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Zim had struck his Tallest truly speechless on three previous occasions. The first occurred during his initial debrief on Operation Impending Doom. The second had to do with the Massive’s escape from the Florpus Hole, which Zim—by this time grown far less hinged and marginally taller, his disguise riddled with patchy hair to simulate the hormonal changes undergone by his human classmates—attempted to take credit for.
The third and most recent incident concerned his addition of mini-marshmallows to the traditional Irken delicacy of spray cheese on pretzel sticks, an innovation that Purple found revelatory and Red obscene. After that controversy, they had thought themselves safe. But now it seemed that three times were not the charm, and Red and Purple were doomed, doomed, DOOMED to suffer Zim’s shocking pronouncements without reason or resolution. And also just plain doomed, because of what Zim had said.
“Sorry, what was that?” Red asked, while Purple hissed, “Just say no! Don’t make him repeat himself.”
“So you aren’t ‘married,’ my Tallest?” Zim looked between the two of them, confused.
“Whatever that is, we are definitely not it.”
“Oh.” Zim seemed disappointed. “And you’re not ‘dating,’ either?”
“Nope.”
“You’re not in any kind of ‘romantic partnership’?”
“We have no idea what you're talking about, Zim.”
“The Dib-stink was so sure,” Zim muttered, then switched tones. “My Tallest! Zim has called to seek your advice on, erm, a somewhat delicate matter, vital to the success of my mission—”
“Is it the robo-cheese again? We told you we didn’t want to hear about that anymore.”
“No, my Tallest. This is much more important.”
“Is it that living cloud of trash, then? Because the Empire isn’t paying for him to get another useless graduate degree.”
“Of course not, my Tallest. Not that you asked, but Trashy has actually been hired as an adjunct professor—”
“Is it the haunted ice cream?” Purple interrupted. “Zim, tell us about the haunted ice cream. I’m craving a spooky frozen treat.”
“It's that HUMAN,” Zim burst out. “He’s been doing something to Zim! Something horrible!” He gnashed his teeth in frustration. “Horrible, filthy Dib. So disgusting, and smelly, and covered in spiky bits. He's been making me... feel things.”
“What kind of things?” Red asked.
Zim shuddered. “Things.”
“We can't be helpful if you aren't specific.”
Zim appeared to be thinking hard. “Erm…”
His eventual answer dragged on so long that Tallest Purple fell asleep. He awoke to find that Zim and Red were still discussing the human, by now having moved from topics like “enraging squishiness” and “pathetic squirming” to the subtleties of determining antennae analogues among alien species. Appalled, Purple tried to wake up again, but only succeeded in drawing their attention.
“What do you think, should Zim try pulling the human’s ‘hair’ or petting his ‘ears’?” Red’s demeanor showed every indication of seriousness.
“I’m going to pinch myself and this will all be a dream,” said Purple. “Ow!” He glared down at the table-headed drone. “I said I’d pinch myself. ”
“Sorry, sir,” said the drone, who didn’t look too sorry. Bob 2 was Bob’s successor in more than name. He was also a Resisty spy.
“Remember, Zim,” Red counselled, “you are his superior in every way. The human is inconceivably lucky to have caught the interest of an advanced life form such as, uh, you. There’s no way you can go wrong, except if you develop a lasting attachment to him, which would mean you are defective and be punishable by death. Believe in yourself!”
“I will, my Tallest.” Zim saluted. “I will believe in myself! And if that awful Dib doesn’t accept my attentions, then I’ll sic the exploding laser peaches on him.”
“That’s the spirit, Invader.” Red flicked an invisible tear from his eye. “Now go out there and make us proud.”
“I won’t let you down, my Tallest!”
(“What,” Purple whispered; Red said under his breath, “Zim likes an alien! Isn’t this hilarious? He’s going to make a total fool of himself.”)
Zim had now transitioned to cackling, interspersed with cryptic high-speed ranting. It was clear that the call needed to end.
“Okay, so… we’re gonna go now. Got an empire to run, you know the deal.”
“Yes, yes.” Zim’s attention was elsewhere, already chasing his prize. If the Tallest had been capable of pity, they might have felt it for the human.
Before the call ended, Purple remembered something. “What happened to that haunted ice cream, anyway?”
“Oh, GIR ate it,” said Zim, and cut the transmission.
SEVERAL HOURS LATER, IN A TOP-TOP-TOP-SECRET ROOM STASHED SOMEWHERE DEEP IN THE INNERMOST WORKINGS OF THE MASSIVE…
“Catch!” Purple, ensconced in a fun beanbag chair, lobbed a miniature chocolate-covered doughnut at Red. He whooped when it bounced off his head. “That’s another two points for me.”
Red picked up the doughnut and ate it without looking away from the datapad in his lap. “I’m not playing. Come watch this video, this drone just fell on his ass.”
“But I don’t wanna get up,” Purple whined. “You come over here.”
“You’re lazy.”
“And cute.” Purple stretched out to his full height, draping himself over the chair in a way that could be interpreted as provocative.
Red glanced over at him. “No, you’re hideous.”
“That’s not what you said twenty minutes ago.”
“You’re one to talk. If I recall, twenty minutes ago you—” and here Red would have performed an excruciating parody of his partner in the throes of whatever counted as ecstasy among Irkens, had he not been silenced with a well-flung pillow.
When the pillow fight and the activities that followed at last reached a conclusion, Purple rolled over on his side and said to Red, “How do you think Zim’s doing? With his alien, I mean?”
“Ew, do you really have to bring Zim up right now?”
“You’re the one who encouraged him! Heh, can you imagine if he’d found out that we’re actually married?”
A Resisty codebreaker, listening in via secret frequency, fainted in shock.