It seems Dib and Zim have found their first target, on their mission to restore Zim's tracker. Wonder how long it will take for them to start fighting.
"Can you-argh!-can you watch your stupid little feet?!" Dib aggressively whispered at Zim, right before getting another boot in his face,
"Why don't you watch your stupid giant head!" Zim hissed at him, making an effort to keep his voice down if only not to ruin their mission.
While Zim had initially been vary of the human's suggestion to raid a human warehouse, after hearing how it was supposedly filled with advanced technology, he had to agree that it wouldn't hurt to check it out. Though they might get hurt anyway, considering it was heavily guarded. The place was surrounded by a large fence, with guards patrolling the parameters. Getting past said fence hadn't exactly been easy, with the two of them having climbed over after they memorized the guards' patrol route. Luckily for them, while the place was filled with security, it didn't look like any of the guards were that interested in keeping watch, not expecting anyone to break into what seemed like a typical warehouse. That made everything much easier for them, though it still didn't mean they could walk through the main entrance all willy-nilly. Which was the reason why they were sneaking in through a window in the side of the building, and why Zim was standing on top of Dib, to the dismay of both of them.
"Couldn't you just use my hands to stand on? You know, the hands I'm currently holding out?!" Dib angrily uttered to an otherwise uncaring alien, flailing an arm out of pure spite just to illustrate his point.
"Your head provides the most stable foundation to stand on." Zim nonchalantly explained, before making an attempt to jump up and reach the window, only to fall short by an inch or two.
"That was an insult, wasn't it? It is, it always is! WHAT'S YOUR PROBLEM WITH MY HEAD!"
"Shh! Be quiet, Dib-stink, or else you're going to bring all the other stinking humans to us." The alien scolded him, with Dib only rolling his eyes in response.
Zim looked back up at the window before placing his hands on his hips, leaving Dib to desperately try and keep balance to stop Zim from falling down, with the alien not even noticing his struggle.
"Blast these short legs of yours! You aren't even tall enough to reach the window!" The alien exclaimed, very directly ignoring the fact that it might have been him that was too short.
From below Dib gave Zim an annoyed stare, as if daring him to continue. Zim was at the moment still staring up at the window and didn't seem keen to look down on the human he was using as a ladder.
"Maybe if we find a crate or something, we might be able to circumvent your embarrassing shortness." Zim continued, and at that point, Dib was about done with the whole situation. So he took hold of Zim's legs, who let out a quick yelp before being lifted in the air. Dib noted that the alien was surprisingly lighter than he had expected, but that still didn't mean he could hold him up forever.
"Can you reach the window now?" Dib asked, with a bit of coyness in his voice. The alien grumbled something he couldn't hear, before giving up on saying anything, and reached for the window instead.
"Yes, Zim is now reaching the window!" He joyfully stated, as if he had accomplished some incredible feat.
"Good, and is the window open?"
"Umm…Yes, now it is!"
"Great!"
Without any formal warning, Dib made a little jump and pushed Zim as hard as he could, catching a glimpse of the green body making its way through the window and hearing the bump from the other side of the wall. All while accompanied by the rather distressed and surprised screaming from Zim, though the sound quickly dissipated after a grunt once he hit the floor. Dib looked up at the window with an unsure expression, as the silence that followed his little stunt became deafening. In the quietness, he wondered if he may have been a little too rough on the alien. Though he dismissed his worry, convincing himself that Zim had gone through way worse things, and was probably fine. Not that it stopped him from finding the silence eerie, and anxiety-inducing.
"Uhhh…you're fine, right Zim?" He meekly asked, with no reply coming from the other side, though that hardly surprised him. Still, he started looking around, worried that a guard might have spotted them by now.
"Zim, I know you're probably a bit pissed at me, but could you please-"
Just as he was looking to one side, a thin mechanical limb that the human was more than familiar with, came out from the window and stabbed its sharp end into the collar of Dib's coat, merely a few centimeters from his throat. Before he had any time to wonder if Zim was trying to kill him, the metal limb lifted him up, the human letting out a small squeal in response. It then dragged him halfway through the window, before retracting itself from his coat. The window was a lot smaller than he had thought at first and while Zim had no issue getting through, Dib found himself hanging in the window frame, tipping between the two sides of the wall. And not that Dib would ever in his life admit it to anything living or dead, but he had for a single second been worried that his head wouldn't have gone through, as he was being pulled through the window.
He tried looking around to spot Zim, but he couldn't properly see anything in the dark hallway. With that, he tried instead to wriggle himself free from the window. With a bit of effort and a few grunts, he managed to get through enough so that gravity did the rest of the work, letting him plunge down onto the floor. He took a second to regain his breath, before lifting himself from the floor, dusting himself off in the meantime. As he did, a short figure emerged from the shadows. It didn't take him long to recognize Zim, who looked at him with a rather displeased expression.
"For the sake of the mission, I'm willing to let this be a fitting punishment for pushing Zim through a window." He explained, though his voice revealed a slight irritation that probably meant he wasn't completely satisfied with the outcome.
"Sounds fair enough," Dib replied seriously, not in the mood to get on Zim's bad side, now that they had finally managed to get inside the warehouse. Zim turned around and started walking down the hallway, with Dib quickly joining by his side. He then grabbed a solid-looking flashlight up from his pocket and turned it on. The flashlight was pretty useful in their given situation, as Dib had predicted. The hallway lights were turned off, leaving the entire palace covered in darkness. And Dib had yet to find out how to see in the dark, and his night goggles needed to be recharged, so a good old flashlight it was.
"Do you truly need a light to see? HAH! Pathetic as usual." The alien commented with a smug grin on his face.
"Of course I need a light! This place is pitch black. Besides, last I remember you can't see in the dark either."
"No, but you forget about my SUPERIOR EYESSSS! I can see much better than you, so I wouldn't need a simple little light to-" Zim was interrupted after stubbing his toe into a cabinet. He jumped around a bit as he tried his best to not scream, while Dib tried his best to not laugh.
"Oh yeah, I can see how well those 'superior eyes' are working out for you." Dib slyly stated once Zim calmed down again, with the angry alien giving him a death stare before they continued forward.
The warehouse was surprisingly big and had many more rooms and hallways than one would believe. What looked like office spaces littered all around the corners, together with other assortments of rooms and doors that led to places Dib wasn't entirely sure about. Neither did the darkness help with making the palace seem any less like a labyrinth with an office theme. Every now and then they could hear something moving about, though it usually turned out to be a mouse. A slew of cobwebs lingered on the ceiling and on the corners. It definitely looked like no one had been around for ages.
After opening the door to a bathroom for the third time in a row, Dib decided they needed something a little more concrete than their intuition to find what they were looking for. He fumbled around in his pocket for a bit, before pulling out a folded piece of paper. Dib then stopped to observe it, with the alien stopping too and looking over his shoulder.
"What's that?" He asked with a strangely endearing tone.
"It's a map. I thought it might be useful." Dib quickly answered, before going back to studying the map, trying to figure out where they were standing. Which was a much harder task than he had anticipated. But once he found out where they were, he started walking again, his gaze constantly switching between the map and where they were going.
"How did you manage to get a map to this repetitious place? In fact, how did you even manage to learn of this place's existence?" Zim asked, this time with a hint of curiosity in his voice, as he had given into wondering why The Dib thought this place was worth raiding for tech and components.
"Well, both things I got from a contact in the Swollen Eyeball Network. This warehouse had gotten some interest because they thought it might house proof of the government hiding the frozen body of George Washington in the Delaware River."
"...George-who and the Dela-what?" Zim asked, though his question seemed to fall on deaf ears, as the human simply continued talking.
"When they discovered that it was just a warehouse for a bunch of dangerous and experimental technology that the government wanted to hide away from the public, they kinda just…lost interest. So it wasn't that much of a hassle to wriggle information on the place out of them, together with a map."
A few seconds of silence followed where Dib looked at the map while Zim stared at him with a dumbfounded look.
"...This 'network' of yours sounds really stupid."
"You don't say, well, do I have to remind you whose great leaders decided the best way to conquer the galaxy was by GOING IN A STRAIGHT LINE-"
"DON'T YOU DARE SPEAK ILL OF THE TALLEST, OR IS SWEAR HUMAN, I WILL PERSONALLY RIP OUT YOUR-"
Just as Zim had interrupted Dib, he too was interrupted by the fact that both of them had taken their eyes off where they were walking, and had managed to walk directly into a door. They then learned that the door wasn't locked as they tumbled through, landing on the floor with a thud. It didn't take them long before they gathered their senses, though instead of standing up, Zim's first instinct was to continue with his threat.
"Wait!" Dib quickly stated as he noticed that Zim was about to speak. He then picked up the map and looked at it again, while he still laid on the floor. He then pointed his flashlight into the room they were in, and a look of amazement appeared on his face.
"I think we found the place." He commented before standing up, with Zim following suit, the both of them now scanning the room they had tumbled into.
It sure looked like some kind of storage area, as the ceiling was high up, and on each of the sides of the room stood tall shelves filled with all kinds of boxes. A few labels confirmed their suspicion of being in the right place, as there were several memorable titles such as 'experimental explosives', 'nuclear fission powered shotguns', and 'robot puppies'.
They both then shortly nodded to each other before spreading out, with Dib taking the left side and Zim the right. They then systematically when through each box they could find, while looking at its contents. Zim had some kind of scanner he used, that would sometime start beeping, and then Zim would pick up whatever device the scanner was beeping at and stuff it into his PAK. While he wasn't considering outright thanking or The Tallest forbid PRAISE the human, he couldn't deny he was finding many more components and technological junk he would need to fix his tracker, than he had expected.
Dib was having far less of a positive experience, as he awkwardly went up to a random box, took up whatever was in it, and turned to ask Zim;
"Can you use this?"
The usual answer would be Zim quickly scanning the item, before saying;
"No."
Which went on for a few minutes.
"Can you use this?"
"No."
"How about this?"
"No.
"Then what about this?"
"No."
"And this?"
"No-WAIT!" Zim dramatically yelled, before observing the object in Dib's hand, while the human stood still and waited for an answer.
"...No." He replied uncaringly before going back to searching the boxes. Though that wasn't exactly the answer Dib had been hoping for.
"You know, this would be much easier if I KNEW what is it you want! Couldn't you have given me, like, a list or something?"
"A list?! HAH!" The alien blurted out, as if the suggestion itself was some kind of joke, while he turned to face Dib with a mocking grin.
"As if you and your small, stupid human brain could even COMPREHEND what kind of components Zim would need to fix the machine!"
"Oh, you wanna bet?!" Dib yelled back defiantly.
"If you're so eager to prove your own stupidity, then Zim is more than happy to indulge you!"
Dib looked at Zim nervously, as he hadn't really expected the alien to call his bluff. Well, nothing left to do but prove himself. How hard would it be anyway? He had practically inspected every corner of Tak's ship, so he was sure he could find a component or two for some stupid tracker.
"Go find me something that could be used to make an Automatic-Cerebral-Interface-Transmitter." He continued, saying the words extra slowly as if making sure the human could understand what he was saying.
"You know what that is, correct?" Zim asked with skepticism in his voice.
"Ha, sure I do!"
Well shit. Dib thought to himself, as he went over to the nearest box and rummaged through it. He tried to make it look like he was actually looking thoroughly for something, but in reality, he had no idea of what he was looking for. In the end, he picked up a metallic orb of some kind and held it over to Zim.
"Could this work?" He asked, with the slightest hint of hope in his voice.
"Mmmmmmm…no."
"DAMMIT!" Dib yelled as he angrily threw the orb at the ground, not damaging it, but instead making it say a 'clack' sound. Zim chuckled and was seemingly about to say another insult when suddenly a bunch of sirens went off all around them, and yelling could be heard coming from the halls.
"Uh, Dib-thing…what's happening?" Zim hesitantly asked, as he looked around, trying to assess the situation, which was becoming worse by the second.
"I-I don't know, maybe it's not related to us? Maybe someone turned on the alarm by accident?" Dib nervously replied, but as the sound of boots stamping became louder the less he became of his claim. It was then he remembered the orb and looked at the box he had taken it from.
'UNIVERSAL REMOTE ALARM TRIGGERS' Stood there in large bold letters.
"Oh, you gonna be kidding me." The human muttered to himself as he slouched down, wondering why he even tried to be stealthy if the universe was gonna let him mess up so badly.
"DIB! This is no time to sulk like a sad Slorb!" Zim yelled at him, Dib appreciating that he at least noticed how defeated he felt.
"We have to get out here! You know the way to the window, yes?"
"Yes…so, do we run now?"
"That would be for the best, yes."
With that, they both sprinted down the many hallways, just in time to run past a group of guards that had reached their location. They were caught off-guard at first but soon enough they started running after the two while firing their guns every now and then, forcing the pair to take a sharp turn at nearly every hallway they came across. Alarms rang the entire time, practically deafening the two of them as they ran. Red lights also blinked from unseen light sources, making it unnecessary for Dib to use his flashlight. Angry shouts hounded them, making it feel as if they stopped for just a second they would be eaten up by a monster. The chase only got more hectic as more guards joined, Dib finding it hard to breathe between the constant running and half the air being filled with bullets. With every new hallway, his sense of direction became worse, and soon enough he realized that they were practically running at random. Even Zim must have started feeling his hopelessness, as he gave the human a worried and searching look, trying to see if he had any idea of what they should do. Which he of course didn't. Dib was just about to apologize to him for dragging him into this mess and getting them both killed or worse considering what they might do to Zim when he noticed a familiar cabinet.
"Wait, I MIGHT KNOW WHERE WE ARE!" He screamed victoriously, feeling a new burst of energy fill his chest as he picked up the pace, with the alien trying to match his speed.
"YOU DIDN'T KNOW THAT BEFORE?!" Zim screamed with a hint of dismay in his voice, but Dib decided to ignore him as he focused on trying to remember the route. It took a few turns, but soon enough they reached a very long hall, that guessing from the windows, was directly placed at the side of the building. And right near the end of the hallway, he could see the open window.
"THERE'S OUR TICKET OUT!" Dib yelled as he pointed forward, though Zim didn't comment. Seemed he was too busy with not getting shot.
The long hallway only made it harder to dodge the bullets, but they continued to run with all they had. But just as they reached the window, another group of guards appeared from the corner in front of them, finally forcing the two to stop in their tracks. Sandwiched between the two groups of guards, they both started feeling hopelessness kick in again.
"SURRENDER! WE GOT YOU SURROUNDED, PUNKS!" Yelled one of them who had his gun pointed in their direction. It seemed like the moment they would try to run, they would be riddled with bullets. Zim was just about to whip out one of his own weapons when Dib turned to face him.
"Okay, I got an idea of something that could help us get out of this mess, but you're gonna have to improvise a bit." Dib quickly blurted out, his gaze turning from one side to another, with small drops of sweat falling from his forehead.
"And when do I need to do that?!" The alien answered back, annoyed at the human for wasting precious time talking he would need to incapacitate the guards.
"HEY! WHAT ARE YOU TWO TALKING ABOUT?! IF IT ISN'T YOU DISCUSSING YOUR SURRENDER, THEN I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!" The guard continued to yell, the finger on his trigger starting to shake, as he lightly pressed against it, just a small twitch away from firing.
"You need to do that…NOW!" Screamed Dib, but just as the guards were about to shoot, with a swift action Dib threw some kind of ball at the ground, which exploded into a thick fog that quickly covered the area where they stood. It didn't take long before the guards started shooting, but in the confusion, they seemed to have forgotten that there were two groups on both sides, who both decided the best reaction was to blindly fire into the cloud. It only took a few seconds of gunfire before the last sound was of bodies dumping to the ground. After that, only the sound of the alarm was left.
Up on the ceiling between a few pipes, hang Zim and Dib, with Zim's PAK legs stabbing against the two walls, holding them up. Meanwhile, the alien held on to Dib, who looked down on the ground as the fog faded, with an expression of astonishment.
"Wow. I'm surprised that actually worked. Good reaction time, Zim." Dib said before looking up at the aline holding him, who looked down at him.
"Next time, maybe you could warn Zim before doing something like that." He replied coldly, before apathetically dropping Dib, who let out a short scream before landing.
"Thanks." He bitterly commented before standing up, with Zim dropping down by his side.
"You're welcome. What was that cloud thing?" Zim asked, looking on as the rest of the smoke cleared, revealing the many bodies laying on the floor.
"Oh, it was just a smoke bomb that I've been designing."
Dib took a look around, taking in the corridor of downed security guards.
"Which seemed to have come in handy…also, are they dead?" Dib asked, with a hint of dread in his voice, as he started imagining all the families he had left fatherless.
A cough came from one of the guards, who stretched his arm into the air.
"Oh god, it was good we had our bulletproof vests on, or else we would all be very dead now. *Blegh*" The guard then fell unconscious like the others, most likely from the intense pain he had been subjected to.
"Okay, that's just convenient," Zim commented with disappointment in his voice, having hoped to see at least a little bit of blood and carnage.
"Now, Dib-stink, can we get out of here before more arrive-"
Just on cue, another group of guards started shouting from the end of the hallway, quickly making their way toward them. This time Zim was the one to take initiative as he used his PAK legs to launch himself up the window. Unfortunately, the legs made it so he couldn't get all the way through. But fortunately, that meant he could help Dib get up to the window.
"GRAB MY HANDS WITH YOUR DISGUSTING FINGER-THINGIES HUMAN!" he shouted to Dib, who didn't hesitate before running against the wall and then jumping up to reach Zim. He managed to grab the alien's hands, but the weight difference nearly made it so that Dib was about to pull Zim back.
"CURSES! YOU'RE TOO HEAVY DIB-THING! I TOLD YOU THAT YOU'RE HEAD WAS TOO BIG!"
Out of either determination to survive or just to spite Zim, Dib pressed his feet against walled and pushed with all he had. Luckily, this was enough to make Zim able to pull Dib through, just as the other detachment of guards was beginning to get close. But it seemed that Dib had used just a little bit too much force, as they were unable to halt the speed with which they came through the window, and therefore ended up smashing against the ground with Dib landing on top of Zim.
"I hate you…so much." Zim's muffled voice called from under Dib, who groaned as he pushed himself up. It was only then that the human learned that the soft pillow he had landed on was Zim's body, which looked worse for wear. Dib started wondering whether it was best to just act like nothing had happened, or apologize. But his thoughts were immediately pushed aside when he realized what kind of position the two were in. With Zim on the ground and Dib holding himself over him with his arms, it looked…suggestive. Even Zim must have realized the same, as he just looked up at the human with wide eyes, as a light blush appeared on his cheeks.
The tender moment would probably have continued for a bit if it weren't for the loud sounds of alarms blaring and the myriad of shouts that came ever closer. All that left Dib with no choice but to ignore the position they were in, and act as fast as possible. And the first thought that came to him was picking Zim up and running with him in his arms. A thought he was a little too quick to act on.
As Zim's blush only worsened, it was only out of pure shock that he held on to the human as he ran across the wide-open grass field that was between them and the fence that would allow them to escape. While Dib was taking it in his stride, he still couldn't help but blush a bit as he held the alien by his back and legs, as he was carrying his bride into their house. The only thing keeping him from questioning just what he was doing was the thought of survival. Still, that wasn't quite enough for Zim.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF THE TALLEST ARE DOING?!" Zim screamed with such passionate fear that Dib worried he was about to have a heart attack or the alien equivalent.
"SAVING YOU IF THAT WASN'T OBVIOUS!" He yelled back, but he could already feel how little that actually justified him carrying Zim like that.
"IF YOU DON'T LET ME DOWN RIGHT NOW ZIM IS GOING TO RIP YOUR PUNY INTENSITIES OUT!"
"YOU WOULD RATHER WASTE TIME ON THIS THAT WILL GET US KILLED THAN BE CARRIED?!" Dib asked though it was more a desperate attempt to distract himself from what he was doing.
"ZIM WOULD RATHER BE BLOWN TO TINY BITS OF MEAT THAN BE HELD IN YOUR DISGUSTING EARTH-MONKEY ARMS FOR A SECOND LONG-"
Zim's words were interrupted as in the distance where all the shouts were coming from, came a whistling noise, that quickly revealed itself to be a rocket fired in their direction. Which exploded only a few meters away from the, making small pieces of dirt and grass land on them as they looked at the crater left in the ground. It was then Zim looked up at Dib, and Dib looked down at him. After a moment of silence, Zim wrapped his arm around Dib's neck and used his other arm to point in the direction of the fence.
"AAAAAAaAAAaaaAAaaaAAAA!-" He yelled continuously, with Dib following suit.
Screaming at the top of their lungs in utter fear, as they were followed by the sound of explosion after explosion right at their heels, Dib ran as fast as he could, Zim's screaming being used as a motivator for him to hurry.
Out of either pure stupid luck or an extraordinary will to survive, they managed to not get hit by the seemingly endless barrage of rockets fired at them, which left the ground looking like a battleground in their wake. As they reached the fence Dib threw Zim against it, who didn't complain but instead started climbing like death itself was coming after him. Dib followed soon after, and whether it was the adrenaline or something else, Dib instinctively grabbed Zim once again and kept running away from the fence, with Zim holding on to the human and both of them still screaming the entire time.
Regarding the delay of this chapter, life has started catching up with me. School has started to take more of my time, and besides that, there was a tragedy in my family that left me without much motivation to write. To make it short, I don't know if I can keep up writing a new chapter per. month.
I'm still going to continue writing this story and finish it but I can't promise that there won't be some delays between the new chapters. Hope you still enjoyed this chapter, and that you will be here again next time!