with an arched eyebrow.

"Hey, magical events might be able to round out to the nearest hundred-year mark, but science still needs to obey the laws of physics, and that means that some things aren't as rounded," Steve countered, as he helped Dib work.

"Which is why we're doing this in the middle of the day, instead of night," Dib added, "I mean, it'd probably look a lot more awesome without all this natural light in the way, but by the time night hit it'll have already passed by. Still, we should at least be able to get some great readings to share with the Eyeballs. Hell, even my dad might be impressed for once — some 'real science' to shove in his face."

"Good thing you're not bitter," Viera said flatly, earning snorts from the others.

"Okay, so we're all set up," Steve said a moment later, him and Dib stepping away from the equipment, "Now all we have to do is wait and… do you guys hear something?"

The trio all paused and tilted their heads towards a hill in the distance, where whirring, buzzing, and other large construction sounds could be heard. Glancing at each other in curiosity, they all shrugged and slowly walked towards the hill to see what was happening. Cresting the hill, they found the source of the noise — and instantly froze, wide-eyed, before dropping to the ground to hide their presence.

In the middle of the field ahead of them was a large lattice of scaffolding, supporting a series of cables running from a huge satellite dish on top down to a boxy structure on the ground, ringed by a series of glass containers. More importantly was the sight of Zim standing by a control panel at the base of said structure, yelling commands at his minions as they scurried about him. Skoodge and Nyx were running back and forth around the scaffolding, making adjustments to the machinery, while Ying did likewise at a more sedate pace, Minimoose floated about the top of the apparatus levitating tools around the dish, and GIR… sat off to the side eating from a box of doughnuts, clearly not interested in what was happening.

"What the hell are they doing here?" Viera whispered to the others.

"Ten-to-one odds say they're doing something related to the Stellar Shower," Dib replied, "Either that or it's a huge coincidence, which I don't believe. But why hasn't anyone come to investigate a huge, noisy eyesore like this thing?"

"I think that might have something to do with it," Steve said in a deadpan, pointing towards several large plywood signs ringing the area, all reading "ATTENTION HUMANS: IMPORTANT CONSTRUCTION WORK. DO NOT INTERFERE. OBEY YOUR CONSTRUCTION SUPERIORS!"

"Yeah, that figures," Dib sighed, shaking his head, "Come on, let's try to get closer and see if we hear what they're planning."

With that, the three of them slowly made their way down the other side of the hill, darting into some nearby bushes before they could be seen by the Irkens. They then peered carefully through the foliage to spy on the aliens, watching and listening as Zim continued to rant.

"…No, no, Zim said that those cables rotate into place clockwise!" Zim was shouting up Ying.

"I am turning them clockwise, sir," Ying replied, the slightest note of irritation marring his usual calm tone.

"I meant my clockwise, not yours!"

"It's the same… oh, never mind," Ying sighed, rotating the cables the opposite direction he'd been doing.

"And you two, pick up the pace! We're on a tight schedule here!" Zim snapped at Skoodge and Nyx.

"Yes sir!" Nyx replied happily as she welded several components into place. Skoodge, meanwhile, was too out of breath from all the running around carrying heavy equipment to say anything, so he settled for merely saluting.

"Minimoose! …Actually, you're doing fine," Zim said, trailing off from his aggressive tone in order to compliment his floating purple minion, "Clearly those latest upgrades I've given you are exceeding expectations."

"Nyah!" Minimoose replied, as he made numerous adjustments to the dish with the various tools he was levitating around the air.

"Yes, and that new voice module of yours is definitely a much more sophisticated-sounding one."

"Nyah!"

"You're welcome!" Zim replied cheerfully, before frowning as he looked to the side, where GIR was still eating his snack, "GIR, should I even ask if you're going to do anything useful?"

"Nope!" GIR responded with a smile, causing Zim to sigh and bury his face in his hands.

"Gah, never mind," Zim muttered, "Just keep sitting there, keep watch, and stay out of the way. The Stellar Shower is almost here, and the Energy Harvester must be ready by then, so we can siphon and collect all that cosmic power for our own use. Limitless power for Zim!"

"To do what?" GIR asked, tilting his head curiously.

"Eh, I dunno. I'll think of something," Zim replied with a shrug, "The important thing here is harnessing the energy, then we'll figure out what to do with it later. Now, try to be helpful for once and stand guard so no one interferes. Understand?"

"Yes, my master!" GIR said, eyes turning red for a moment as he saluted, before turning back to blue as he returned to his doughnuts. Zim sighed again, before shaking his head and returning to micromanaging the construction.

Meanwhile, Dib and the twins, who had managed to overhear all of this, retreated further back into the foliage.

"Well, you gotta love his consistency for exposition," Steve remarked, "So how do you want to play this?"

"Obviously we can't let them get ahold of this kind of power, even if they don't even know what they going to use it for," Dib said, "So we need to take that thing out now, before they can use it."

"Hit 'em hard while they're distracted, and then blast it before they can recover," Viera suggested, the boys nodding in agreement. They then crept back to the edge of the foliage, readied their weapons, and prepared to strike. Meanwhile, Zim was still ranting at his minions.

"Faster! We don't have time for delays!" he snapped, "Must Zim do everything himself?!"

"But you're not actually doing anything," Skoodge pointed out as he welded a component into place.

"Zim heard that! Stop talking and-AH!" Zim started to say, only to yelp in pain and surprise as Dib suddenly bolted out of cover and charged him, plasma gauntlet smacking him in the face and sending him flying to slam against one of the girders supporting the Harvester. The other Irkens jumped at that, but before they could do anything, the twins also charged from cover and opened fire, plasma and fire lancing across the Harvester's scaffolding, the resulting explosions driving Skoodge and Nyx back.

Ying, by contrast, leapt off the top of the Harvester and towards the twins, shifting into his Battle Mode in the process. Seeing him coming they leapt out of the way before he impacted the ground, and then took off running, firing back at him as he chased them. Taking advantage of this distraction, Dib ran towards the machinery at the base of the Harvester, only for a recovered Zim to jump in his way, PAK legs deployed.

"Well of course you decided to show up, Dib-Stink," he sneered, "But it matters not! You cannot stop Zim's latest plan! A plan which is most certain to finally-"

"I heard you telling GIR you don't actually have a plan for what to do with all that energy," Dib said flatly, smirking as Zim's face fell.

"Oh, well… shut up and die!" Zim snapped, slashing at Dib, who dodged out of the way. The two then fell into an almost dance-like pattern, trading strikes and trying to avoid each other's blows, leaving them locked in a stalemate.

While this was going on, Nyx and Skoodge were looking down from the smoldering scaffolding, watching as the fighting carried on below them. Her hands twitched as she repressed the urge to jump down and help Zim; as much as she wanted to, she knew he wouldn't want the interference in his battle with Dib. So instead, she tore her attention away from the two of them and looked to where Ying was chasing the twins around, the pair alternating between attacking him and running from him.

"Skoodge, keep working on the Harvester. I'll handle this," she said, pulling out My Little Friend and hopping off of the scaffolding.

"Uh, sure. I'll just stay here," Skoodge said, rather happy to have an excuse to stay out of the fighting for once. He watched for a few moments as Nyx ran towards Ying and the twins, plasma minigun spinning to life, before turning back to his work.

Seeing Nyx run towards his friends, Dib cursed and turned to launch a plasma wave at her, only for Zim to sweep his legs out from under him, sending the attack flying and knocking him to the ground. And before Dib could react from that, Zim lashed out with a kick to the head that rendered him insensate.

"That's right, Dib, just lie there and stew in your failure," Zim sneered, before turning back towards the Harvester — and was promptly punched in the face hard enough to bowl him over completely.

"Excellent advice. Why don't you take it for yourself?" Tak asked with a smirk, while behind her Skoodge slammed into the ground hard enough to leave his head embedded in the ground. Up above, Tenn dusted her hands off, having snuck up on the chubby Irken and dealt with him before he could sound an alarm.

"What? Tak? How did you- GIR! You were supposed to be keeping guard!" Zim yelled at his robot, only to turn and blink as he saw MIMI slamming GIR repeatedly into the ground with her extended arm.

"Look, Master! Kitty came to play!" GIR said happily, not caring as he repeatedly hit the dirt.

"Eh, that figures," Zim muttered angrily, before turning back to Tak with a scowl, "Regardless, what are you even here for? Going to steal my brilliant plan for your own pathetic ends?"

"What plan? You're just harvesting cosmic energy on the off chance you might need it for something later," Tak replied, smirk growing as Zim's eye twitched.

"Did everyone hear that?" he snapped.

"You talk very loudly," Tak said, "And to answer your first question, I'm not going to let a Defective traitor like you get ahold of that much potential power. So, I think I'll just take it off your hands and deliver it to the Tallest — the Armada will make much better use of it."

"As if Zim will let some lapdog steal his brilliance to aid those ungrateful sloths," Zim snarled, brandishing his PAK legs at Tak, "You'll take that energy over my dead body!"

"Fine by- HEY!" Tak started to reply, only for Dib to suddenly jump up and bolt towards the Harvester's control panel. Cursing, both Zim and Tak jumped to intercept him, a three-way fight quickly breaking out, plasma flying in every direction.

Meanwhile, Nyx had crested a hill and was about to start shooting at the twins, who were currently keeping Ying at bay with a wall of fire. Seeing the plasma bursts from the corner of her eye, she turned to look back at the Harvester, and scowled as she saw what was happening.

"Seriously? I just got over here!" she said, scowl deepening as she saw Tenn atop the scaffolding and doing something with the interior of the machinery, "Oh no you don't, Drone!"

While hesitant to leave Ying to fend on his own, Nyx knew he could handle himself, and that it was more important to stop Tenn's interference. So, spinning on her heel, she sprinted back towards the Harvester. As she approached, she almost opened fire, but stopped as she realized that she'd only damage the Harvester. So instead, she re-compacted the minigun and slipped it back into her PAK, and pulled out a handful of small metal darts, which she then flung through the air ahead of her. Micro-rockets triggered in their bases, propelling them to impact into the scaffolding a few feet away from where Tenn was standing. Hearing this, she turned to the source of the sound, then cursed and jumped out of the way just before the devices burst in explosions small enough to avoid damaging the Harvester.

As Tenn coughed the smoke out of the respiratory sacs of her squeedlyspooch, Nyx reached the scaffolding and leapt up to her level. And before Tenn could register that, Nyx lashed out with a kick to the midsection that sent her flying off of the girder they were standing on. Fortunately for Tenn, however, she was able to deploy her PAK legs and grab the edge before she could fall. She then flipped herself onto her feet, and glared at Nyx.

"Dirty move. Though I suppose I should expect that from a crazed little Defect like you," she spat.

"Blah blah, let's skip the boring Imperial propaganda," Nyx said, fake yawning, "Seriously, do you practice that stuff in front of a mirror every day or something?"

Growling at how dismissive Nyx was being towards her, Tenn shot forward and slashed at her. Nyx ducked into a roll to dodge it, then brought out her own PAK legs, countering Tenn's slashes with her own. Tenn threw a punch, which Nyx blocked, before retaliating in kind. Tenn shifted to the side, letting the punch go wide, before grabbing Nyx's arm and pulling her forward while bringing a knee up to collide with the anarchist's abdomen. As Nyx doubled over, Tenn twisted her around while keeping a grip on her arm, keeping it painfully behind her back while she was forced to her knees.

"Heh, not so tough when you can't bite your opponent, are you?" Tenn sneered… only to stare in surprise as Nyx suddenly twisted her body in such a way that the shoulder of her pinned arm dislocated with a sickening crack. And before she could react to that, Nyx jumped back to her feet, spun around, and punched Tenn in the face with her free hand, hard enough to send her flying several feet before skittering to a halt. Shaking her head to clear it, she looked back at Nyx and grimaced at the sight of her dislocated arm flopping about.

"That's disgusting," she spat, fighting back nausea.

"Yeah, I know," Nyx replied with a pained grunt as she popped her arm back into place, "But hey, it works. Now let's… huh."

Nyx trailed off and looked up, Tenn unable to resist doing the same as the sky was suddenly filled with light. A blazing aurora of every color was cutting through the atmosphere, brightly enough to be seen by the naked eye despite the sun still being out. And while the average Doomsville citizen at most just glanced at it and then shrugged it off, the much more attentive combatants actually stopped fighting to gaze in awe at it.

"Okay, yeah, I can see what all the hype is about now," Viera admitted.

"Indeed, it is rather impressive," Ying said, as he paused in hefting the tree he'd just pulled out of the ground to use as a club. Snapping out of their daze as they noticed this, the twins yelped and ran off, before Ying likewise regained his composure and chased after them again.

Meanwhile, back atop the Harvester scaffolding, Nyx and Tenn were still looking up at the Stellar Shower as it passed by, when Skoodge suddenly shot up onto their level with a large wrench in hand.

"Hoo-ah!" he cried, swinging the heavy tool at Tenn from behind, only for her to duck, letting it swing over her head, before she jumped back up to punch Skoodge in the face, knocking him onto his back.

"Sneak attacks work better if you don't announce them," Tenn said dryly as Skoodge groaned at her feet, before she turned back to Nyx, "Now then, where were we?"

Nyx opened her mouth to say something in response, only to be cut off by a sudden groaning sound. Looking for the source of it, the three Irkens found that the Harvester's satellite dish was moving, being rotated so that it was pointing directly at the center of the Shower. This was followed by a low humming, before a portion of the Shower's aurora started twisting, funneling down into the dish, where it was then channeled down the cables to the base of the tower.

"When did you have time to activate the Harvester?" Nyx asked Skoodge, sounding impressed.

"I didn't do that," he replied. The three of them all blinked in confusion, before peering over the edge of the girder they were standing on to look down at the control panel… where Minimoose was currently seated on the activation switch, having dragged it down into the "on" position with his body weight.

"Nyah!" he squeaked, sounding rather smug.

"Well done, Minimoose!" Zim crowed, from where Tak had him pinned against a support beam with one PAK leg, while another fired repeatedly at Dib as he took cover behind a different beam, "Now these fools shall witness the glory of Zim!"

"What part of 'I'm just going to take all this energy from you' did you misunderstand?" Tak asked dryly, watching as the glass containers ringing the base of the Harvester started filling with energy, "Dib's the one trying to stop this from happening, I want it to."

"Well, you'll still fail anyway! Because Zim is- AAHHH!" Zim started to say, only for Tak to roll her eyes and cut him, by grabbing him by the collar and flinging him through the air, away from the Harvester. She then turned back to Dib and found him charging towards her, fists pulled back and ready to strike. Smirking, she easily dodged out of the way… only for her smirk to drop off her face as Dib didn't even try to slow down as he passed her. And then her eyes widened as Dib used his momentum to leap towards a beam and kick off it, sending him through the air over her and spinning him around to face the base of the Harvester.

And more importantly, the containers of cosmic energy ringing it.

"Don't you dare!" Tak yelled, firing at Dib to try and knock him out of the air. But it was too late, and Dib threw his fists forward, the plasma gathered around his gauntlets shooting towards the containers. The blast hit dead on, several of the containers bursting immediately, the others following suit in a chain reaction, as Dib hit the ground.

"Ha! So much for either of you harnessing all that energy!" he said, scrambling back to his feet.

"You idiot! Where do you think all that energy's going to go?!" Tak snapped in panic, pointing towards the damaged machinery. Dib followed her finger, and his eyes widened as he took in the sight of all the released cosmic energy coalescing into a corona, which was pulsing at an increasingly intense rate.

"Oh, that's not good," Dib said meekly, just as the pulsing hit a crescendo.

CRA-THROOM!

With a blinding flash of light, the energy burst, somehow managing to both explode and implode at the same time, vaporizing the base of the Harvester. But that was practically an afterthought, to everything else that happened.

The world seemed to freeze, and then fold in on itself. Gravity momentarily ceased, leaving all the combatants in the area floating in midair, before it flipped, sending everyone flying towards the bright light emanating from the explosion site. Human, Irken, and robot alike tried to grab ahold of anything they could to stop themselves, but it was fruitless, and they all slammed into the light, each of them vanishing with a flash.

This all lasted only a few seconds, and then reality reasserted itself. The remaining remnants of the Harvester which hadn't been sucked up by the disturbance clattered to the ground, scorched and smoking, surrounding a crater on the ground… and a glowing, prismatic crack hovering in midair above it.

Of everyone who had been fighting, there was no sign.

Somewhere Else, Shortly After

"Ugh, what hit me?" Dib groaned as he regained consciousness. Forcing his eyes open, he looked around and took in his surroundings. He, and everyone else who had just been involved in the fight, were all lying scattered around the ground, surrounded by various charred pieces of the Harvester, and there was a glowing crack in the air above them all… wait, what?

Dib stared at that abnormality, trying to process it, before shaking his head to clear it, reminding himself that now probably wasn't the time to examine it. Getting to his feet, he quickly ran over to where the twins were also regaining consciousness.

"Are you guys alright?" he asked, helping them to their feet.

"I think so," Viera said with a slight moan, while Steve wordlessly nodded, "What happened?"

"What happened is that that bigheaded moron just blew up a machine processing pure cosmic energy!" Tak snapped, as she and Tenn likewise made their way back to their feet, "We're lucky we weren't all vaporized!"

"My head is not big!" Dib snapped.

"Yes it is!" GIR said cheerfully, as a woozy Zim leaned against him for support.

"Ugh, Zim feels like he was run over by a Plasma Tank," he muttered, rubbing his head. Looking around, he noted Ying helping Nyx up and brushing her off, and Skoodge lying on the ground, still mostly unconscious. Scowling, he kicked his fellow Invader in the side, causing him to jolt awake.

"Goat cheese omelettes!" Skoodge exclaimed as he came to, before blinking and looking around in confusion, "Are we not dead? And what's the glowing thing?"

"It appears to be some kind of dimensional tear," Tenn mused, pulling a device from her PAK and scanning the tear with it. Being weary from the unexpected end to the fight, and genuinely curious about the situation, no one did anything as she did so, except awkwardly look around. While doing so, Steve spotted something, and his eyebrows rose in surprise.

"Er, does anyone else see this?" he asked, gesturing at what he'd seen. Everyone turned to see what he was looking at, and likewise stared in confusion.

Aside from the Harvester debris, the park was looking unusually clean and well-maintained — the grass was evenly mowed everywhere, the trashcans weren't overflowing, and the benches, fountains, outhouses and other furnishings were all shiny and new, without any graffiti, dents, or even grime to be seen. Even stranger than that, however, was the sign marking the entrance to the park, which now read "Hopesville City Park".

"'Hopesville'? What the hell is going on?" Viera asked the question that was on everyone's mind.

"Ah, caragash," Tenn muttered, looking up from her scanner and eyeing the rift in the air, "I'll tell you what's going on — this thing is a Smarkle Rift."

"Yes, that's exactly what Zim knew was happening!" Zim said quickly, earning rolling eyes all around.

"You don't even know what that means," Tak said flatly.

"You lie!"

"What's a Smarkle Rift?" Dib asked, trying to keep the conversation on track, at least until he got some answers.

"It's like a miniaturized version of a Florpus Hole," Tenn responded, which only got blank looks from the humans.

"…Are you just making up words because you know we don't know enough about space science to tell?" Steve asked, causing Tenn to sigh in exasperation.

"Primitive apes," she muttered, before shaking it off to explain, "What I mean is, this is basically a hole in the fabric of the multiverse that leads between different realities."

"Wait… we're in an alternate universe?!" Viera exclaimed.

"That's what it looks like," Tenn said, "All that cosmic energy being condensed only to be released so explosively tore open the rift, and since we were all unfortunate enough to be standing in proximity, we got sucked through and dumped wherever it led."

"Oh. Um, oops?" Dib said weakly, as it occurred to him that this was technically his fault.

"Yes, yes, this is all very interesting, but Zim has important things to do, so I'll just be heading back now," Zim said, jumping up to the rift-

ZAP

-and being sent flying the moment he touched it, slamming into a tree several yards away. As Nyx and Skoodge ran over to help him (the robots all following at a more sedate pace), the others all observed with mixed amounts of surprise and amusement.

"Not that that wasn't extremely satisfying to watch," Tak commented with a smirk, "But what just happened?"

"The rift is uni-directional. It only allows things to pass one way," Tenn explained, which instantly killed the mood.

"We're stuck here?" Steve asked, alarmed, "Come on, there's gotta be a way to reverse this thing so we can go back!"

"Not with any equipment we have on hand," Tenn said, "We'd need something a lot more sophisticated."

"…What are the odds there are alternate versions of all of us in this universe?" Dib asked after a moment of thought, "Because if there are, and they're anything like us, they should all have at least something to contribute to fixing this."

"A fair point," Tak reluctantly conceded, "So, truce until we're all back in our own universe?"

"I don't think we really have a choice," Viera said, "Fighting each other right now will probably just ruin any chance we have."

"Right, we all need to work to… Zim's group already left, didn't they?" Dib said, trailing off with a sigh as he turned and found that, indeed, Zim and his minions had all disappeared.

"That figures," Tak grumbled, "Well, we'll just have to deal with that moron if and when he becomes a problem. Until then, let's all get a move on."

Not bothering to wait for a response, Tak then turned on her heel and marched away, MIMI following after her. Tenn took a moment to give the humans an appraising look, and then followed after her partner as well. Team Save Earth watched them go, before looking at each other.

"So, where do we start?" Steve asked.

"We head to my house, and hope that whatever version of me is in this world has the resources to help us," Dib said.

"And if he doesn't?" Viera asked, "For all we know, in this universe you're a luddite or something."

"Then for once we're going to have to hope Zim or Tak have better luck than us," Dib replied, "Now let's get going."

With that, the trio took off for this world's version of Dib's house.

Meanwhile

Zim marched down the street, minions at his back, not outwardly showing any reaction to the situation they'd found themselves in. Inwardly, though, he had to admit that he found this alternate world a little disconcerting — the streets were clean, the buildings weren't run down, and rather than apathetic or angry, the humans wandering the streets all looked happy, and were acting kind to each other.

It completely flew in the face of everything Zim had come to know of Earth since arriving on the disgusting ball of dirt.

"Not that it matters, we won't be here long," he thought, before speaking aloud, "Now remember, when we find my counterpart, let me do the talking, Zim to Zim."

"Uh, yeah, sure thing," Skoodge replied, not quite sure how to handle the thought of multiple Zims. Nyx, by contrast, was grinning widely.

"More than one Zim? That's so awesome! I've had dreams about that, actually," she said, earning a disturbed look from Skoodge.

"I don't believe any of us needed to know that, Madame," Ying commented from his place at Nyx's side; in response, she flushed slightly and bopped him lightly on the head.

"Yes, having more Zim is always a good thing. Though obviously I'm the most amazing of all Zims!" Zim crowed, before perking up as they neared their cul-de-sac and he saw that his house was there. It had a normal front door and there were no gnomes in the lawn, but overall the crooked green house still stood in the same spot as back in Doomsville. Smirking at this — in his view — proof of his inevitable dominance in any reality, Zim quickened his pace, reaching the door moments later and kicking it open.

"Zim! Behold the might of Zim!" he called out, whipping off his disguise and throwing his arms out wide in greeting. When nothing happened, he frowned and actually looked around. The interior of the house was nearly identical to back in their reality, except for differences like the wallpaper and carpets being brighter colors, the monkey painting over the couch being missing, and the toilet in the kitchen being likewise missing.

"Ugh, this reality's Zim clearly has no sense of interior design," Zim complained, "And where is he? Me. Whatever… this is confusing."

As if in response to that comment, the floor next to the couch opened, and a platform rose up into view. And standing there on it was a nearly-perfect copy of Zim — physically, they looked exactly the same, but the other Zim's outfit was blue instead of pink. And more surprisingly, he had what appeared to be a genuine smile on his face.

"Greetings, Zim! Welcome to the home of Zim!" the other Zim greeted cheerfully.

"Eh? You're not surprised to see me?" Zim asked, arching an antenna at his counterpart's casual reaction to his presence.

"Well, I probably would have been if I hadn't detected that energy surge in the park earlier. A Smarkle Rift, right?" the alternate Zim responded, only to pause and stare as he took in the others behind Zim, "Wow, that's weird… anyway! Let's get down to the lab and talk this over properly."

Everyone gathered onto the platform, and it lowered down into the lab, which Zim noted looked almost exactly the same as his own. Then they reached the main chamber, and Alternate-Zim walked over to the chair in front of the central console, which a red-eyed GIR was standing at attention next to.

"Hi me!" GIR greeted his counterpart, who merely stared impassively back at him.

"GIR, go get the others," Alternate-Zim said, tone too light to be considered an actual order.

"Yes sir," Alternate-GIR replied with a salute, marching off into a side tunnel.

"Is he always like that?" Zim asked, slightly disturbed to see GIR acting like a proper SIR.

"Yeah. I tried to program him to lighten up once, but that didn't go so well," Alternate-Zim said, shuddering slightly before shrugging it off, "Anyway, let's address the obvious problem — something caused you guys to get sucked through the multiverse to end up here in my reality, and now you need my help to get back, right?"

"Yes, and this must be done quickly. Zim has much important work to accomplish!"

"Of course, I understand perfectly, and I'll be happy to help. And it should no time at all, or my name isn't Protector Zim!"

"…Protector Zim?" Zim asked slowly, he and the other Irkens blinking at the proclamation.

"Yep, the best Protector in the entire Irken Federation, the absolute best at helping less advanced species uplift themselves to join our galactic community," Alternate-Zim said happily, before pausing as he noticed the incredulous looks he was getting from his guests, "Is that… not how things work in your universe?"

"Well, actually- oof!" Skoodge started to say, only for Zim to cut him off with a kick to the leg.

"Yes, of course that's how it works in our universe," Zim said with a strained smile, "Zim loves to aid lesser species. That doesn't make me sick at all!"

Alternate-Zim squinted an eye at that response, but before he could say anything, his GIR returned to the room, followed by a copy of Ying… who was messily eating from a pack of Vort Dogs, bits of the snack falling all over him and mixing with various other stains and crumbs covering his body.

"Whaddaya want?" Alternate-Ying asked in a thick New York accent, giving Alternate-Zim a disinterested look and not even acknowledging the visitors.

"That is disconcerting," Ying said, the twitching of one eye the only thing giving away how he felt about seeing his doppelgänger.

"Aw, come on, it's not that big a deal. Just laugh off the weirdness," Nyx said, mildly amused by the situation… and then her own counterpart walked into the room, and her good mood ground to an instant halt.

"May I be of assistance?" Alternate-Nyx asked in a completely bland voice that was matched perfectly by the utterly neutral look on her. She was wearing a beige pantsuit with a plain shirt and a tie that was checkered with barely-distinguishable squares of beige and tan. In Nyx's view, absolutely everything about her looked and sounded like she should be sitting in a cubicle in some corporate building somewhere, surrounded by people all dressed and acting exactly the same.

"…" Nyx stared at her counterpart wide-eyed and silently for a moment, and then her PAK legs deployed. With a primal snarl, she tried to lunge at her bland lookalike, only for Ying to grab her around the waist to prevent her from doing something rash.

"Kill it! Kill it with FIRE!" Nyx screamed as she thrashed in Ying's grip.

"Always good to see you taking your own advice, Madame," he commented dryly.

"Er, is she okay?" Alternate-Zim asked, leaning back in his chair in minor fear at the display.

"She'll be fine," Zim said dismissively, not particularly impressed with how meek his counterpart was acting. He was a Zim, he shouldn't be wimpy!

"Hey, shouldn't there be a me around here somewhere too?" Skoodge asked, looking around curiously.

"Oh, my Skoodge doesn't live here. He's a freelance explorer who just visits occasionally when he's between adventures," Alternate-Zim explained, pressing a button on the console and bringing up pictures of him and his Skoodge… who was a foot taller than him and built like a bodybuilder. Skoodge and Zim's jaws dropped at that, and Nyx even halted her attempts to attack her counterpart to stare at the images.

"Admittedly he can be kind of a jerk sometimes, but I know he doesn't mean any harm," Alternate-Zim said with a shrug, gesturing to a image of Alternate-Skoodge giving him a rather painful-looking noogie, "Anyway, enough with the exposition, we should be getting to work."

"Nyah!" Minimoose squeaked, floating over to deposit a pad in Alternate-Zim's lap.

"Ah, thank you, Minimoose," Alternate-Zim said, while Zim blinked and turned to see that Minimoose was still floating behind him, looking identical to the one floating next to his counterpart.

"Huh, I guess some things are universal," he muttered, before shaking his head and asking, "Well, how long will this take?"

"It shouldn't take too long at all. I just have to set aside a few of my other projects and rededicate the resources to handling this," Alternate-Zim said, tapping away at the pad, "Let's see, I'll have to put that climate change reversal plan on the back-burner, delay development on those clean energy plants for developing countries, I can probably get away with leaving at least a few servers dedicated to figuring out the best way to clean up all the plastic in the oceans…"

As he listened to his counterpart list various ways he could help the humans, Zim clenched his jaw to keep from screaming in frustration. He just had to remind himself that this was a temporary situation, and soon he'd be back in a reality that made sense.

And with any luck, all the others were being just as annoyed by meeting their counterparts as he was.

Downtown Hopesville, Same Time

Making their way through the city towards where the alternate version of Dib's house should be, Team Save Earth couldn't help but marvel at the differences between this reality and their own. It wasn't just that everything was cleaner and better maintained than in Doomsville. And it wasn't all the little things, like ads for the newest model Game Pal or for Slimy's Pizza Pig, which subtly spelled out that they weren't in their own world. No, it was more to do with seeing the crowds of people walking around acting cordially towards each other, in sharp contrast to the general apathy and disgruntlement they'd all long since gotten used to seeing back home.

"Is it wrong that I kinda like this reality better than our own?" Steve asked.

"If it is, I'm guilty of it too," Viera replied, "It just feels… nicer here than our world."

"Can't argue with that, but don't get too taken in," Dib said, "We do have to go back to our own universe, if for no other reason than because the Irkens will be and we need to be there to protect the world from them. Plus, I'm not sure how having multiple versions of the same people living in the same reality long-term would work."

"Yeah, fair enough," Steve said, "Still, it's nice to imagine… is that a farm?"

The sudden shift in conversation caught Dib and Viera off guard, and after looking at Steve in confusion for a moment, they followed his pointing finger across the street to find that there was indeed a farm there. A honest-to-goodness farm taking up an entire city block, complete with a barn, numerous vegetable patches and corn fields, and several pens of various kinds of livestock. If not for the incredulity of being smack in the middle of an urban environment, it would have been picture perfect.

"Who puts a farm in the middle of a city?" Dib asked in disbelief.

"Er, check out the name on the sign," Viera said, pointing to the sign atop the archway framing the front entrance to the property. Which proudly declared it as "Membrane Farms".

"…You've gotta be kidding me," Dib said flatly, before crossing the street towards the farm, "C'mon, I need to check this out."

The trio crossed the street and passed through the wide-open gates of the farm. Looking around confirmed that it was exactly as it appeared from the outside, with the exception of a section they hadn't been able to see through the fence surrounding the property, where a desk had been set up with a register on it, and a series of racks containing fruit, vegetables, and meat next to it. And seated at that desk…

"Dad?!" Dib exclaimed on instinct, before reminding himself that the man he was looking at wasn't actually his father. Even so, it was hard for his brain to process the image of Professor Membrane wearing the flannel shirt and blue coveralls of a stereotypical farmer (and for some reason, still with his trademark goggles).

"Yee-haw! Well, howdy there, son! Didn't expect to see ya and yer lil' friends down here today!" Farmer Membrane greeted with an over-the-top "hillbilly" accent that threw Dib for another loop.

"Er, we're just passing through," Dib said weakly, not even trying to explain the whole "alternate universe" thing; this version of his father clearly wasn't a multi-Nobel-winning genius, and probably wouldn't understand it anyway. Which was suddenly making Dib worried about his chances to work out a way to invert the Rift, if his own counterpart was anything like this.

"Well in that case, why don't ya'll help yerselves to some free samples?" Membrane asked, gesturing to the racks next to him.

"That's, really not necessary," Viera protested gently, only for Membrane to wave her off.

"Naw, it's okay. Company policy — everyone who visits the farm gets free samples!"

"…Isn't that a bad business plan?" Steve asked, arching an eyebrow, "I mean, what's to stop people from just taking samples and not actually buying anything?"

There was a moment of silence, as Farmer Membrane scratched his head in thought.

"Huh. That there never occurred to me. I'll have to do some thinking on that," he admitted with a shrug, before turning towards the barn and raising his voice to say, "Sweetie, remind me ta' rethink the free sample policy later!"

"Okay, Daddy!" a sugary-sweet voice replied as its owner emerged from the barn, at which point Dib's already shocked brain almost went into a total breakdown.

It was this reality's version of Gaz… who was wearing a bright pink dress, a heart-shaped necklace, and pink bows in her hair. She was smiling widely, and her wide open eyes almost seemed to be sparkling. Dib and the twins could only stare, Dib and Viera's jaws dropping as they took in that sight, while Steve blinked repeatedly as if that would change what he was seeing.

"By the way, Daddy, I finished restocking the hay and mucking out the stables," the alternate Gaz said cheerfully, "Did you need anything else?"

"Naw, I'm fine, honey," Membrane said as he got up, "Whelp, Imma gonna go check on the corn harvest. Y'all help yourselves to whatever ya want."

As Membrane walked away, Alternate-Gaz finally seemed to notice Dib and the twins, who were still silently gaping at her. Gasping in delight, she darted over and wrapped Dib up in a hug, earning a startled yelp from him.

"Hi, big brother! I didn't know you were coming by today!" she said brightly.

"Grk," Dib mumbled, mind unable to wrap itself around the concept of his sister being so nice to him. She didn't seem to notice his reaction, but after a moment she let go and looked inquisitively at him and the others, tapping her chin in thought.

"Hmm, there's something different about you guys," she mused. At this point, Steve snapped out of his shock; seeing that the others were still too stunned to say anything, he took the initiative.

"Would you believe we're from an alternate universe?" he asked, not seeing a point in lying about this. What would be the point when they were going to be trying to ask for help getting home anyway?

"Really? Ohmigosh, that's so cool! Wait 'till my Dib hears about this!" Alternate-Gaz gushed. Dib, meanwhile, finally came back to his senses, shaking his head to clear it and jumping onto the conversation.

"Speaking of which, we'll probably need his help to get back to our own universe. Do you know where he is?" he asked.

"Sure, he and his friends should be at home! C'mon!" Alternate-Gaz said, before turning around and skipping away. Literally skipping.

"…This is going to give me nightmares," Dib sighed, following after his sister's counterpart. Steve followed, dragging along Viera, who was still frozen in shock.

Elsewhere, Same Time

Tak and Tenn stood in the central command room of their counterparts' base in the Deelishus Weenie building… or rather, the Tasty Wiener building, as it was apparently known in this universe. They'd arrived a little while earlier and been welcomed by Tak's counterpart, who had apparently detected the Rift and therefore wasn't surprised to see them. Now, they were waiting on the alternate Tak to finish analyzing things on her computer.

Or rather, the "anti" Tak, as they'd both mentally dubbed her, due to some rather glaring personality differences they'd immediately noticed.

"Well, the calculations on the Rift inversion are coming along pretty rapidly, we should be able to send you home in no time," Anti-Tak said perkily. Between that tone of voice and the blue-and-white colored uniform she was wearing, she was such an overall cheerful image that it practically made Tak's eyes hurt just to look at her. And all this talk of being a "Protector" quite honestly made her sick, but she was doing her best to repress that.

"Glad to hear it," Tak said curtly, watching her MIMI trying to avoid being dragged into playing with her own counterpart; judging by how Anti-Tak shrugged the whole thing off, Anti-MIMI was usually like this, which was frankly disturbing.

"Is she planning on joining the conversation any time soon?" Tenn asked, gesturing towards where her counterpart was laying splayed on a nearby couch, sipping a soda and watching a screen displaying some TV show, apparently oblivious to their presence.

"Yeah, I wouldn't count on it," Anti-Tak said, sounding slightly disgruntled, "I agreed to let her crash in my base a few months back when she was between jobs, and she's done pretty much nothing since."

"Hey, I help out sometimes," Anti-Tenn protested mildly, barely looking away from her screen, "I'm just not interested in your whole 'who can uplift the humans better' game with Zim."

"It's not a game, it's friendly rivalry, there's a difference," Anti-Tak sniffed, while Tak's eye twitched at one particular word in that sentence.

"You're… friends with your version of Zim?" she asked slowly, just barely keeping herself from yelling in outrage.

"Well, 'friends' might be too strong a word, but yeah, we get along okay," Anti-Tak replied, oblivious to the disgust on her counterpart's face, "We just have a big difference in views over the best way to uplift a species — Zim thinks he should just solve all their problems for them, while I think they'll only truly prosper if they work things out on their own, so I just leave clues for them to figure out advances at their own pace."

"And I think the whole thing is a total intrusion into an entire species' privacy and autonomy, no matter which way you guys handle it," Anti-Tenn commented, "Like, just let peeps be peeps and handle their own business, that's what I say."

"'Peeps'?" Tenn echoed, incredulous at how laid back her counterpart was acting. She may not have cared much about this ridiculous uplifting policy the Irkens in this universe had, but still, seeing any version of herself act so unprofessional was a slap in the face.

"Ugh, enough with this conversation already. Please just figure out a way to get us back where we belong already," Tak groaned, rubbing her forehead.

"Right, okay. Like I said, we should have this done pretty soon and get you on your way," Anti-Tak said, turning back to her console, "And with any luck, we can do this without Dib finding out… er, our Dib that is. I don't know what yours is like, but if he's anything like ours, letting something as potentially dangerous as a Smarkle Rift fall into his hands is the last thing anyone should want."

Tak and Tenn blinked and exchanged a look at the suddenly ominous tone that Anti-Tak was speaking in.

"Er, what exactly is your Dib like?" Tenn asked hesitantly.

"Trouble. Very, very serious trouble."

Membrane Neighborhood, Soon After

"Is it me, or did this walk take twice as long as it should have?" Steve asked as they walked down the street, "Is this version of your house farther away from the park than it is in our reality?"

"No, it's the same distance, it's just taking so much longer because of all the little stops that Anti-Gaz has been making," Dib groused, having quickly moved past shock at his sister's doppelgänger to annoyance at her actions.

"Anti-Gaz?" Steve asked with an arched eyebrow.

"Well, she is the exact opposite of the regular Gaz. I mean, she's so cheerful, she been chatting nonstop since we met, she gave a five-minute speech about the benefits of a primarily granola diet, and she's been stopping to help every since person we've bumped into along the way — I mean, she's literally helping an old lady cross the street right now!" Dib explained, gesturing to where Anti-Gaz was guiding an old woman with a walker across the street.

"Why thank you, dearie, you're such a sweetie," the woman said as they reached the sidewalk, patting Anti-Gaz on the head affectionately.

"Aw, it's no problem," Anti-Gaz replied with a giggle, blushing slightly at the praise.

A snort drew Dib and Steve's attention to Viera, who hadn't said anything since they'd met Anti-Gaz. She appeared to be over the initial shock, but she still didn't look quite right, as she was biting her lower lip rather hard, and her eyes were tearing up slightly.

"You alright?" Steve asked his sister cautiously, a bit concerned at how she was acting. She didn't verbally respond, just nodding her head stiffly as Anti-Gaz skipped back over to their side of the street.

"Sorry about that, I just couldn't not help, ya know?" she asked, "Anyway, let's get to the house, and I'll let my Dib know you're here, and I'm sure he'll be super happy to help you out."

"Thanks," Dib replied, not sure what else to say in this bizarre situation. He and the others followed after Anti-Gaz again, and a few minutes later reached this universe's version of his house… and for some reason, a shiver ran down his spine. Dib couldn't put his finger on it, since the building looked exactly the same as in his own world, but there was something about it that was making warning bells go off in his head.

Before he could process that thought, however, Anti-Gaz had opened the front door and the twins had already entered, so he reluctantly followed. Keeping an eye out as he passed through the threshold, he was pleased to see nothing out of the ordinary, aside from the fact that the living room was lacking any of Gaz's gaming systems or Professor Membrane's various bits of memorabilia. Other than that, it looked the same as his own, yet Dib still had a bad feeling.

"Okay, just wait here and make yourselves at home, and I'll go get Dib and his friends," Anti-Gaz said, before making her way to the stairs. As she disappeared upstairs, Dib and Steve turned towards Viera, whose shoulders were starting to shake.

"Seriously, what's up with you?" Steve asked. In response, Viera gave another snort, before bursting out into uproarious laughter. As the boys blinked and stared in surprise, she doubled over, clutching her stomach as she laughed so hard she practically collapsed.

"Oh God, she's like something out of a Saturday morning cartoon for 5 year olds!" she managed to gasp out between laughs, "Can you imagine how our Gaz would react if she saw this one? Please, one of you remind me to take a picture before we leave!"

"…You think we should be worried?" Steve asked Dib, the pair sharing a look as Viera finally stopped laughing, collapsing onto the couch to catch her breath.

"Nah, she's fine, let her get it out of her system," Dib replied, as he looked around warily, "I'm more concerned about… I don't even know what, but I just have a bad feeling about this whole situation."

"We're in a universe where the darkest, most twisted person I've ever met is so nice it might give me cavities," Viera said dryly, "If she's the standard, what's the worst that could happen?"

As if on cue, beams of light shot out of the ceiling, surrounding the three of them. And before any of them could react, they were pulled into the air and left suspended there, floating several feet above the floor.

"What the hell?!" Dib exclaimed, as he and the twins struggled uselessly against whatever had ahold of them.

"It's a stasis field. I would have thought that would have obvious," a very familiar voice called out from the other side of the room. Managing to twist around in the field beams, Dib and the twins found themselves looking at what they realized were their counterparts in this universe, and were instantly staring in shock.

Dib's counterpart was wearing a white lab coat instead of a black trench coat, and also had a bulbous cybernetic implant surrounded by scars in place of his left eye. Viera's counterpart was wearing a flowing black robe and pointy black witch's hat, while her hair was dyed black with flame-like red designs at the edges of her ponytails. And Steve's counterpart was wearing black pants and matching tank top which was straining against the ridiculously massive muscles he was sporting.

"…Oh my God, this is one of those 'everything's the opposite' mirror universes, isn't it?" Steve groaned, earning him raised eyebrows from everyone else (except his own counterpart, who was staring somewhat blankly into the middle distance).

"How'd you jump to that conclusion?" Dib asked.

"First, your father's a hillbilly farmer instead of the world's smartest man, then your sister is the nicest person in the world instead of the scariest, and now our counterparts are over there looking like a bunch of comicbook supervillain cliches," Steve said dryly, "It's not that much of a stretch."

"Who are you calling a cliche?" Anti-Dib growled, cyber eye glowing red.

"I'm just impressed he can speak in full sentences," Anti-Viera commented, while Anti-Steve merely grunted.

"Okay, getting this back on track," Viera spoke up, "Is there a reason you're holding us prisoner all of a sudden?"

"You're doppelgängers of us who just showed up in my house shortly after a massive burst of cosmic energy," Anti-Dib replied, as a holo-screen appeared next to him displaying a chart overlaid on a map of the city, "So forgive us for being defensive."

"And honestly? You look like a bunch of annoying do-gooders who we'd come into conflict with in short order," Anti-Viera added, "So why not be proactive?"

"'Do-gooders'? So you admit you're evil?" Dib asked.

"Well, if you want to confine yourself to such naive concepts as morality…" Anti-Dib started to say, only for Dib to groan and cut him off.

"Really, a self-righteous philosophical monologue? Okay, we get it, you're evil, you don't have to be a douche too."

Anti-Dib growled at the insult, but took a calming breath before speaking again, "Alright, let's get to the point — why have you come to our reality?"

"It was an accident, and we were hoping you could help us reverse the portal we came through so we can go back," Steve replied, "But honestly right now I'm more concerned you're all going to experiment on us or something."

"Tempting, but let's stay on track," Anti-Viera said with a smirk, before glancing at Anti-Dib, "A portal. Hmm, could that work for that plan we were talking about? The ultimate contingency."

"It might," Anti-Dib mused, pulling out a data pad, "Considering the amounts of cosmic energy being put out, if we can harness it, it should just be enough."

"Enough for what?" Dib demanded.

"Oh, nothing much, just the end of the world," Anti-Dib replied casually, smirking at the shocked looks that received.

"What?!"

"More specifically, using all that energy to collapse the universe and then rebuild it as we see fit," Anti-Dib continued, glancing at his pad for a moment, "Actually, given the circumstances, we should be able to destroy your universe too, and merge it into what's left of ours. A two-for-one deal."

"You're insane!" Viera shouted, which earned an eye roll from her counterpart.

"That's your response? Now who's being cliche?" she snorted.

"What else do you expect us to say to that?" Steve asked, "And what the hell makes you think you can even pull that off?"

"Well, I am a genius," Anti-Dib said smugly, before putting an arm around Anti-Viera's shoulders and pulling her close, "And Viera here is a magnificent sorceress. Together, we're unstoppable."

"Aw, you say the sweetest things, dear," Anti-Viera said with a slight giggle, giving him a peck on the cheek, causing Team Save Earth to all stare at them in disbelief.

"Wait. Are you two… a couple?" Dib asked slowly, earning confused looks from the pair.

"Sure. Aren't you?" Anti-Dib asked, gesturing to his counterpart and Viera.

"No!" Dib and Viera answered in unison. Noticing this, they glanced at each other awkwardly then looked away, both blushing. Steve arched an eyebrow at this, then chose to change the subject before the awkwardness could grow.

"So, you two are 'unstoppable together'? What about him?" he asked, pointing to his own counterpart.

"Steve like hitting stuff," Anti-Steve said, voice slow and deep.

"Yeah, he's mostly the dumb muscle who does the heavy lifting for us," Anti-Viera said with a sigh.

"Which to be fair, does have its benefits," Anti-Dib admitted with a shrug, "Like whenever those meddling fools Zim and Tak get in the way of our plans and he breaks their faces."

"Oh, come on! Zim and Tak are heroes in this universe?" Dib asked with a groan, "This place is definitely going to give me nightmares!"

"No it won't. You'll all be dead soon enough," Anti-Dib said flatly.

"Enjoy your last few hours of existence. We're off to become gods," Anti-Viera said, giving a mock-cheerful wave before snapping her fingers and causing the three of them to disappear in a cloud of black smoke, leaving Team Save Earth alone in the room, still suspended in the stasis beams.

"Yeah, this is how I wanted to die," Viera said dryly, "Vaporized by an insane alternate version of myself collapsing reality."

"We're not going to die, we're going to stop them," Dib reassured, "We just need to figure out a way out of here, and-"

THUMP

The stasis beams suddenly shut off without warning, dropping the trio to the floor with yelps and thuds.

"Whoopsie, sorry about that," Anti-Gaz said, from where she was standing next to a control panel in the wall, "I thought that would lower you down, not just shut off all at once like that. You guys alright?"

"Yeah, we're fine," Dib replied as he and twins got back to their feet, "But why are you helping us?"

"Well, it's the right thing to do, duh," she said, "I love my brother, but from the sounds of what I heard, this plan of his is super-duper bad, and I can't let him get away with it. You better go stop him."

"We will. Let's go!" Dib said to his friends as he made his way to the door, the others quickly following.

Anti-Zim's Base, Same Time

Zim sat slumped on his counterpart's couch, Skoodge and GIR next to him, the two of them watching the TV while he quietly brooded. Barely paying attention to the Happy Monkey Show (which was somehow even more irritating than the Scary version), he glanced around and saw that they were alone, his counterpart being down in the lab with his GIR working. Frowning, Zim craned his neck to look in the kitchen, and saw only the two Minimooses, laying on the table with a chess set between them, apparently midway through a game.

"Where's Nyx?" Zim asked, noting her absence.

"She grabbed her counterpart and took off," Skoodge explained, "Something about trying to 'inspire her inner anarchist'. Both Yings went with them."

Zim muttered something dismissive at that, while absently tapping his fingers on the armrest. The beat he was tapping slowly increased for several minutes, before he snarled and jumped to his feet, startling Skoodge.

"I can't take this anymore! What is taking that… that Anti-Zim so long?! Is he too busy helping the filthy humans to help me? I should have just handled this myself!" Zim screeched.

"Why didn't you?" Skoodge asked, "I mean, no one said that, uh, 'Anti-Zim' had to do it himself."

"Silence!" Zim snapped, flustered as he realized that oversight. But before he could act on it, the door suddenly burst open; looking towards it revealed an angry-looking Nyx stomping in, Ying following closely behind her, while their counterparts followed at a more sedate pace. And for some reason, all four were covered in soot.

"Dare I ask?" Zim said dryly.

"This thing cannot possibly be a version of me!" Nyx snapped, pointing at Anti-Nyx as the latter slowly closed the door and started brushing off soot with a cloth, "I just spent the last hour putting her through every anarchist trick I know, and she's screwed them all up! I set fires, and she helped put them out; I blew open ATMs at a bank, and she helped the security guards collect the bills before people could run off with them; I blew up a corporate tower, and she helped the owners get all their insurance papers in order! Who even does that?!"

"Following proper procedures is key to productivity and an orderly society," Anti-Nyx replied blandly.

"Grraaah! I hate this place so much!" Nyx growled, tugging at her antennae.

"Try living with the broad," Anti-Ying commented, as he devoured an entire pie in huge bites.

"Are you ever not eating?" Ying asked his counterpart in disgust.

"Nah, not really."

Before the complaining could be continued by anyone, the floor opened up and Anti-Zim emerged from the lab. Anti-GIR was standing stoically at his side holding a large bulky device that looked like an old-fashioned movie projector with a ray gun in place of its lens.

"And voila, it's finished!" Anti-Zim proclaimed, "This neutron flow polarity reverser should invert the effects of the Smarkle Rift and allow you and your friends to head back home."

"Finally," Zim grunted, tossing on his disguise. If Anti-Zim heard the anger in his voice, he didn't react to it, instead throwing on his own disguise (identical to Zim's) and leading the way out the door, the whole group following and the two Minimooses bringing up the rear.

The assemblage made good time, and were soon almost back to the park. As they walked down the street towards it, they were greeted by the sight of Tak, Tenn, and Anti-Tak approaching from the opposite direction, the latter in a holographic disguise identical to her counterpart's save for the colors of her clothes. She was also carrying what looked like a large crystalline tube with a control panel of some kind built into the base.

"You too, huh?" Anti-Tak asked Anti-Zim as they neared each other, neither noticing the glares their counterparts were giving each other.

"Yep. Is that a chronal inversion matrix?"

"Yeah, I figure it should cause the Rift to spit them back into their own reality and then collapse on itself."

"Hmm, not bad. Combined with my polarity reverser, this should completely seal the Rift without a trace."

"It pains me to see them acting like this," Tak muttered to Zim as their groups followed behind their counterparts, who were happily comparing notes.

"For once, Zim agrees with you," he muttered back. Meanwhile, Skoodge looked over the newcomers, and arched an eyebrow as he noted an absence.

"Where's the other you?" he asked Tenn, who rolled her eyes.

"Back at base, doing some kind of yoga," she replied, "Says she couldn't care less about any of this. What about yours?"

"Not even on the planet. Apparently he's some kind of awesome adventurer," Skoodge said, "Shame I can't meet him, but Zim doesn't want to stick around here any longer than necessary."

"I can understand… what the?" Tenn trailed off, as the group reached the park and all stared in confusion. The Smarkle Rift was still there, but it was now surrounded by a ring of machinery, with cables connecting plinths that appeared to be generators of some kind standing at various intervals around the Rift. Floating atop these plinths were crystals, which were pulsing in time with the Rift as streams of energy flowed from it into them.

"Eh? What is this?" Zim demanded.

"I'll tell you what it is," Dib said, the anti-Irkens jumping in surprise as he and the twins ran up, "Our counterparts are insane supervillains who are planning to use the Rift to destroy this universe and ours so they can create a new one and rule over it."

"They're doing what?!" Anti-Zim exclaimed.

"Wow, that's a step up from the usual mayhem they do," Anti-Tak commented, "If I wasn't horrified, I'd be impressed."

"Can they even do that?" Skoodge asked.

"Theoretically, if they can harness enough energy and properly shield themselves, yes," Tenn said nervously.

"Wait, wait, wait," Zim said, looking incredibly confused, "You're saying that this reality's Dib-Stink is evil?"

"Well, 'evil' is a strong word… but he and his friends do call themselves Team Enslave Earth," Anti-Zim said.

"Seriously?" Steve asked, deadpan.

"And they're about to destroy two universes for kicks. Yeah, they're evil," Viera cut in, "Now can we all focus on how we're supposed to stop that?"

"How dare they?!" Zim suddenly yelled, "Zim will not allow anyone — least of all any version of the Dib-Monkey — destroy Earth before I can! Skoodge, Nyx, let's go!"

With that, Zim bolted towards the Rift, his minions following after him while everyone else watched, in varying levels of exasperation and confusion.

"Wait, what was that last part?" Anti-Zim asked, blinking.

"Never mind, let's just get in there before that idiot screws things up," Tak snapped, also running off, with Tenn and MIMI close behind. After only a moment's hesitation, Team Save Earth and the anti-Irkens followed after.

Meanwhile, Team Enslave Earth were standing off to the side of the ring of machinery they'd built around the Rift. A string of cables ran from the ring to form a smaller one around the three of them, and the glowing mystical array drawn on the ground that they were standing on. As Anti-Viera stood next to him, hands clasped on a skull-shaped amulet and chanting slowly, Anti-Dib carefully examined the pad in his hands, monitoring the energy fields.

"Almost there," he said, "Soon we should have enough energy collected and condensed. Then we can channel it outwards in a destructive wave through both sides of the Rift, while this barrier of yours protects us."

"I know the plan, dear, you don't have to spell it out for me," Anti-Viera snapped, "Now hush and let me focus."

"Fine, keep doing your mumbo-jumbo, as long as it works," Anti-Dib grumbled, earning a glare from his girlfriend. But before she could continue the argument, a plasma blast suddenly slammed into the middle of the circle, the resulting explosion sending the two of them and Anti-Steve flying. They hit the ground a few yards away, and quickly scrambled back to their feet. Looking to the source of the attack, they were greeted by the sight of Zim and his minions, with their counterparts and the others all close behind.

"Huh, now that's weird to look at," Anti-Dib commented, his cybernetic eye whirring slightly as he looked over Zim's group.

"He's calling us weird? Has he looked in a mirror lately?" Skoodge asked, only for Zim to wave him off.

"Zim cares not for the opinion of this fake Dib!" Zim snarled, PAK legs deployed and lifting him into the air, "Especially not with this insulting plan of his — I don't care if he destroys this disgusting reality, but our Earth is mine to destroy! And no one takes what belongs to Zim!"

"Seriously, can we back up and discuss that part again?" Anti-Zim asked.

"Oh, for Irk's sake — in our universe, Irkens conquer planets, instead of wasting time and energy trying to uplift them. I would have thought that was obvious from our reactions," Tak snapped, glaring at her counterpart's scandalized look, "Now can we please focus on stopping this ugly bunch so we can go back where things make sense?!"

"Just try it!" Anti-Dib snarled, pressing a button on his wrist. With a whirring noise, cables shot out of his lab coat and wrapped around him, within minutes encasing him within a miniature mech suit of black metal, with large laser cannons mounted over the wrists of its large fists. Anti-Viera, meanwhile, clasped her skull amulet and barked something in a harsh-sounding language. Black flames ignited in the amulet and burst out to surround her, taking the shape of some kind of demonic harpy, which screeched defiantly at their opponents.

"…Can you do that?" Tenn asked Viera faintly, as everyone stared in surprise.

"No, but I obviously should learn how to," she replied. Steve, meanwhile, looked to his own counterpart to see if he would power-up too. Instead, all he did was flex his large muscles in a threatening manner.

"Well, that's mildly disappointing," he said flatly.

"Less talking, more fighting!" Zim snarled, lunging at Anti-Dib, only to be easily smacked aside by a metal gauntlet. Anti-Dib laughed at this, only for Dib to charge in and slam his own gauntlet into his chest and knock him back several feet. Skoodge, Anti-GIR, and the Minimooses soon followed into the fray, while Zim scrambled back to his feet and joined them.

"Are you two planning on doing anything?" Tenn asked Anti-Tak and Anti-Zim, who were standing off to the side.

"…I usually let GIR and Minimoose handle the fighting for me," Anti-Zim admitted meekly, "I'm more of a planner than a fighter."

"And I'm a pacifist," Anti-Tak added.

"Are you serious?" Tak snarled, "How have those three not conquered or destroyed this Earth yet?!"

"Well, to be fair, most of the time their plans seem to blow up in their faces. And when they don't, it's easy enough to cause them to fall apart without having to resort to violence," Anti-Tak protested.

"Ugh, whatever. Watch a professional at work," Tak snapped, before deploying her PAK legs and charging towards where Tenn and Viera were engaging the latter's fiery counterpart, MIMI zooming after her.

While everyone else was preoccupied with his teammates, Anti-Steve stomped over to his counterpart, who merely arched an eyebrow before whipping out a blaster and discharging a few shots. To his surprise, however, all this did was leave Anti-Steve slightly scorched, and angrier than he already was.

"Uh, can we talk about this?" Steve asked nervously.

"Fake Steve talk too much! Steve smash!" Anti-Steve snarled, bringing his fists slamming down to smash into the ground as Steve jumped out of the way. Rolling across the ground a few feet, he jumped back up and fired off a few more shots as he backpedaled to put distance between them, all to no effect.

"Why isn't this working?!" he yelled, as Anti-Steve advanced on him.

"Ha! Fake Steve weak, because Fake Steve still using thinky part!" Anti-Steve gloated.

"'Thinky part'?"

"Thinky part!" Anti-Steve repeated, jabbing at his forehead, "Steve stop using useless thinky part and focus on being strong, so now Steve stronger than sister or Dib, with their stupid big thinky parts! Steve stronger than anyone!"

"Terribly sorry, sir, but I'd like to test that theory," Ying's voice suddenly cut in. Blinking at that, Anti-Steve turned around, and was promptly uppercut hard enough to be sent flying into a nearby tree. Steve watched, bemused, as Battle Mode Ying, who had delivered the attack, took off after his opponent, before turning to an amused Nyx, who was standing nearby.

"Not that I'm complaining, but why are you helping me?" he asked cautiously.

"Hey, even I'm not crazy enough to deal with the freaky fire monster," she said with a shrug, "And I don't really wanna see if Zim's 'no one kills Dib but me' thing applies to alternate universe versions. So that leaves dealing with muscle-head over here. And what are you two doing?"

That last comment was directed toward Anti-Nyx and Anti-Ying, who were standing nearby. While the latter was leaning against a bench and chugging from a plus-size bag of potato chips, the former was cranking an old-fashioned accountant's calculator.

"I'm keeping track of all damages being done to the park and estimating the restitution we'll need to pay to the city for all of it," she replied.

"You actually pay for the damage you cause?!" Nyx snapped, eye twitching.

"Of course. One must always be held accountable for their actions, and pay their dues for the continuation of a stable society," Anti-Nyx responded, a hint of professional pride creeping into her monotone.

"…Flirk this," Nyx said with a resigned sigh, before suddenly deploying her PAK legs and firing a point-blank plasma burst, instantly vaporizing Anti-Nyx. Steve's jaw dropped at that, while Anti-Ying looked on impassively.

"You've got no idea how long I've wanted to do that," the robot commented.

"Wow, that was a relief. Now let's go do the same thing to other you," Nyx said to Steve, before turning and running off towards where Ying was grappling with Anti-Steve. Steve watched her go, still stunned, before shaking it off and running to join her.

Meanwhile, Viera was trading flames from her amulet with her counterpart's aura, keeping her distracted while Tak, Tenn, and MIMI darted around her, looking for an opening.

"You're too weak to stop me!" Anti-Viera snarled, black flames clashing with red, "I've dedicated the entirety of myself to learning all mystic secrets, without pointless moral restrictions. And now my hard work will be rewarded, as I become sole goddess of a new universe!"

"Sole goddess? What about your boyfriend?" Viera asked, battering away another wave of flames.

"Oh, he'll still be my cute little pet, but I'm not going to share my power with anyone, least of all someone dedicated to useless science," Anti-Viera cackled, "That's why I secretly designed the ritual to channel all the leftover cosmic energy into me after the collapse. Not that I expect a weakling like you to understand my brilliance."

"I understand you're not good at multitasking. Next time, focus on fighting instead of monologuing," Viera replied smugly. Anti-Viera started at that, and looked down to see that while she'd been talking, Viera's amulet had stopped projecting flames and instead started sucking them, taking her own with them. Shrieking, she tried to reverse the flow, but it was too late, and her fiery aura was soon dispersed, returning her to normal.

Before Anti-Viera could react, Tenn dashed forward and punched her in the stomach, folding her over, followed by Tak jumping in to kick her in the face and flip her onto her back. She hit the ground, only for MIMI to then grab her by the ankle and toss her through the air to hit a tree head first, knocking her out.

As Viera and the female Irkens restrained her unconscious counterpart, Dib was engaging his in a fistfight. Anti-Dib's mech's gauntlets were bigger than his own and packed more of a punch, but Dib's being plasma-powered made up for that, especially as they absorbed the attacks from his counterpart's energy cannons. It also helped that Anti-Dib also had to fend off attacks from Zim, Skoodge, Anti-GIR, and the Minimooses.

What didn't do any good was GIR standing off to the side, randomly firing off weapons.

"Whee! I'm helping!" GIR said, shooting a set of rockets that barely avoided hitting the whole group before blowing up some nearby trees.

"No, you are not. Please desist," Anti-GIR commented evenly, casually dodging a plasma blast from one of Anti-Dib's cannons.

"GIR! Do something useful for once and attack the fake Dib-Monkey, you idiot!" Zim snapped, ducking under a stray shot from one of GIR's blasters.

"You're all idiots!" Anti-Dib crowed, as his mech deflected energy attacks from the Minimooses, "I'm the most brilliant mind to ever exist, and I'm not going to be denied my victory by you simpletons! I'm going to create a new universe, one where everyone will be forced to acknowledge my intellectual superiority!"

"Seriously, that's why you're doing this? You're going to destroy two universes just so people will flatter how smart you are?" Dib demanded incredulously, "That's pathetic!"

"Indeed! At least Zim is conquering Earth for my own sake, not to get anyone's approval!" Zim sneered.

"Well, I mean, that used to be why you were doing it," Skoodge said, as he tried to slash Anti-Dib only to be batted away.

"That's how it used to be, so it doesn't count now! Shut up!" Zim snapped, not caring Skoodge was too disoriented to actually hear him.

"All of you shut up!" Anti-Dib roared, firing repeatedly from his wrist cannons. He failed to hit anyone, but they were all driven back. As they scrambled to regain their footing, he advanced on them, ready to finish the fight…

WHUMP

And then something slammed into him, knocking his mech off its feet. Blinking, Anti-Dib looked around to see what had hit him, and found Anti-Steve lying a few feet away, with what looked like a swing set wrapped around him. Turning to where he had come from, he saw Steve, Nyx, and Ying approaching, followed by Viera, Tak and Tenn, who dumped the unconscious and tied-up Anti-Viera next to her brother.

"I believe this is the part where you give up," Tak commented with a smirk, as everyone surrounded him.

In response, Anti-Dib snarled and slapped a button that appeared on one wrist. At first, nothing happened, but then the machinery around the Rift started glowing brightly, before several beams of light shot from it and into the mech suit, which started glowing with the same energy.

"Ahahahaha! Behold the might of my genius!" he laughed, "I rigged the array to channel all the excess cosmic energy into me after the collapse — as if I didn't know Viera was planning to do the same thing with her stupid magic — but I'll just take it now, and wipe you all out!"

Without giving anyone a chance to say or do anything, Anti-Dib spread out his palms, firing off energy beams. Everyone just barely got out of the way, as the beams cut car-sized and bus-long gouges through the ground, and returned fire with all their weapons, only for the aurora of energy surrounding Anti-Dib to flare and absorb all of them.

"My brilliance is unstoppable! All of your incompetent fools will fall before me!" he cackled. As everyone else looked on with various levels or apprehension, Zim's eye started twitching.

"No. No, no, no!" he yelled, "Zim refuses! To lose! To a Dib! Minimoose! Use your new weapon upgrades!"

"Nyah!" Zim's Minimoose responded, floating over to hover in front of Anti-Dib.

"Aw, how cute. What's it gonna do, stare me to death?" Anti-Dib laughed… which trailed off as everything except for Minimoose's face dissolved into a series of cables, panels, and moving parts, which shifted around and expanded far more than should have been possible for the moose's size. Within a minute it had all come together, leaving Minimoose's face in the middle of a floating collection of plasma cannons, missiles and various other weapons, all of which were pointed right at Anti-Dib.

"Oh," he said faintly, going pale.

"NYAH!"

BOOM!

People walking the streets of Hopesville paused to watch as a mushroom briefly blossomed over the city park, before shrugging it off and going about their day. The only one to pay it any close attention was Anti-Gaz, who was already making her way in that direction. She soon reached the source of the explosion and found all the combatants lying where they'd been knocked over by the force of the blast, and that the machinery and crystals surrounding the Rift had all been blown apart. Meanwhile, her rather scorched brother was lying in the middle of a crater, surrounded by pieces of his mech suit, and with a back-to-normal Minimoose lying next to him.

"Gee, you guys really went all out, didn't you?" she commented as everyone got back to their feet. The prime universe Irkens, seeing her for the first time, did double-takes and stared at her.

"Wow, our Gaz would freak worse than I did," Nyx muttered to Skoodge, who nodded dumbly. Zim merely stared for another moment, before forcing himself to refocus on Minimoose, who was shakily floating over to him.

"Excellent work, Minimoose," he said.

"Nyah!"

"You're right, that was worth the effort to put all that into you, though we did just blow our one use of it all…"

"Nyah!"

"Good point! It was good point for when we vaporize the real Dib's huge head."

"My head's not big!" Dib snapped, echoed weakly by Anti-Dib, before the latter passed out.

"Well, that was certainly a lot more exciting than our usual fights," Anti-Zim commented as he and Anti-Tak walked up and observed the knocked-out Team Enslave Earth, "And now that we've finally beaten Dib and his minions, they can face justice for their crimes!"

"What do you mean, 'we'? You two didn't do anything!" Tak snapped.

"We were providing moral support!" Anti-Tak protested.

"Whatever. Can we just get out of here now?" Tenn asked with a weary sigh.

"Yes, right away," Anti-Zim said, as he and Anti-Tak were handed the equipment they'd dropped earlier, "Thank you, Nyx."

"Of course, sir," Anti-Nyx replied, as her counterpart did a double-take.

"What the hell?! I vaporized you!"

"Yes you did. Fortunately, I have backup clones," Anti-Nyx explained, as blandly as normally, while a screen popped out of her PAK and displayed an image of numerous copies of herself suspended in tubes, "All exactly the same, all ready to perform their duty and serve."

"…Gaaarrrgggh!" Nyx yelled wordlessly, before falling over and kicking spastically at the air as she rolled around in frustration. Everyone stared at this for a moment, before turning their attention back to the more pressing matter at hand.

It took a few minutes, but Anti-Zim and Anti-Tak set up their equipment and activated it. Twin beams of prismatic light shot out of their respective devices, merged together, and then slammed into the Rift. The Rift twisted and contorted, its color patterns shifting.

"There we go. According to my readings, you should now be able to pass back through the Rift and return to your own universe," Anti-Tak said, looking up from a pad.

"Are you sure?" Dib asked. In response, Zim punted GIR, who flew through the air with a happy yell and passed through the Rift without interference.

"It works," Zim said with a nod, "Which means we can now go home and forget this all ever happened. Skoodge, Ying! Grab Minimoose and Nyx!"

Without waiting for a response, Zim jumped through the Rift himself. Ying, carrying a still incoherent Nyx, followed close behind, while Skoodge took a moment to look between the two Minimooses (who had apparently been saying their goodbyes) before grabbing one and jumping into the Rift as well.

"Our turn," Tak said, marching towards the Rift and jumping in, MIMI zooming in after her and Tenn following after merely giving a dismissive nod to the others.

"You'll close this thing behind us, right?" Dib asked, slightly unnerved by talking to a nice Zim but being too tired to care at this point.

"Don't worry, we will," Anti-Zim said, "We don't want anyone else to stumble between universes by mistake, after all."

"Bye! Nice meeting you!" Anti-Gaz commented, as she produced pillows from somewhere and placed them under the heads of the unconscious Team Enslave Earth members.

"That reminds me," Viera said, pulling out her phone and aiming at Anti-Gaz, "Smile!"

Anti-Gaz did so without question, while Viera took her picture. Dib and Steve rolled their eyes but didn't comment; instead, the three of them likewise made their way to the Rift and jumped in. As soon as they disappeared from sight, Anti-Zim and Anti-Tak fiddled with their devices, and the Rift collapsed in on itself, ceasing to exist.

And with that, their universe went back to normal.

Primary Universe, Same Time

Team Save Earth popped out of the Rift and watched as it was sealed. Looking around they were greeted only by the sight of the wrecked Harvester, and the rapidly disappearing forms of Tak's team; Zim's group was long gone.

"Well, that was… different," Dib said with a sigh.

"Almost worth it," Viera said with a snicker, looking at the new photo on her phone, which received another eye roll from the boys, "Besides, we stopped Zim and Tak from getting that cosmic energy, so there's that."

"I guess. Come on, let's get out of here before we get blamed for this mess," Dib said, turning to walk away. The twins followed him in silence for a moment, before Steve decided to break it.

"So, are we going to talk about how your guys' counterparts were a couple, or-"

"No," Dib and Viera said, once again in unison and with matching blushes. Steve snickered at their reactions, but chose not to comment on it.

Meanwhile, Zim's group were making their way back to base. Nyx had recovered her wits enough to walk on her own, while Zim had fallen into a sulk and was stomping his way down the sidewalk.

"Uh, Zim? I'm not completely sure I got the right Minimoose," Skoodge said, looking to where the moose was floating beside him.

"They were identical, it doesn't matter," Zim grumbled.

"Nyah!"

"See, he says so himself!" Zim snapped, before angrily kicking a garbage can, "Gah! I can't believe we had to go through all that nonsense, and we have nothing to show for it!"

"But I gots a souvenir!" GIR said, unzipping his dog costume and rooting around in his head.

"What are you talking…" Zim started to say, only to trail off as GIR pulled out a chunk of crystal roughly the size of Zim's palm, which was faintly pulsing with light.

"Is that part of those crystals the other Dib and his friends were using to steal the cosmic energy from the Rift?" Nyx asked, she and the others staring in shock.

"Yep! Imma gonna put it in my scrapbook!" GIR said, smiling happily.

Zim stared for a moment longer, then grinned widely and snatched the crystal shard out of GIR's hands. Ignoring the robot's whining (he'd forget about it in a minute anyway), Zim started cackling; he still didn't know what he was going to use this energy for, but now he had some he could use.

This was a good day after all.

XxxxxxxxxxxxxxX

End Episode 7

XxxxxxxxxxxxxxX

A/N: There you go. Hope that the length of this chapter made up for the wait, and that you enjoyed everything else.

If anyone's curious, for the alternate universe characters I took elements from various other fanfics and pics I've seen around the net. Also, I changed Minimoose's sound from a generic squeak to the "Nyah" used in canon because I finally got sick of not lining up with that little detail.

Well, nothing else to say for now, except to once again wish everyone the best in the middle of the pandemic.

Next time: Nyx and Gaz go on a road trip. IN SPACE!

Until then, please review!