Ever have a day that's full of new things and not all of them are that fun? Yeah, it's certainly A Day when that happens.

Warning for this chapter: slight gore/bodily harm, and a broken bone. Things happen when you act stupid.

Enjoy!

Part 76: New Experiences

Dib stood with his feet braced, face filled with determination, and body stiff. It was bit too stiff, though, so Zim patted his shoulder, shoving Dib slightly so he'd be forced to regain his footing. It loosened him up, even if it also earned Zim some ire. "Hey!" Dib snapped.

"You need to loosen up," Zim ordered. He gestured to Gaz, who was lax enough to have her hands in the pockets of her hoodie. "Be like Gaz. She's not nervous at all."

"She doesn't know enough about the concept to be…" Dib grumbled, repositioning himself.

"Think of it this way, idiot, if you fall, at least it's next to the couch," Gaz says, swaying on her heels.

"Thanks."

"Yeah, no problem."

Dib groaned, running his hands down his face. "This is supposed to be a mental thing, right?"

"Yes. You should be able to call upon the PAK's interior features by thinking about them. As you wear it more often it should happen subconsciously as well," Zim explained, taking Dib's arms and forcing them away from his body to shake out the stiffness. Dib pulled them back, shaking them out himself.

"But how?" Dib asks. "Like, is there a specific command? Do I imagine the legs?"

"Imagine the movement, not the actual limb," Tak says from the kitchen doorway. Gaz hummed, glancing her way.

"How long did it take to get used to them?" she asks.

"A few years as a smeet, but our brains were forming when we were learning. So, I'm not sure how long it would take for you, or what the elasticity of more mature humans' brains is," Tak admits, tapping her cheek in thought. "Most allies who get PAKs don't get most of the features."

"Why not?"

"So they can't use them to attack other Irkens if they stop being an ally," Zim says with a hand wave. "Now, try to call upon the legs. Get them set solidly on the ground."

"Oh, because it's that easy," Dib grumbled. Zim smirked, shaking his head endearingly, as he could still hear the excitement underlying Dib's voice.

Dib closed his eyes, setting fingers at his temples to focus. He was utterly buzzing with excitement. He tried to imagine the limb leaving the PAK, repeating an image of the motions he'd seen Zim's own PAK legs perform to get out. How they'd bend and twist to get past the small opening and then expand to latch onto a surface. He felt something whirring inside his PAK, the gears inside sending a very faint vibration across his back. It almost tickled. Zim laughed, clapping once.

"See! Easy!" he says. Dib cracked open an eye, spotting two of the legs bracing in front of him, the third at his back, like a triangle. He could have soared.

"Gaz! Gaz, I did it!" Dib shouted, waving his arms. Gaz tilted her head with a 'huh'.

"Honestly? I thought you'd take longer."

"OI."

Zim tapped at the legs, testing their sturdiness. "Not bad," he mused. "They weren't the smoothest extraction, but you'll get better at it. Try to retract them now."

Dib tried to imagine it. The legs were a little jerky in their motions, hesitant as they tried to fold back into the PAK. He didn't even know how they fit inside. How many hidden joints did they have that locked into place when they expanded and had to bear weight? Did they even have hidden joints down the lengths of the limbs or was it some sort of layering metal that just seamlessly slotted together that he hadn't noticed before? The actual length of the limbs between the established joints changed, whenever he saw Zim using them, and he could recall clearly how far they could reach if Zim extended them fully. They seemed endless, potentially.

There was no way that they just folded into the PAK, or there would be no more room for the tablets or other tools stored inside. Since it didn't take up any space in the actual body, there wasn't any hidden storage that he could conceive. Dib paused retracting the limbs, leaving them jutting out at odd angles, like it was recoiled in pain, almost. They looked like the twitching limbs of a dying spider.

"Um…" Dib looked at Zim uncertainly. "How do they slip inside…?"

"Don't think about details like that," Zim says. "They'll do that themselves, just think about the feeling of the retraction."

Oh, because that makes sense, of course, Dib thought bitterly. He sighed, shutting his eyes and returning his fingers to his temples. Don't think about it, feel it. Don't think about it… feel it…

There was a clinking sound at his back, and the slots slid shut. Dib chanced a glance and saw no legs. He smiled wide, sitting down on the floor to try drawing them out again. Gaz sat cross legged, practicing herself. Before long, both were drawing the legs out and sliding them back in at a decent pace.

"Respectable time to learn the motions," Tak says, nodding. "They catch on faster than I thought."

"Of course they did, they're geniuses," Zim boasts. "Not any human could use a PAK that I've made."

Tak's brow twitched. "Right…" She turned her attention to Gaz instead, her temper wavering as she tried to ignore the smugness in Zim's tone. It was none of her concern if he wanted to risk his life doing this. She glanced down to see Gaz already gazing up at her.

"What?"

"What do you do to get them out?" Gaz asks. Tak shrugged.

"I don't think about it, anymore."

"Yeah, that's helpful."

Tak 'tsked' and waved her off. She marched towards the door. She shouted through the house. "SKOODGE! It's time to go!"

"He's coming," The Computer droned. Tak clicked her tongue to the ceiling.

"Is the attitude of your base AI intentional?" she asks.

"He came like that," Zim says flatly, helping Dib balance. As he was standing with wobbling PAK legs in the middle of the room, Skoodge came up from the labs via the linen closet, pausing in the doorway.

"Oh! I didn't know you were practicing, I would have joined…" he says.

"Absolutely not, you took long enough packing up!" Tak snapped.

"I feel like a drunk spider," Dib grumbled. His hands were braced at Zim's arms, with Zim holding him aloft by his biceps to keep him from tipping over. Zim looked Skoodge's way, nodding as he passed. "Hey, call us if you get the chance!"

"I will!" Skoodge says with a wide smile. Tak sighed heavily, dragging her palms down her face.

"You will be gone for a few days, at most," she grumbles.

"What, you're not coming back?" Gaz asks coyly, raising a brow. Tak turned to her with a scowl, flicking her wrist at her as the disguise flickered on.

"I'm getting a new ship so I don't have to come back to this dirt ball of a planet," Tak says, swinging the door open as Skoodge hurriedly turned his disguise on. "Should've made it a parking lot," she grumbled under her breath.

"You wouldn't get to enjoy the parks if they did that!" Gaz shouted after her, flipping her off as she stomped out, growling. "Drama Queen."

"I'll let you know when we're on our way back!" Skoodge called.

"I'M NOT COMING BACK!" Tak screeched.

"Bye!" Dib shouted.

Gaz kicked the door shut with a PAK leg and a huff. Zim scoffed, letting Dib go to try and balance himself. He lasted for only a few seconds before one of the PAK legs skid along the floor and he toppled, faceplanting into the floor. Zim failed to hold in his laughter quickly enough, covering his mouth after he started. Dib glared up at him, blowing hair from his face.

"Ass…"

"You'll get better at it, I'm sure!" Zim assured him, coughing through his laughter.

"Right," Dib sighed. He retracted the PAK legs, picking himself back up.

It was difficult in a strange way, Dib learned. As he practiced, he figured out that it was less that he wasn't able to control the limbs, it was having four at once. He shifted his thoughts of it after a third failed attempt. Move each limb one by one was far easier than trying to move two at once, when he was still highly conscious of his original limbs on top of it. He was a spider, now. How ironic. He got the hang of it after about two hours of trying to move one limb at a time, with the occasional slip up wherein he moved his arm alongside a front PAK leg or his leg with a rear PAK leg. Moving them in time with his physical limbs made it slightly easier to figure out which part of his brain to flex to make the PAK limbs move, at least. Gaz was move from one side of the living room to the other withing that same time frame.

It had to be the video games. It had to be. Dib refused to believe there was much else different about their own brain chemistry - as reductive as that might've been on a scientific standpoint - that she was lacking any struggle compared to him. She played so many games that required so much diversion of her attention, it had to be a factor…

"Stop mumbling, idiot, just accept I'm better than you, damn." Gaz spat at him, smacking the back of his head on her way by. She was using the PAK legs to walk feet to wall, now. Dib sighed heavily, forcing his mouth shut at the chin.

"Sorry," he mumbled.

"You've improved quite a bit," Zim says. He'd taken up lounging on the couch once Dib had managed to get the hang of balancing himself. Gir sat beside him, chowing down on a literal bag of popcorn that had to be stale by this point. Dib didn't know how long he had to have had that in his head, but he didn't want to know.

Dib set his feet on the ground, lifting the PAK legs momentarily to reset himself, mentally. He took a deep breath, organizing his thoughts how he could to try and get this right in one attempt. Once he was ready, and could metaphorically 'feel' the PAK limbs as they hovered and waited, he set a pair diagonal of each other on the ground first. They each hit simultaneously and there was a surge of pride within him. He lifted himself up and lurched forward. The second pair of the legs came down, with the first pair lifting just after, and he repeated that motion, walking across the living room.

"Oh my God! I did it!" Dib cheered. Gaz slow-clapped, making another round on the walls.

"Excellent! With more practice it will be an unconscious act," Zim says. Dib laughed, moving back and forth through the living room.

Zim hummed, holding his chin. If they wore the PAKs for long enough, not only would their aging decrease drastically, but he could perhaps even stunt it. He wouldn't know if it would be as effective of a longevity effect as with Irkens, but perhaps he could perform further study. Finding an Irken to ask, much less experiment on, however, was easier said than done. Aside from Tak and Skoodge, no other Irkens paid him any mind. That had been perfectly fine for him recently - it meant he was finally left to live in peace - but it did present something of a significant snag for his plans. He sighed, his antennae tapping against his skull.

"This is so cool."

"Hm… shall we celebrate?" Zim asks. Dib turned to him, tilting his head curiously. Zim smirked, holding his hand out for Dib to take. He lowered himself to the floor, drawing the PAK legs back in as Zim guided him towards the door, his disguise flickering on.

"Have fun, nerds," Gaz called behind them.

"Where are we headed?" Dib asks, slipping into the driver seat. Zim pointed west.

"I found somewhere I think you'll enjoy," he says. "And it'll be good practice."

Dib laughed and started down the street, following Zim's directions until they were moving out of the neighborhood. They skirted the edge of the city, moving into an industrial area. Dib looked around the area, brow raised, as they moved further from the cityscape. The industrial area began to thin out after several minutes, dotted by random buildings and empty lots. Zim tapped the dashboard, pointing to a massive brick building sitting on the corner of several empty lots. Dib pulled up to a side door that was partially open, noting the broken windows and a hole in the third floor wall. Once he'd stepped out of the car and could step back to take a proper look at it, he could see more disrepair dotting the building. Debris and trash was littering the outside of the building amongst pieces of brick and broken glass.

The building had been abandoned to the degree that he didn't see any plywood or planks to cover the windows at all. Nor was there any indication that the roof was still entirely intact. Zim glanced around them, making sure that no one was in sight, before he saddled up next to Dib, wrapping his arm around Dib's midsection and pulling him towards the door.

"I found this area while scouting for a new base quite a while ago," Zim admitted.

The interior was in marginally better shape. The building itself was a small warehouse, based on the architecture, if Dib had to guess. The brick was also littering the interior alongside more trash and miscellaneous debris allocated to the walls and corners. The wrought iron staircases at least looked to be intact. The first floor was largely open, with a massive open and railed area at the entrance just ahead of them leading to the second floor. Dib wasn't completely sure that the upper levels were still stable, but he was certain if he fell, Zim would be able to catch him-

"Wait, when you say 'practice'..?"

"Have fun," Zim says, patting him on the back. "It's one giant, what did you call that thing at the park…? Ah, jungle gym. It's one big jungle gym for someone with PAK legs to roam around with."

Zim's PAK lifted him up, easily carrying him to the second floor balcony area. The movement of the PAK's limbs were unsettling, but incredibly precise. Dib shook his limbs out, bouncing on his heels as he psyched himself up. The PAK legs extended, positioning themselves on the floor and hoisting him up. The feeling of the PAK pulling on his back briefly before whatever stabilizers kicked in was still a new sensation. He wasn't sure he'd ever truly get used to it. At least it wasn't much different than being lifted by a harness - it wasn't as if it hurt. He clumsily reached Zim, stumbling a few steps before he retracted the PAK legs again.

Lord, if his father ever got his hands on technology like this. He would be surprised if his father had never sketched something akin to this in his idea logs. No doubt he would at least conjure up a similar mode of mobility to make traversing the labs easier.

He followed Zim around the building, copying his motions as best as he could. He was steadily growing used to traversing with the PAK legs. The repeated practice allowed him to make leaps and bounds in progress, if he did say so himself. The mental effort of piloting eight limbs, as his original four were to retain balance, was strange, to say the least. He really did feel like a spider. A deformed spider; but a spider nonetheless. He'd thought it was difficult at the house; but having to traverse vertically was an entirely different magnitude of mental gymnastics. As he fumbled along from floor to floor and along the stairs he had to take his time. He wasn't gearing up to break a PAK leg on his first day, if they could even be broken. He couldn't be certain what they were actually made of.

Dib came to rest on the third floor, carefully lowering himself to the floor with an intense stare. He looked up to find an empty hallway ahead of him. He hadn't even heard Zim move away from him. Dib glanced around for a brief moment to take in his surroundings. The floor was mostly office-like, with abandoned desks and chairs littering the space. There was a lack of windows at this section, with the hallway and the adjacent walls blocking most of the floor from his view. The hall was lined with doors, some of which were cracked open and allowing a meager amount of light into the hall. He fumbled in his inner pockets until he pulled out a small flashlight. It was compactable, folding in on itself and powered by a crank. It was the one light he always tried to keep on him purely because it was so easy to carry.

He cranked it up, grimacing slightly at the loud buzzing of the crank powering up the light. It soon lit the hallway and would retain the intensity of the light for a few minutes before he had to crank it again. The cracked doors led to empty rooms scattered with tables and chairs in varying degrees. One had a white board still set against the wall with a massive crack down the side, as if it had fallen off the wall at some point. One table was toppled with a broken leg. Dib hummed, trying a few of the closed doors only to find them locked or blocked from inside by something.

It was lackluster on his rankings of abandoned explorations. There wasn't much character to an abandoned office building. If it had been a factory he could have possibly found some sort of odd equipment or machinery he had no context for. Houses usually had possessions that the old owners had left behind. He could at least craft some sort of story with that. This gave him nothing to work with. He was about ready to turn back and start looking for Zim when he felt a hand at his shoulder.

Dib screeched, whipping around with his flashlight. He caught sight of Zim just before the light made contact, watching in horror as the bulb end of the light caught Zim right in the side of his head at his eye.

"AAAAAAAAAI'M SO SORRY!" Dib yelled, moving his hands rapidly. Zim was holding his face, his disguise flickering out as he glared at Dib.

"OW."

"I'm so sorry…" Dib whimpered. His hands hovered around Zim's face unsurely. He wasn't sure what he could actually do to help, aside from chuck the flashlight out the window. Zim pulled his hand back, his eyeball resting in his palm. He stared at it with his one good eye calmly, as if Dib wasn't seeing what he was seeing right now. "Oh my god."

"Huh," Zim pressed his palm against his face. Dib could hear the quiet 'pop' as the eye slid back into place. As Zim blinked, getting it back into place proper, he smirked. "You managed to knock out my bad eye, good going."

"Huh?" Dib could only kneel there as Zim stood, rubbing at his eye. "HUH?"

"Oh, get a hold of yourself," Zim ordered, lifting him up by his arm with a nonchalant wave of his free hand.

"Didn't that hurt?" Dib asks incredulously. "What the actual fuck," he whispers.

Zim laughed, knocking his fist lightly against the temple of his 'bad eye'. "It is not that uncommon with Irkens."

"Well, if a human does that, it isn't exactly easy to just pop it back in!"

"You are an inferior race, do not feel bad about that," Zim assures him, patting his shoulder. Dib smacked his hand away with a glower, only earning a laugh in response.

"That's common? Your eyes just fall out?!" Dib asks.

"Of course not! They get knocked out," Zim corrects. Dib smacked his forehead, dragging his hand down his face.

"Where even were you?"

" I was finding a suitable spot to practice a more advanced technique," Zim explained. Dib just stared at him, or more accurately at his eye. Zim sighed. "They're not entirely organic. It's fine. It doesn't even hurt."

"I repeat: what the fuck?"

Zim waved him off, moving on to the next set of stairs with an open area acting as a platform. More accurately, the "platform" was from a collapsed floor. Near the wall was a hole that was just about big enough to fit them with some wiggle room. Dib trudged after him, mentally recounting how many outings they'd had where they hadn't clocked an injury versus the ones they'd had. It wasn't shaping up very well statistically. Zim stopped just below the hole, using one hand to halt Dib in his tracks and the other to point up.

"Climb through," he ordered.

"Sorry, what?"

"Just do as I do," Zim says. His PAK legs lifted up, bending in on themselves to fit through the hole and adjust enough to lift Zim up through the hole. The legs had bent inward, twisted to maneuver the hole the most efficiently. Dib watched, mouth agape, as Zim set himself down with his hands out, as if it were the easiest thing in the world. "Okay, your turn."

You've got to be kidding me, Dib thought.

He had held high hopes… before his fifth attempt ended with the PAK legs once again scraping along the floor from a bad angle and he was dropped back to his feet. He groaned dramatically, walking to the wall to rest his head against it. He knocked his head against it a few times before straightening himself up. He'd tried so many ways of doing this. He had practiced multiple bends to the PAK legs, and even kicked off a nearby cabinet once, dragging it closer to use as a launch point. He could do this, he knew that he could. It wasn't that complicated of a motion for the PAK legs to even do, it was just when he tried to lift up that it went wrong. He returned to the hole, rubbing his hands together as he studied it. The sky was starting to get dark as the day turned to evening. He was determined to figure this out before they left.

He tried once more, getting his PAK legs through the hole with zero issue at this point. He tentatively lifted himself up, pausing once his feet left the floor to test the sturdiness of it. Once he was confident, he lifted more, only for the PAK leg on his right to slip. He fell back down; but this time he managed to catch himself with the PAK legs, spreading them out to distribute his weight. However, the pride of that success was overshadowed by the failures preceding it and Dib's shoulders sagged with a sigh.

"You can figure it out," Zim called with a scoff, picking at his claws leisurely.

Though he could hear the confidence in Zim's voice at the prospect, Dib groaned regardless. He looked up to glare at him in exasperation. He left himself to sag further as he hung from the PAK legs. It left his toes to drag on the ground as he repositioned himself under the hole. Zim leaned on a pillar, continuing to pick at his claws as he saw the PAK legs poke through the hole in his peripheral. They slipped, followed swiftly by a loud crash, the sound of metal on metal, a sickening crunch, and Dib-

"OW! FUCKING SHIT!"

"WHAT?! WHAT HAPPENED?! ARE YOU HURT?" Zim fell to the hole, looking down to find Dib crumpled on the floor, a file cabinet crushing his left leg with his right stuck by the pant leg on a piece of wood sticking off the window frame. Dib looked up at him, his eyes wet and his bottom lip quivering.

"I think I broke my shin…" he says.

Zim jumped down, his hands starting to tremble as he lifted the file cabinet off. It was remarkably heavy, the locked drawers catching as he tossed it, contents and all, to the side. Dib was gritting his teeth tightly as he sat up. His shin had been profoundly crushed by the weight of the cabinet, and yet, he had expected more blood. The bone hadn't broken skin, thankfully, leaving the blood that was present to be from cuts left by the cabinet.

"Is there a blood clotter… in the PAK?" he asks, trying to steady his breathing. His leg was also going numb, but with the weight of the cabinet gone, that left him with one - hopeful - reason. "Does it have pain killers?"

"Yes and yes, stop moving," Zim ordered.

"God, tell me it isn't morphine," Dib groans, shifting so that Zim could more easily hoist him onto his back.

"No, I made it myself," Zim scoffed. "I can make a much more effective pain killer."

"Am I going to get high off this?" Dib asks flatly, pinching his brow. Zim adjusted him properly and slowly started down the stairs to the lower levels with the open design.

"I said I made it, so what do you think?"

"Fair point," Dib sighs.

He rested his head on Zim's shoulder as they descended to the first floor. Even as Zim had to readjust and hoist Dib further up his back, the pain was minimal. What he would've done to have this kind of pain medication when he was getting broken bones cryptid hunting. Zim ducked to leave through the front door, readjusting Dib in his grip as he approached the car. He paused at the passenger side. Zim hummed, angling his head to look back at Dib.

"Could you?"

"Oh," Dib patted down his pocket. He came up empty and hastily patted down his other side, hesitating when he came up empty again. His trench coat provided no better results. He looked woefully towards the building as he caught Zim's disbelieving and aghast glare turning towards him in the car window. Dib avoided his gaze, grimacing.

"Um. I think my keys are…"

"They're inside the building?!"

"I must have dropped them."

"DIB!"

"How was I supposed to know I'd wreck my leg?!" Dib snapped, resting his forehead against Zim's head. Zim sighed heavily, trudging down the road towards the city. He was, once again, thankful he'd bothered to more or less map the city and surrounding neighborhoods out in his PAK after the last time he'd gotten lost. He was never doing that again if he could help it. Dib lifted his head, looking around curiously. "Are you going to carry me the whole way?"

"Until I can be sure your leg is usable, yes."

"So, yes."

Zim laughed, glancing back at him with a smirk. "You have a PAK now," he says.

Dib furrowed his brow. So long as he felt no pain from each step Zim took, he really couldn't bring himself to care enough to figure out what he meant. He set his head against the back of Zim's, picking out any and all oddities or breakage in the passing wall and windows of the buildings. The night air was perfect, gently blowing against his skin as they walked. He was starting to nod off when Zim stopped, bending forward with a groan. Dib perked up, shaking his drowsiness away. Before he could properly register anything, Zim was swinging him around, hooking his arms under his knees and his shoulders. Dib blinked up at him, dazed.

"Did you just swing me around like a hola-hoop?"

"A what? Don't be stupid, Dib-stink, you were too heavy on my PAK," Zim scoffs.

And now I'm a bride? What is this? Dib thought. He hooked his arm around Zim's neck, hoisting himself up enough that Zim's arm slid under his PAK, bracing against it instead of awkwardly around it at the shoulders. "Just don't drop me."

"Who do you take me for, you worm?!"

Dib snorted, resting his head against Zim's shoulder and his arm. The walk was slow. In part it was because Zim was having to follow a GPS map in his head, and in part because Dib could tell he was being cautious not to jostle his leg too badly. He found himself dozing more than once on the way back. They would be in the city amongst the skyscrapers one moment, and then he'd come back to consciousness to find them further into the suburbs. Despite his best efforts, he couldn't keep himself awake, even with talking to Zim about anything that came to mind. And true to his word, Zim hardly seemed bothered, much less tired.

The Computer unlocked the door as Zim approached. He watched Gir as he jumped off the couch, disguise on, and sprinted to the door to swing from the knob and open it for them.

"Mary! Master!"

"Hello, Gir. Be quiet," Zim whispered.

"Is Mary sleeping?"

"Yes, so be quiet."

"Okay!" Gir whisper-screamed, bouncing back and forth on his feet.

Zim carried Dib to his room, setting him down on the bed and pulling the covers over him. He slipped off the glasses as Gir jumped up, crawling under the covers with a giggle. Zim slid off Dib's shoes next, setting them into his closet. When he returned to the bedside, Gir was snuggling up at Dib's arm, digging himself into the trench coat. Dib didn't seem to notice at all, sleeping away. Zim lifted the blanket, tentatively pressing down on Dib's leg. He breathed a sigh of relief when he felt nothing out of place.

The PAK had probably healed Dib's leg halfway home, at the least. But by that point Dib was passed out already, only waking up for brief moments to murmur something incoherent before falling asleep again. If he wanted to be able to allow Dib to stay awake as long as he knew the boy was planning to, he'd have to research human brain chemistry more extensively. He wasn't entirely well versed in what was necessary in sleep for humans to survive; but he'd seen Dib sleep deprived often enough to see how vital it was - whatever 'it' was. It was currently just another thing to add to the growing list of improvements to their PAKs.

He ducked out of the room briefly to check in on 'his' room. Gaz had thoroughly taken it over by this point, going so far as to move some of her things into it to fill the shelves and the dresser, like a personal guest room. She was soundly asleep in the bed, Game Slave paused and resting beside her. Zim sighed, his antennae sagging. He crept over, carefully saving her game and setting the Game Slave on the charging dock. Gaz murmured and turned over. Zim flicked off the lamp by the bed and shut the door behind him.

"Computer, where are Dib's keys?" Zim asks.

"Third hook by the back door."

Zim used his PAK legs to creep to the back door, snatching the keys and leaving through the back door. He could move much faster with the PAK legs from rooftop to rooftop in the dark. It was far from late, it was hardly nine o'clock, but with the speed and agility he had with maneuvering the PAK legs, he was traversing to the city scape in less than an hour. He was at the car in half of that time. He had just unlocked the door when he thought of the keys still lost in the building.

It wasn't difficult with his PAK light and the sight of dried blood to find where Dib had initially fallen. In the dark and silence of the industrial yard at this time of night, he didn't bother being gentle. He tossed pieces of furniture and rubble around at leisurely, looking for the identifiable glint of metal as he scanned the area. He caught sight of a glint of metal under a piece of rubble near the center of the room. He kicked the rubble away, finding the keys had slid into place when Dib fell. He snatched them up with a scowl, shoving them in his pocket with a slew of curses.

When he'd arrived back at the car he stood glaring at it for a few minutes. He didn't want to, but there was only one way he was getting the car back to the house with any modicum of stealth or ease. He sat in the front seat, growling at the unfamiliar steering set up. It was so inefficient and archaic compared to the Voot. The speed limits in particular were especially aggravating. The drive was silent and tense. He was lucky that the streets were largely empty. He only passed a few cars and the one off individual or pair of humans.

He parked the car in the driveway, inches from the garage door. Zim slipped inside, slotting both sets of keys on the hooks at the front door. He quickly checked in on Dib, finding Gir pretending to be asleep under the covers, before he moved to the linen closet elevator. He descended until he'd reached the lab that he'd dedicated to the PAKs designs. Blueprints and sketches were strewn across the wall with tape to walls or pins to boards. Pieces he'd rejected were set to one corner, overflowing in the bin. Other pieces he'd made notes to return to, sometimes literal notes stuck to the face of the piece, were along their own wall, under the sketches that had inspired them. The other two walls and corner were the storage and workspace. He kicked away tools and spare parts as he made his way through the room.

Zim slid into the wheeling chair along the desk and pulled close the tablet. He swept through the tabs and paged notes until he'd reached the notes he'd taken on human sleep. The human brain was complex - more complex than Zim had initially assumed - but that wasn't entirely surprising for sapient species. With well over 100 neurotransmitters and possibly over a dozen primary hormones alone Zim was beginning to realize the scale of his new 'project'. There wasn't even a solitary gland that released the hormones. He tabbed at his head with a scowl. It was no wonder that the lack of sleep caused humans such issues when their brain was operating this precariously. He'd been studying it for a few months now, and the more he learned the more sense it made that sleep deprivation could cause hallucinations, not even mentioning the other health issues.

He should have expanded his repertoire of experiments when he was still in the Irken Labs. He had his work cut out for him.

Dib woke up groggy and with his arm asleep under the weight of Gir laying across it. He shifted in bed, turning over with Gir giggling as the little bot kept a strong hold on his arm. Dib carried Gir with him as he rolled over with a hum. The warmth of the bed was enticing, inviting him to spend the next three hours under the covers. He hummed contently, enjoying the warmth, until the memory of the day prior came back to him. Dib shot up, flinging the covers off, and by extension Gir, as he fell out of the bed. His heart spiked when his leg hit the ground, but no pain shot up his leg.

He set himself up against his bed, pulling his pant leg up. The leg was completely healed, and with a few moments of feeling it out, the bones appeared to have set correctly, as well. His brain almost short circuited trying to figure that out. Dib eventually fumbled to grab his glasses, taking a second to officially confirm that the leg was indeed healed, before he trudged out of his room. Zim poked his head around the corner from the living room.

"Ah, you're up. It's only 7."

"My leg is fine?"

"I told you, you're wearing a PAK I made," Zim says.

"What happened to his leg?" Gaz's voice came from beside Zim. Zim flinched, getting up from the couch with an awkward cough.

"Nothing important," he says quickly.

Thank God you were so bad at invading, Dib thought. He gave an awed 'huh', looking down at his leg again. "Cool…"

"I do have something else for you," Zim says.

He hurriedly joined Dib in the hall, hooking their arms to drag him to the shared bedroom. Dib stood awkwardly in the doorway as Zim pulled open a drawer from the dresser. He pulled something wrapped in a plain cloth out and held it out to Dib with a proud smile. Dib raised a brow, taking it in his hand and gingerly unwrapping it. Inside was an oval gold press, fitting almost perfectly in his hand, and the side facing Dib simply engraved with his name and birthday.

"But, it's not my birthday yet…?" Dib says, looking up in confusion. Zim scoffed, tapping the gold press.

"It is not a birthday present, it is to celebrate your successful synergy with the PAK. Turn it over."

Dib flipped the gold press. The opposing side, the front, held an embossed image of one of the only photos of his mother that he had. From what his father had said, it had been taken just days after he'd been born. She held him wrapped in blankets gently in her arms, smiling into the camera, sitting in a windowed space with flowers outside. The actual photo hung in his room above his desk next to other family photos and what certificates he'd accrued in his life. His little wall of achievements.

"What…?"

"You recall the meteorite you acquired this from?" Zim asks. "You kept speaking as if you had to sell it, but never made any effort to, so I am giving you an excuse to keep it. Since you so desperately needed one."

"Aha! Well, yeah, no way can I sell it now," Dib says, rubbing at his eye.

"We can go gold mining again another day," Zim says. "That gold you can sell."

Dib's smile stretched ear to ear. He wrapped Zim in a tight hug. "Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" He pressed a kiss to Zim's cheek, chuckling when Zim's face went dark green.

"Take it downstairs if you're gonna make out about it!" Gaz called. Dib promptly spun on his heel and slammed the door shut. They could hear Gaz whistle from the other side and his face turned bright red. He set his head on the wall with a groan.

"I'm getting back at her for that," Zim says sternly.

"An ambitious goal," Dib mumbles.

"No, an achievable one!" Zim corrects promptly. Dib craned himself to see Zim better and didn't like the smile that spread across his face as he thought. "I'll tell Tak how to 'woo' humans, and see how Gaz likes it."

Dib gaped at him in horror. "Zim! This isn't wooing any old human, this is Gaz," he stressed.

"I will find a way!"

"Zim, I know you're smart enough to know there is a fine line between a "flustered" Gaz and an "I'm hitting you with a chair" Gaz."

"That's the best part! I don't have to be there!" Zim says proudly. Dib gave him a deadpan stare for a moment before turning to the wall once more.

"I commend your belief she wouldn't commit assault and battery with furniture retroactively."

"Stop being paranoid," Zim scoffed. The PAK brought the tablet out to him. He opened a messaging app, typing away at it. He paced the room, talking to himself in a low voice as he typed. "Less passive language, more explicit inclinations of her intentions, more praise… what else would Gaz want?"

"I am not answering that," Dib says flatly. "Wait, you have Tak's number?"

"Skoodge gave it to me."

"Skoodge had Tak's number?"

"Skoodge has everyone's contact," Zim says with a resigned sigh. He mumbled again, resuming his pacing. "Even when I try to hide it… How does he find it?"

Fun fact: A Troy Ounce of gold today is close to $2,000. But now Dib's is priceless :)