Chapter Text
Chapter 16
Three days had passed since that day. Zim had attempted to block out most of that day from his memory, but it had a nasty habit of coming back once in a while. Mainly when the alien felt lonely, and Zim had felt that often. Without a plan and with no one to turn to he had resorted to wandering. There had been other times that Zim attempted to get his pac to work. There were even moments where Zim debated on just giving himself to the zombies. However, suicide was not in his character. That is also not how this story ends.
He traveled to abandoned buildings looking for food. Slept in abandoned houses to regain his strength. When it would feel safe enough Zim would even find himself giving into emotional and physical desires that only left him feeling worse than before. Nothing helped now, he was alone with no way out. What was worse was Dib was gone.
The last image of when he saw Dib was forever burned into the back of Zim’s skull. On his darker days he worried if the human had survived the trip, or if he had simply died of his injuries. Zim new he would never get the chance to know the truth and resigned to the thought that he would starve to death first.
When the world grew quiet Zim grew restless. Loneliness clawed at the few sane thoughts he had left and it began to make him desperate for any signs of life. Fuck, this had been a new low for Zim, and that was saying a lot considering all the lows he had explored prior to.
In terms of travel, Zim couldn’t venture too far with the massive amounts of damage done to the planet. With large trenches that split into the surface and massive amounts of Earth death liquid everywhere, Zim ran out of places to blindly wander.
He had passed by their old school, he even found their old neighborhood. Of course that wasn’t too difficult considering Zim had purposely come back this way several times. Not so he could go stand outside the Dib’s house and hope the human would suddenly come running out the front door. No of course not, that would be silly. But here he was again, standing in front of that house, staring at the Dib’s window with a pain in his eyes that for sure was a permanent look on his face now.
The thought had crossed his mind to go inside several times, but at the same time Zim knew there was no real point to it. He just wished he knew what to do now. The deep thought rewarded Zim with a sharp glare off the bedroom window as the sun had set in the distance. Zim screeched and covered his eyes rubbing them and cursing under his breath. When his eyes had recovered Zim turned his gaze back at the window in hopes to set the vile thing on fire with his mind for hurting his eyes so. Instead he saw something he wasn’t expecting.
It was a pair of bright red eyes.
Zim recognized them immediately and he wasn’t sure if he should feel angry or scared. But there was no time for him to think over how this made him feel when he heard the door of the Membrane residence being kicked down. A venomous snarl came from the culprit that was responsible for the door, “I told you I would be back…” Scared, Zim definitely was scared.
“Tak…”
The female Irken walked out of the house with purpose to her steps as she approached Zim. He just stood there in shock as she suddenly hit him across the face and pulled him up by the shirt collar, “Surprised to see me back?! I told you it wouldn’t be the last you saw of me! And now that I have returned, I can finally take what is rightfully mine!”
“Earth?”
“YES!”
“You can have it.”
Those curled antenna twitched with confusion and Tak suddenly stopped her ranting, “What?” Zim’s expression was still nervous but he didn’t waver, “You can have Earth...it matters not to Zim anymore.” Tak’s glare returned, “Do you take me as a fool?! You have done something haven’t you?! Something to make a fool out of me again!” Zim shook his head, “Everyone is dead Tak...everything’s gone…if you want the Earth, it’s all yours.”
Tak looked around to see the neighborhood was completely destroyed, but wasn’t entirely convinced that Zim wasn’t playing some sort of trick. But then she got a good look at his eyes, “What is this?!” she dropped Zim suddenly backing away, “You’re sick! Your Irken genetics have been damaged!” she wiped off her hands as if he was carrying some germs.
Zim was getting annoyed, did he really use to act like this? He stood up and simply held up his hands to get Tak to calm down, “I’m not contagious you idiot...Not unless I bite your or something…” Tak only backed up more and pulled out her gun to aim it at Zim’s head, “Start talking Zim! Tell me what’s going on! What happened here, and what happened to you?!”
Zim put his hands down and started to explain everything to Tak. He had some attitude as he explained it to her, but after everything he had been through he just didn’t have the energy to fight with her. He told her about the zombies, how one of them bit him, how his pac wasn’t working, the camp, his plan with Dib to leave Earth.
Tak finally lowered her weapon looking at Zim even more confused than ever, “This is...weird...I never thought you could be this...mellow. Guess these humans finally broke you.” That had a fire lit in Zim’s belly, “Shut up!” but Tak ignored the outburst, “So where is the Dib now? Why are you still here?” Zim’s fire immediately died and he looked down at the ground as he fell silent.
Tak couldn’t help but smirk at Zim with delight, “Oh that’s just too perfect! He abandoned you didn’t he?!” she began to cackle and for once, Zim didn’t find it in him to fight back. He knew that couldn’t be true right? No of course it wasn’t true! He remembered that Dib tried to reach him! He remembered how much pain the human was in, he remembered all the moments they shared together. But most importantly he remembered how much they needed each other.
With all those facts though, Zim couldn’t fight against the truth that Dib really was gone. When Tak finally stopped cackling she gave a cheeky grin, “What’s the matter Zim? Not even gonna fight back?” When Zim didn’t respond Tak rubbed her head and sighed, “Wow you sure took the fun out of this. Zim!” Zim looked up to Tak, “It doesn’t matter...he may be dead now…” Tak rolled her eyes, “Making excuses now. At least some things about you haven’t changed.”
“DO NOT PATRONIZE ME TAK!” Zim snarled, but she silenced him quickly with a mechanical arm that appeared from her pac. It stopped in front of Zim to display a holographic message. It started off a little fuzzy and the words were hard to make out. Then after almost a minute in, the picture cleared and Zim could see Dib.
His spooch was seizing. The Dib looked pale and weak, but he was sitting in the chair upright and facing the camera, “Zim…” the message cut out before he could say anything else. Tak brought the arm back into her pac and crossed her arms, “Dib is alive as you can see. I managed to hack into that message yesterday.”
Zim couldn’t believe it. Dib was alive. He looked down and began to feel something stir within him that had him ignoring all of Tak’s ranting and insults. He knew what he had to do, and he had a means to do it. But to make that work, he was gonna have to do something that he really REALLY did not want to do.
“Zim! Are you listening to me!?”
“No not at all.”
“Why you-!”
“Hold on, before you continue. I have an offer for you...I…” he hissed at himself but forced himself to choke out the words as he thought of Dib, “I need your help…”
“Oh? The great Invader Zim needs my help? I think I might like this new broken side of you Zim….what could you possibly have to offer me and why would I ever help you?”
“Because if you help me I will disappear forever. You will never see or hear from me again, you can have the Earth, present it to the Tallest, obtain ranking of invader.”
“....Okay you have my interest now. What do you want?”
“Take me to Dib.”
“Really that’s what you want?”
“Can you do it or not Tak?!”
She held up her hand and contemplated everything for a moment, she considered just killing Zim now instead. She would still get everything he offered and wouldn’t need to do anything for him, “Why shouldn’t I just kill you instead?”
“Because then I won’t be alive to see you win…to show me that you’re better than me...”
Okay that definitely was something she wanted, and it was easier for Zim to offer that than he thought. He didn’t care what he had to do, Dib was alone somewhere in space and needed help. Whatever Zim needed to do to get there he would do it.
“Alright...but tell me one thing. What’s in it for you if I do this? I never thought I would see the day that you would renounce your pride for a meesley human.” The silence was so long that Tak didn’t need an answer, “Oh my Tallest...are you joking?”
“Do we have a deal or not?”
Tak only blinked but smirked, “Who are you and what have you done with the real Zim?”
“He’s dead...now do we have a deal?”
Tak grinned, “Alright Zim. We have a deal.” She crossed her arms, “But first I want to look at your pac. I need to make sure you are not going to suddenly go crazy on me while we’re flying.” Zim rolled his eyes, “Fine, lead the way…”
The new ship Tak arrived in was much larger than the original voot cruiser. Looks like she had been planning on coming with an impressive arsenal to knock Zim on his ass when she got to Earth. Zim was settled in a chair and his pac was removed so Tak could tinker with it.
“Mimi!” she called and the little sir unit came skittering in no longer wearing it’s disguise. She took a tool from Mimi and placed it onto the larger plate of the pac. There was a moment of silence as the device began to work around the edges of the plate and attempt to pry it loose.
Zim didn’t like the thought of Tak messing around in his pac, but he did like the idea of his pac working again. There came a loud pop and Tak started to pull the plate off giving a sickened look, “OH DISGUSTING!” Zim stood up and rushed over, “What is it??” inside the pac was large clumps of sticky black tar that seemed to be gunking up the tech. The two Irken’s bristled with disgust as they watched the tar like substance try to grow into any open spaces left within the pac.
“That’s what’s been in there this whole time???” Tak quickly grabbed a few more tools and pulled on some heavy duty gloves, “Whatever this stuff is, looks like you found your answer for your pac not working. I have no idea what this strange substance is but I doubt we want to touch it…”
Zim looked at Tak, “Can you fix it?” she gasped as the tar suddenly swallowed one of her tools when it made contact. She quickly snapped the plate back on, “Doesn’t look like it. From what I can see it’s a parasite living inside your pac. It’s gonna keep feeding off what it can. As long as you wear it that thing isn’t going anywhere.”
As if the news couldn’t get any worse, “So what now?” Tak thought for a moment, “Well would could try exposing the substance to harsh elements and see if that does anything. But we can’t keep you detached from it too long….” Tak made her way over to a large container that looked similar to a 3D printer. She tapped in a few codes and began to work pulling out an old looking pac.
“...where did you get that…?” Tak pointed to another side of the ship which harbored a deceased Scoodge. Zim jumped in terror and hid behind her chair, “Is that?!” Tak nodded, “Yep, found him being chewed on by scavengers. He wasn’t using it so, waste not want not.” Zim felt his flesh crawl.
When Tak finished she turned to Zim and passed Scoodge’s pac to him, “It won’t be completely compatible, but until I can figure out what to do with the...problem. This will have to work.” Zim hesitated at first but was forced to take it when Tak shoved it into his face. Taking a deep breath he adjusted the pac so it would fasten to his body. It was much smaller than what Zim was used to, so when it snapped into place, it did sting a bit. Zim blinked for a moment and started to feel strange.
“That’s what I thought…” Tak said noticing the violet ring disappearing from his eyes, “Looks like when that rotting human bit you your pac went into counter measures to protect your vital functions. But looks like to keep you alive it shut itself down. With this new pac you should be returning to normal in a couple days.”
Zim could feel his energy returning. He felt good, honestly the best he had felt since this started. He wouldn’t admit it to Tak but she was very resourceful as an outsider. It was an ambition that reminded him of Dib and it recharged his motive to proceed with this plan.
Tak moved to the front of the ship and started to prepare for departure, “Do you know how to find him?” Zim walked over to her. She gave him an irritated look, “If I was able to hack into the message he sent. What makes you think I can’t find him?” Zim glared at her in response, “I’ll see if I can find the signature he used so I can track the ship. But it’ll be difficult to get an exact location until we get past this atmosphere.” The ship began to lift off the ground and Zim stumbled a little from the surprise movement.
Zim held onto the back of Tak’s chair as the ship suddenly launched towards the sky. Within minutes they were pushing past the Earth’s atmosphere and into the depths of space. The ship itself was impressive, and Tak was a very experienced pilot, so leveling out the large ship after take off was child's play.
It had been a while since Zim felt the weightlessness of space, it took him a moment to push passed the lightheaded feeling and adjust himself, “There...looks like the ship is on it’s way to Foodcornia.” Zim was thankful that the course he had charted on the ship was still working. Tak’s ship began to make its way in the direction of the voot cruiser.
“How long will it take for us to get there?”
“You let me worry about that. I don’t want you on my ship as much as you don’t want to be here.”
“So you don’t know?”
Tak sighed, “Look Zim. I will get us there as fast as I can but this trip will be better for both of us if we just don’t speak to each other. So do me a favor and shut it.” Zim wanted to snap back at her but he was not interested, and didn’t want to admit she was right. So he simply walked away to another side of the ship. That’s when his antenna perked, “Um Tak.”
She snarled, “Zim what part of not talking was unclear??”
“I just wanted to mention one more thing.”
“Then what is it-?”
“HIII SCARY LADY!!!!” the loud shriek blared over the speakers and made them both wince. Zim rubbed his antenna but snickered when Tak was growling from the pain, “Gir is the voot cruiser.” Tak groaned loudly, “Isn’t that just perfect?!”
The End