Chapter Text
Zim realized much too late that he hadn’t quite thought this through.
In his haste, he’d forgotten to pack his brilliant disguise, consisting of a wig and (admittedly scratchy) contact lenses. It helped him blend in perfectly with Earth’s dominant species, the humans. Without it, they would notice he was different and nab him up. They would send him to horrible Earth labs to cut him up and see how his amazing superior irken organs worked.
He didn’t think he would run into this problem, as he was traveling inside of his cloaked Voot Cruiser, completely invisible. But he hadn’t accounted for the risk, the possibilities of failure. Why would he? Zim was usually perfect at everything. This was simply a freak accident! Someone even as amazing as Zim could not have accounted for this!
It had come out of nowhere. A flying beast in the night sky with a long, sharp beak. As it glided by, a giant wing crashed into his small Cruiser and knocked Zim straight into the trees below. It was a bumpy landing, the ship bouncing along different tree trunks and branches, and Zim’s body slammed and tumbled all around the interior of his ship. He grabbed for the controls to try and ease his landing, but didn’t reach in time before the ship careened into the ground.
Zim wasn’t sure how much time had passed at first when his PAK jolted him awake again. He checked his internal clock to find he had been unconscious for several minutes. His antennae twitched as he painfully lifted his head. He felt wetness on his lip, and after pressing a finger to it and inspecting the fluid on his glove, he knew he was bleeding.
“Blasted infernal STINK planet…” Zim growled under his breath as he sat up straighter and checked the damages on his Voot. The cloaking had turned off, so it was visible again. He had some things to fix, and it wasn’t going to be easy away from his base. What had even hit him?? It looked like no Earth bird or evil death bee Zim had ever seen in the sky before!
Carefully, Zim opened the hatch of his ship and crawled out, sucking in the fresh air and weakly flopping onto the grass. His eyes took in his surroundings. Tree, tree, tree, bushes, more trees. He was in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. Well, at least that meant no humans. No one could see him like this. Disguiseless! Injured! He couldn’t let the humans think he was weak!
After taking a moment to let his unfortunate situation sink in, Zim got to work. He pushed himself up again and pulled himself over to his ship to start repairs. Two PAK legs emerged from his back as he started the mending.
Then he heard a twig snap, and noticed a bright light on him from behind. Zim froze, eyes going big, then whipped around. His hand came up to shield his eyes from the light. A flashlight.
“Hey, I’m not gonna hurt y--” a voice started.
Zim squawked in a panic and dove back into his ship, the hatch slamming shut behind him. Maybe not the best plan. Now there was nowhere to go! But he couldn’t stay out there. What was a person doing out here anyway?? Everything was going wrong! Zim curled up, hugging his knees and staring upwards at the pink tinted glass.
He saw what looked like a young human male step up, looking down into the ship with the flashlight. The human had fluffy brown hair, big brown eyes with lines underneath them like he didn’t get enough sleep, and wore a red flannel type shirt. Zim didn’t see any malice on his face, but he was still completely freaked out. This human found him completely vulnerable. Well, if he tried anything, he was going to get a PAK leg through the chest.
The human lightly tapped on the glass. “I can help you!” He called.
Zim’s face wrinkled up, brows furrowing suspiciously. Help? Why would a human HELP?
“Did you crash? Are you injured?” the human continued. “Can you understand me?”
“LEAVE ME ALONE, BLASTED HUMAN! OR I’LL TEAR YOUR ARMS OFF!!”
Well, that answered one of the questions. The alien could understand. With that, the human raised his free hand as a sign of peace. “I just want to help! Look, uh… Tell me what you need and I’ll go get it for you. Bandages? Tools?”
“NOPE!” Zim shouted, scooting back as far as he could. “I need NOTHING from YOU!”
The human frowned, tilting his head, then lowered the flashlight. “But it looks like you’re bleeding!”
“This is completely normal!” Zim yelped, but now couldn’t stop trembling. Was this how it ended? In the woods at night, all by himself and with a human who was going to kill him.
“Okay.. Alright.. I’m backing up. I left my backpack over there. I have a first aid kit inside. I’m gonna get it for you, okay?”
Zim opened his mouth but no answer came out. He didn’t know what to say. It didn’t matter anyway because the human turned and walked out of his view. Gingerly, the irken sat up and peered through the hatch window to see the human kneeling down by a backpack and pulling out a small kit. Well, he hadn’t been lying… Maybe he wasn’t lying about wanting to help either?
The fluffy haired human walked back over to the ship, set the first aid kit down in front of it, then backed up again. “Here! You can come get it if you want.”
Zim eyed him suspiciously, but after a few seconds, slowly lifted the hatch of the ship and poked his head out. The human smiled, and it seemed kind and genuine… Zim had never really seen that kind of look directed towards him before. He reached down to grab the first aid kit and sat back, leaving his ship’s hatch open. He dug into the kit for disinfectant and bandages. Still, he felt a little light headed, unable to focus. His head hurt, his leg was stinging, and his side burned. His PAK was alerting him to multiple injuries, tears in his flesh. His hands shook so bad he almost dropped the kit. He felt like he was still in shock about a human seeing him like this. This planet shot his paranoia and anxiety through the roof.
“I can help,” Zim jolted as the human spoke again, seeming to notice his struggle. “I promise, I just want to help.”
“Prom.. iss?” Zim tried to repeat.
“Yeah..” the human smiled again. “My name’s Dipper.. What should I call you?”
“Dipper?” Zim made a face, then looked down. “...I am Zim. You are saying you are not here to cut me open?”
“What? Of course I’m not!” Dipper waved his hands frantically. “Why would I do that?”
“Because you are jealous of my superior organs!”
“Uhhh… no. Look, man, I just wanna make sure you’re okay. This crash looks like it was pretty bad, and there’s blood all over you,” Dipper explained.
“Eugh! FINE! Show me how to use these ridiculously primitive Earthen medical tools!” Zim huffed, throwing the kit back onto the ground.
“Okay..” Dipper held back a laugh, walking forward and kneeling down. He grabbed a few things from the kit. “I’m gonna touch your head.. Is that okay?”
“Do it before I kill you,” Zim grumped, staying still as Dipper leaned a bit too close for comfort and disinfected the cut on his head. The irken hissed in pain as it worked, and a bandage was wrapped around the wound. Despite the sting of the medicine, the touch was very gentle, careful. It was strange. Unnerving.
“Anywhere else?”
“..No,” Zim lied. His head was most important anyway. And he wanted hands off him now.
“You think you’re gonna be able to get this ship back off the ground anytime soon?” Dipper asked.
“Of course I am! After some quick and simple repairs!” Zim insisted. He was lying, but he sounded confident enough.
Dipper tilted his head, as though deciding whether or not to believe him anyway. “Hm.. Well, okay. Here’s more bandages in case you need it. Uh.. If you by some chance don’t get this off the ground tonight--”
“I WILL!!”
“..Riiight… I’m staying in a place called the Mystery Shack. It’s that way,” he gestured, “about five minutes away, walking. You can stay there while you heal and gather supplies, if you want. Also… be careful. It can get kinda weird out here, especially at night. It’s safer in the Shack.”
Zim squinted an eye at him, brows furrowed. “...Eh?”
To Zim’s surprise, Dipper stood back up then, and began walking off in the direction he’d specified. Why would he just walk away if he intended to capture Zim? Was this a trick?
Dipper turned and waved at Zim before disappearing through the trees, leaving Zim completely alone again.
“Will I ever understand humanity?” Zim grumbled to himself, quickly grabbing the supplies Dipper left for him and carefully attempting to treat the rest of his wounds. He lifted his dark pink uniform tunic to clean up the scrapes, and patch up any tears. His PAK would have him all healed by morning, luckily.
But right now, Zim was sore, exhausted, and scared. He kept hearing noises. His antennae quivered. Zim had an idea on what Dipper meant about it getting weird out here. A beast had knocked Zim out of the sky, and he’d done his research on this Gravity Falls place. It was why he was here, as part of his next evil plan. But Zim hadn’t planned on a broken ship and an injured body within the first ten minutes he’d been here. He was out of his element already.
He jumped with a start when he heard what sounded like deep breathing, and he could’ve sworn he saw red eyes in the shadows.
Maybe he should give this Mystery Shack a thought.
Almost before Zim could process it, he was stumbling after the human who had disappeared into the darkness. He unsheathed his PAK legs and used those to swiftly bound over the bumpy terrain of the forest. If this human was telling the truth, he wanted to help Zim, then the alien would find safety in this shelter. If he was lying, well, Zim was confident he could get himself back out of the situation. Humans were squishy and fragile, and Zim had knives and lasers installed in his back.
In short, Zim would much rather take on humans than horrifying forest creatures of the night in this place.
Zim squeaked and crashed into a garbage can which went toppling over. Dipper, who was on the back porch, jumped and whipped around. Zim hated how the human’s dumb eyes lit up.
“Zim!”
“Just let me in!”
Dipper smiled and opened the door for him. The alien quickly darted inside.