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To say that Zim had been a tad distracted from taking over the earth, and plunging puny humans into fits of despair as he forced them into some destructive labour system or the other that slowly destroyed the planet while collecting resources for Irk would be an understatement. The very fact that he even knew so much about earth resources said as much. No, Zim had discovered, thanks in part to an error in his main computer’s processor, that he had an unfortunate predilection for musicals. At first, the very sound of the shrill human voices was enough for him to want to destroy his entire base, but as he worked to rectify the situation, it seemed to…grow on him.
Most things about earth had. The drab days in musty October that seemed to drag on, slowly draining the energy from everything, the way the lack of light seemed to affect human mood, writing on Dib’s face after he had fallen asleep in class, it was comfortable. It left him longing for something that even draining the happiness from human worker drones couldn’t. Something that wasn’t on irk.
Certainly a pitiful and inferior feeling but one that tugged on his Squeedily Spooch and left a taste of something just out of reach. He had tried to play it off too. Tried to pretend that he was still just as full of disgust for humanity as when he arrived 3 years prior, a tad like the types of pretend play that humans did on stage for entertainment. He’d shove Dib onto a particularly large pile of leaves and point dramatically, making sure to add a maniacal cackle here and there, the only thing he could do to quiet the much softer chuckle that gets caught in his throat as Dib huffs, puffing his cheeks, just barely tinted red, shooting him a dirty look as he collects stares from their neighbours.
In those moments Zim was sure he could outdo any of the prominent tony award winners.
He’s nearly sure he’ll get caught today. Today, like the last 37 days, the club sign up sheet for drama taunts him, dangling from the noticeboard in the hallway by a singular thumb tack that had certainly seen better days. There’s something new today though, the audition sheet for the new play. A gust of the cold wind kicks at it softly, and he almost considers it, just for a second.
“What’chu doing there Zim? Contemplating your latest plot for world domination? Trying to figure out if we got History homework?”
Dib seemed to slither into the space between his ears with an ease that left a feeling of unease deep in the pit of his stomach. He tried to look unphased, turning to his locker slowly to retrieve his skool books, sparing a glance at his persecutor.
“For your information stinky, Zim is recovering his simple human implements to prepare for notetaking. And today is the history test.”
He shuts the locker, seemingly using it to punctuate his sentence, and begins walking in the direction of their first class, at a pace just slow enough for Dib to follow.
“It is? That sucks.”
Dib gives a supplementary yawn, and Zim watches the way the skin on the bridge of his nose scrunches up, the way the light bounces off his greasy dark hair, as he struggles to keep up the pace, adjusting his glasses quickly. He looks away, grabbing Dib’s arm to pull him out of the way of a few students, just until he opens his eyes again.
“You look terrible.” He remarked crudely.
“I stayed up all night watching documentaries about ancient civilizations again.”
A thought seems to cross his mind, and Zim watches as his eyes seem to light up.
“You don’t know anything about what happened to the Mayans do you? Some people attribute them vanishing to having communications with an alien species.”
He seems nearly radiant rattling off his favourite points of a few documentaries. Zim sometimes wondered if Dib would grow out of his love of Aliens and the supernatural. His father seemed convinced of it but Zim wasn’t entirely sure that would do him any good; with a side note being Zim’s own curiosity that was often filled by Dib’s impressive memory of random facts.
“You stayed up watching that instead of studying for our test?”
“I kinda, wasn’t feeling it. Like, I don’t really get it, why I have to do all this stuff when I already know what I want to study more about. Besides, it’s not like you’ve studied, aren’t you just going to use your alien technology to pass?”
Zim narrowed his eyes at the human.
“Oh I’ve studied stupid earth boy. Zim doesn’t need the help of high-tech computers to conquer a simple human knowledge assessment.”
Dib lifts a finger to comment, possibly taunt him, but their conversion is interrupted by the skool bell.
“See ya stinky.” He ruffles Dibs hair with one hand and disappears into his class, not bothering to glance back at the expression he knows is painted over Dib’s features.
Zim did study, he found it mildly interesting, yet insultingly simple sometimes to participate in human learning. He did school for reconnaissance, or so he told himself, and after all and he wasn’t about to waste his time. Once they started high school it had become quite clear to Zim that perhaps reconnaissance on the Dib wasn’t exactly the same. He had moved from cataloguing his weaknesses to his allergies, from his enemies to his bullies, which didn’t exactly mean Dib had grown on Zim, but more that he had determined that humans seemed to pose more of an immediate danger for Dib than he ever could. Certainly, at this point if he put the effort in Earth would crumble in under a day, sometimes it even seems as though it’d do so when all he does is eat peanut butter sandwiches with Dib in the cafeteria. Alien invasions were definitely the least of their problems.
He tended to finish assessments before most other students, and spent the remaining time pretending to struggle with a few questions to satisfy any suspicions others had. He tapped the end of his pen against his lips and looked up, like he’d seem Dib do hundreds of times and took the opportunity to glance at the teenage boy in the Bigfoot pullover. Dib had propped himself up using his left arm, as he slowly nodded off. Perhaps if he just said it was for research Dib wouldn’t realize that he had been afflicted with an affinity for human pretend play. Dib was probably too smart for that.
After skool he once again found himself in the same predicament. The flimsy piece of paper dancing lightly in the wind. Usually he just waited by the front steps for Dib to finish gathering his stuff and shove his way through the hoards of students all bungling as they scrambled to get home, almost as though they wanted escape the building itself. His first year of high school Zim had made an investigation into the properties of the building to see if perhaps there really was something about it that gave it such an ominous feeling. He figured Dib would like that sort of thing, if he ever got around to telling him much of anything about his investigations for his missions.
As it turned out, there only seemed to be a few too many sections of the roof constructed out of Asbestos, which he anonymously reported to the proper authorities, he couldn’t have his main data point become unusable due to whatever effects it could have on the students, though he thought for a while of kidnapping a child and doing some experiments to determine the effects. He still might do that, if only to distract himself from the performing arts.
He checked his wig briefly in the mirror he kept in his locker, just to make sure he didn’t have a loose antenna. The wig wasn’t exactly a comfortable feeling, but he’d gotten so used to tucking them away that at times he almost didn’t feel them. He shut his locker, taking the opportunity to scan the hallway for signs of students who seemed overly curious of his activities, before taking confident strides towards the poster.
They had decided on doing The Wizard of Oz after all. He had spent the last few weeks eavesdropping on the students he’d identified as club members, and while he’d nearly been certain Mathilda would be voted by the students, a coup had been suspected for a while, as the only drama teacher had a preference for The Wizard of Oz. He didn’t care of course but, in some way, he could understand the human want to be interpreted as something other than what they were, even if just for two hours. Sometimes, if he let himself drift in class, he could almost imagine that he really was just an off-colour human, one who didn’t really understand the whole socializing thing, who was decently good at learning, and had the ability to enjoy the company of weird kid with an oversized head. Zim wasn’t stupid enough to spend hours pretending to be something and then show off his skills of deception on a stage or anything, but he’d definitely practiced pronouncing the words that sounded nothing like irken with GIR. Either way, he’d simply let his PAK record the memory of the poster and look at it later.
Dib was sat on the steps, earphones in, leaning on the railing and forcing everyone to walk around him, his nose and ears slightly reddened by the cold. He gave Zim a curious look, furrowing his brows.
“What’s the matter space-boy? You forget something?” He plucked an earbud out, cocking his head to the side as though he expected an answer. Zim simply rolled his eyes, walking past him.
“Would you at least slow down?” That, he would actually do.
Zim found himself thinking about musicals again. He wondered if his next report on earth could just be, musicals. It sounded stupid in his head, but it wasn’t as though the tallest would see it anyway. He hadn’t had a successful transmission to them in a while. He wasn’t worried of course, the armada possibly had just moved a bit further than he could reach from earth. He had been having a more difficult time procuring materials to upgrade his equipment as of late, and while he could probably fly out in the voot for a while, most afternoons as of late he’d spent the time watching television with Dib and Gaz, or creating a mediocre plan to distract Dib for a while so he could get information about the drama club. Professor Membrane had even invited him for dinner on the only night he didn’t have school work to complete. The upgrades simply weren’t as pressing as keeping his presence unknown from humans, and getting detention, or being absent would certainly result strangers getting a little too close for comfort. He was already distracted today, so that entire plan was off. His cellular phone lit up from his workbench.
“GIR I thought I told you to keep that thing up in the living room!” The robot returned his admonishment with an excited gurgle. The phone went dark. Zim sighed, then caught himself. He had found himself doing those more human expressions on the base more and more frequently. Maybe he really did need to upgrade his equipment so he could check his PAK for faults. The cell phone grew alight, vibrating once again.
“What is it this time?” He muttered aloud to himself. He hoped it wasn’t one of those dreaded class group chats. They had the annoying quality of ‘memes’ to them that he simply couldn’t stand. He didn’t really understand any of them, or how they were funny. Not one of them made him laugh. Why was the ‘loss’ meme funny? Was it funny because everyone was sad? Humans did have a penchant for each other’s misery. His issue with the inferior technology was a whole other issue. He picked it up. Dib had sent him a message, a simple “u up?” with a human dressed in a green costume with some assorted area 51 joke spread across it. He supposed these ones were funny because the image depicted an alien and Zim was an alien.
Humour of this sort was certainly lost on him. From a literary standpoint it could be considered a dramatic irony, if the general audience for the meme wasn’t Zim. He figured Dib didn’t send him such an image at 1 am so that he could educate him on dramatic irony. Plus, Zim was on the science track so that he could keep an eye on Dib, such knowledge would probably be out of place. He decided on his reply after a minute of thought.
“No stinky, Zim is enjoying the appropriate 8 hours of sleep, required for the brain development of the normal human teenager.” That felt as though it satisfied the question. “Do Irkens even need sleep?” came quickly after.
“Do you?”
Dib responded with a colon next to a lowercase p. Texting was a human skill Zim had yet to grasp.
“It must be nice being able to leave the earth whenever you want.”
Zim contemplated asking Dib if he planned to join a club this year, maybe offer that they make one together. Would it be suspicious? If Dib joined a club Zim would certainly be justified to doing the same, and even if it wasn’t drama, he’d be able to fill his brain with something other than vocal ranges and two act plays.
“Don’t think you can be rid of Zim Dib-thing. I will not be leaving until the armada has destroyed this planet and or ran experiments to determine how it is possible for your head to be so large and yet so full of nothing.”
Checking his other messages, it seems just as he thought the class group chats were simply abound with new 'funny' memes, students bad mouthing others, and of course, people who couldn’t keep their assignments straight. A message in one of the chats he was added to by an acquaintance catches his eye, keyword membrane outside of a biology class. He taps it almost instantly.
“Nah u look cute. Quirky kinda.”
“I look like Membrane. Did u c that ugly bigfoot sweater today? She literally looked homeless. 🤢”
“🤣 🤣 🤣”
Which ever skoolmate seemed to have gotten a bad haircut and was being reassured that no one could look as bad as Dib. As usual he’s the butt of some cruel reassurance. Something about the human urge to tear someone down to make themselves feel better gave Zim a surreal feeling of relief that he wasn’t human that seemed almost tainted with a familiar sadness at the same thought. Not that irkens felt sadness. It was probably more a feeling of shame that he got from being an unsuccessful invader. Perhaps he would actually try to focus on his conquering of earth.
“Computer, retrieve information about explosive devices.”
Zim was almost able to start the weekend before his thoughts once again drifted to musicals. GIR had ingested some sort of liquid and had begun to malfunction, well, behave outside of his usual malfunctioning state, belting show tunes he seemed to have saved onto his hard drive. Zim had him nearly fully opened on his work bench, making a mental note to delete GIR’s catalogue of show tunes, when he was alerted to his nemesis’s presence on his property.
“Uh, computer, activate the normal human lawn ornaments and the sprinklers, threat level: alpha. Also… bring up the security cameras.”
He glanced at Dib over the screen and watched as the gnome’s eyes began to glow. Dib looked slightly concerned at the sight, but ultimately decided to begin with an elaborate flourish of his trench coat.
“Zim! I know you’re home, plotting some kind of devious world ending plan, and I’m here to stop you!” Zim chuckled. Dib’s dramatic pointing really brought it together.
“Isn’t that Mary?!”
“Quit squirming GIR, Zim must concentrate.”
The gnomes spin to face Dib and he takes a deep breath. Zim mouths the next few lines of his spiel, 'I won’t be deterred by your evil gnomes Zim.'
“I won’t be deterred by your evil lawn gnomes Zim!” Dib recited without fail. Zim watches gleefully from the corner of his eye as the gnomes eyes fire laser pointers and Dib begins to flail about concerned for his life, unaware of Zim’s threat level upgrade. A meme crosses Zim’s mind and he drops the soldering iron to send Dib a text, “I wOn’T bE dEtErReD bY yOuR eViL lAwN gNoMeS ZIM.” He watched as the boy realizes that he hadn’t been in danger.
“Huh?” But before he could respond the sprinklers set off, and he makes a mad dash to keep dry. A few moments later Zim received a text. “GG Spaceboy.” Zim smiled at the phone before catching himself again and returning to GIR.
“CAN WE GET TACOS???”
Zim’s newest addition to his musical predicament is his interest in tap dancing. He certainly didn’t intend to learn it, but after getting distracted in the middle of his latest foray into the world of being a half decent irken invader, he fell into to one of those 'rabbit holes' as he’d seen it referred to on the internet. They were definitely outside of his budget, and his plan but it was becoming harder and harder to convince himself out of these things. Zim instead fell into a fit of shoe making. This was of course, almost no difficulty to him, a trained soldier for the most powerful society in the galaxy. Even a smeet could learn something as simple as human shoemaking. His technology also helped but that really wasn’t the point. The vibration of his cell phone breaks him out of this shoemaking haze and he feels it again, the distant shame. A text from Dib. “Will you let me in today or will I need galoshes?”
“Computer, show me the front of the base.”
“Yes master.” The cameras come on just in time to see GIR letting Dib into the base. He feels a familiar panic rise in his stomach.
“Computer! Why didn’t you notify me of a presence on the property?”
“Running Diagnostic.” Zim scrambled to pull over a hoodie, and to get into a pair of jeans. The wig wasn’t necessarily essential as Dib had seen him many a time without it, and his contacts. He wiped his hands hurriedly on a cloth to rid them of residual matter.
“Problem identified. Faulty sensor wiring.” Zim groaned. He definitely couldn’t put off fixing that.
Dib seemed…quiet. He regarded Zim with a glare and Zim almost wanted to shudder under it. He noticed a bruise starting to form on the human’s cheek and neck, the dark circles under his eyes, and the even darker bluish-red bruise under his left eye. Zim felt his antennae move backwards, reacting to the tense air, dense with hostility. He rubbed his knuckles to relieve his growing anxiety. Dib’s eyes almost seemed full of a thick sadness, coated in fear and doused in anger.
“You aren’t going to take it over, are you?”
Zim felt confused, he almost wasn’t sure what Dib was talking about. Dib ran his fingers through his wind tousled hair. Zim notices a cut on his left cheek.
“Are you-“
“Just answer me.” His voice is low and seemed to tremble under the weight of his words.
“Don’t look at me like that, just…” He trailed off, pulling his hands through his hair. Zim slowly moved closer to Dib, taking a place beside him on the floor. He pulled the end of the oversized sweater down to cover his hand and placed it gently to Dib’s cheek, peering into his face for a closer look. Dib’s busted lip seemed like the worst of it, although he briefly thought to do an x-ray to ensure he didn’t have a radial fracture. Shock seemed to pass over Dib, but it took Zim a second before he pulled away, creating distance between them. He gets up, moving towards a first aid kit he kept in a kitchen cabinet after he first noticed that this happed frequently enough to be concerning. He returned, handing it to Dib. While he had quite a few bruises, his glasses seemed to have come out nearly unscathed, a single scratch permeating the lens.
“GIR, x-ray vision.” The robot seemed to take pleasure in jumping into to Dib’s arms, getting as close as possible and startling the boy. Zim checked his phone soon after, and seemed visibly relieved to see no fractures. He turned to glare at the human. Flicking him once in the centre of his gigantic forehead.
“What the fuck?”
“Of course, Zim will be taking over your miserable planet stinky. Don’t think you’ve won just yet.”
Monday was the day that what little self-control kept Zim out of the drama club seemed to vanish. Well not vanish per say, Dib had decided to stay home, the cold October rains had trapped him on the inside of the skool and as the wind picked up, the audition poster tore free of the notice board, floating through the crowd of students desperate to leave, ultimately getting trampled and kicked until it had found its way to the foot of Zim’s locker. He regarded it carefully. He certainly hadn’t thought it a sign like most humans, but he had spent the last 39 days absolutely dreading what might happen if he gave up his strong hold on his will to maintain a distance from human affairs, to prevent himself from assimilating. Maybe if he just went to have a look at it, it would quell his curiosity. It wasn’t impossible, that was for certain.
He manoeuvred through the crowded hallway, towards the hallowed halls of the school auditorium, one of the newer sections, one that had been constructed from the least amount of carcinogenic materials. He pushed open the double doors hesitantly. It was certainly larger than his middle school auditorium, which was to be expected as his school had a decent performing arts program. The cushy red seating reminded him of a movie theatre and it was one of the only air-conditioned rooms in the entire school. Zim had probably been here once since he started. He was mildly surprised at the small number of students, just around 15, and the sole drama teacher, who turned to regard him. She was tall and thin, her hair seeming to fade from black to a wispy grey as it neared the ends.
“Oh! Are you here to audition?” Zim felt anxiety prick at him softly. Audition was the opposite of what he came to do. He came to convince himself that this was not what he wanted, and yet his words seemed to get caught in his throat. Zim rubbed the back of his neck.
“Could…I?”
Zim would be lying if he said seeing his name on the official cast list as a major character on the following Wednesday didn’t make him feel excited. He hadn’t realized what feeling Elle Woods would have gotten after getting Calehan’s scholarship. It made him literally want to break out into song. He had been cast as the wicked witch of the west, which he assumed had to do with his skin, and technically he could probably call the casting prejudiced, but he really couldn’t think hard enough to figure it out.
“Hey, it’s Zim, right?” He nearly jumped at the sound of the teenage girl’s voice.
“This is…correct.”
He narrowed his eyes at her. She had homeroom with Dib, he didn’t really recognize her outside of that, which she seemed perceptive to.
“I’m Ashley, I’m playing Dorothy. I’ve seen you around a bit but I was just hoping to get your number to add you to our group chat.”
Zim wanted to crawl out of his skin at the words 'group chat'. He bit his tongue to suppress his urge to hiss.
“Zim would certainly be overjoyed to join this, 'group chat'.”
He input his number into her phone as she rambled about knowing Keef and such nonsense that Zim could really only nod absentmindedly. She left on her own when the bell rang, but he couldn’t help but wonder if he missed Dib. He shot Dib a text to let him know he would be busy after school.
Zim wondered how much Dib knew about his affliction. He often tried to suppress the urge to sing or repeat lines from his favourite musicals in the upper sections of his base, as he tended to find new devices placed by Dib every other day, in particular following his casting in the play. He knew Dib had probably caught him a couple times, late at night when GIR had gotten a song stuck in his head as he attempted to put the finishing touches on a few of his devious plans. He used to destroy them too, leave them smashed, put them all in a bag and triumphantly returned them to the human, laughing manically at Dib’s annoyed expression, but without fail, Dib always managed to place more. After Zim had decided to do similar activities to find out his deepest secrets to expose them, he accidentally overheard professor membrane scolding Dib for his constant expenditure on such devices and somehow didn’t have the same penchant for carelessly destroying them. He still did accidentally destroy a great number of them, Zim wasn’t exactly gentle but his deliberate malicious tampering tapered off.
He found another one in his satchel as he went to check if Dib ever replied to his message and felt an instant embarrassment. Dib had certainly heard him sing and act now, as he’d brought the bag into the auditorium with him. How long had it been there like that without him noticing? He checked his phone, glancing back at a few of a chats he checked a few days prior. His interest peaked as he realized his new contact, Dorothy human, had participated in the conversation he read the other night. He felt an overwhelming urge to cut her hair poorly in her sleep and completely ruin her for it, but managed to decide against it. Perhaps he and Dib would fight over it later, which would completely negate the entire point. No message from Dib anyhow. He shoved the phone back into the bag, gathering the listening device to return to Dib later.
With most of Dib’s listening devices quantifiably quelled, Zim resigned himself to practice for the play for the evening, but his mind seemed further permeated by the thoughts of the other students bullying Dib. He wondered to what extent they bothered Dib in the past, and he couldn’t manage to run his lines to any level of completion without thinking about it.
Zim hadn’t seen Dib for another few days but after he reached his base he regarded a tiny camera attached to his satchel, that he hadn’t remembered seeing earlier. He had noticed it on his bag during play rehearsal but seeing as he left his bag in the audience, there hadn’t been much he could do. He picked it off with two of his fingers, turning it over in his palm until his suspicions were confirmed, it was from one of those shitty ghost hunting sites he knew Dib loved to frequent. Zim had thought about making him a whole bunch that would be better quality, but he figured he’d probably end up finding them on GIR’s dog costume, in his clothes, on his satchel, in his wig, in his chair, and anywhere else the clever defender of earth figured would be just conspicuous enough that it would be unnoticeable. He could probably cloak them like he did the Voot but that was a kind of counter intuitiveness that would be a level too high for even Zim. He checked his recent messages with Dib, all received, all unopened. Irkens weren’t exactly known for being patient, and Zim certainly fit the stereotype. He waited until it was just late enough for most of the neighbourhood to be asleep while running his lines, before he used his PAK legs to crawl his way to Dib’s bedroom window, giving it two sharp taps.
Peering in, the first thing he noticed was Dib’s camera that he had aimed at Zim’s house. Last time he simply broke the window he had also broken the camera, and with Dib seeming more distraught about the latter, he had fixed it, broken into the room inconspicuously and left it for him to find. They didn’t really talk about it after that, but he hoped that they’d at least talk tonight. The room, was in a state of partial darkness, the only source of light being Dib’s laptop in the corner, a sure sign that he was still awake. It didn’t take 30 seconds before the window was opened, allowing the alien to crawl inside. Dib stood just an arm’s length away, his hands akimbo.
“Fancy seeing you here, Zim.” His words thick with a venom that instantly annoyed Zim. Dib was mad at him? For what? He’d gone through the trouble of keeping the sticky human child with the oversized head on his mind for the past few days, just stopping short of being concerned for his wellbeing, and Dib was mad at him?
“What brings you here?”
Zim crossed his arms, using one of his pack legs to scoop the small bag with Dib’s reconnaissance equipment from his jacket pocket, and holding it towards the human.
“Zim simply came to return these ‘buggies’ that you seem to have foolishly scattered across his base as per usual.” Dib snorted at his answer, and Zim balled his hands into fists in an attempt to curb his urge to beat the ever-loving shit out of him.
“I guess I should be what, grateful? That the oh so popular actor could make just enough time for little old me.”
Zim snarled flicking the bag in his direction. Dib almost seemed a little frightened by the gesture, but Zim could hardly see it. He took in a breath through his clenched teeth.
“Yes, you should be very grateful your future overlord took such liberties stupid earth boy.” He spat the words as though they burnt his tongue as the left his mouth. Dib chuckled, raising an eyebrow deciding to challenge the irk invader.
“If you ever find time for that between-“
“Shut it!” Dib flinched at the sudden raise in volume, but seemed unphased, continuing his challenge.
“Have you already broken into all your new friends’ bedrooms or are you giving me special treatment?”
Zim almost didn’t realize that his PAK legs had shot out, pinning the boy to the wall, until he heard Dib’s back greet it with a defined wet, smack. He seemed almost surprised at himself, the sudden shame flowing in to continue to fuel his anger, more targeted at himself. Zim couldn’t believe that once again he’d let his anger distract him, that he’d left Dib get a rise out of him. He locked eyes with Dib who held an indignant expression, his eyes blown wide, nostrils flared and his face flushed. His greasy dark hair fell flat against his face, the ends of which fluttered out with each excited breath. Zim had begun to retract his PAK legs, slowly one at a time before Dib managed to land a kick to his mid section, startling him into dropping the human more suddenly than he had intended.
“Zim doesn’t have friends.” He bit back. Dib snorted.
“I thought you just took an idiom too far, ‘The enemy of my enemy’ and all that.”
“Zim prefers to keep his friends close, and his enemies…” He trailed off, opting instead to end it there and dash out the way he came, leaving Dib in the dark. He almost wanted to look back, to watch Dib pick himself up, and stare out the window just for a few seconds before cursing under his breath and latching it again.
Zim doesn’t exactly intend to see Dib again by the time he does. Dib is behind the school, surrounded by a group of human teenagers, some of whom he had gotten to know over the last few days, well, as well as you could know a human without experimentation, including Ashley. Dib is clutching at his nose, his eyes are wild as he turns his attention to the alien, who had managed to successfully invade this altercation. The girl closest to Dib seemed to have just delivered the blow Zim had missed, and she rears back at his presence. Zim is confused. He’s not entirely sure what he’s looking at, looking to Ashley for clarification. A sly smile paints her lips.
“Hey Zim! I thought you weren’t going to practice today.” Her voice is slick and smooth, and almost breaks the tense atmosphere until he looks to Dib again, who seems almost like a caged animal. Zim isn’t the keenest person when it comes to understanding social cues, but anxiety fills his chest at the sight because Dib genuinely looks, scared. Dib is scared of Zim sometimes. He’d even venture to say Dib is scared of him often, but that’s almost logical. Zim is an alien, whose main goal is to conquer and subjugate the planet. Ashley and her cronies were stupid human teenagers. Zim almost feels a pang of jealousy at the sight, Dib hadn’t been this frightened of him in quite a while. The scene looks like it's straight out of a musical, Dib looks like a lion cub about to be ripped to pieces by a pack of hyenas.
“This is correct, Zim will be leaving now.” His eyes dart to Dib again, who’s face seemed to be a wash with fear, anger and anxiety.
“Zim was simply looking for Dib-stink here, so that we may…" He trailed off, searching for an appropriate excuse. "...walk home together.”
Ashley let out a fervent chortle of laughter and Zim feels his eye twitch. Did…she just…laugh at him? He moves between the group, grabbing Dib by the wrist and wrenching him from the surrounding humans.
“Just leave her, I mean, you can’t be friends with people like this if you also want to be friends with us Zim, and if you’re not friends with us it might become difficult for you to participate in the drama club.”
Dib struggles under his grip but Zim doesn’t release him, or even stop to consider the threat before he replies.
“Zim is okay with this. I’ve lost interest in play acting anyway.”
Zim continued to drag Dib harshly until they were almost a full block away from school.
“Zim.” Dib called, and was promptly ignored.
“Zim what the hell!”
“Fuck! Zim you’re hurting me!” Zim drops his hand in an instant, as though he had been startled out of a trance and stops moving, noticing that he seemed to have drawn blood once again. He almost apologizes, but the words get caught in his throat. He meets Dib's eyes, full of fury and confusion.
“Why would you do that?”
“Zim doesn’t understand what you mean.”
“Bullshit.”
Dib grabs a fist full of Zim’s hoodie, forcing him to face the teenage boy.
“I thought you really wanted to be in the play. You…” Dib seems to stop short of saying something, pursing his lips as though he intended to keep what he wanted to say from escaping his lips.
“Of course I was simply feigning interest in the play to catch your ire earth-boy.” He explained, rotating his hand at the wrist as he spoke as though he was explaining such a simple topic that it was foolish to even ask about. Dib glowered at him, and Zim hoped he’d just let it go. Just let Zim get away with the obvious lie.
“Besides, Zim’s understudy is wonderfully mediocre enough to fill his place.” Dib releases him with a huff.
“You’re such a terrible liar, you probably would have sucked anyway.”
“LIES! FILITHY HUMAN LIES! Zim knows you’ve creepily watched his performance enough to know that there is no truth to your assertion about Zim.” Dib chucked softly and Zim felt relief creep up in his chest as he goes into a tirade against the boy for daring to laugh at him.
“Master, the human known as Dib is approaching the premises.”
“Show me!” Zim watches as Dib approaches the door, ringing the doorbell.
“Uh, Zim? I know you’re home.” His tone sounds unsure and Zim can see the paper he had clutched tightly in his hand. It was already Saturday evening, Dib never usually came over this late and once again, hadn’t told him he was coming over. Zim scrambled upstairs and to his front door, already snugly dressed in human attire, minus the wig and contacts. Dib seemed startled by the opening of the door.
“That was fast.” He remarked.
“Why have you come to bother Zim?”
The boy shuffles his feet awkwardly and Zim realizes he’s missing something.
“I found out the local theatre group was doing a musical, and I figured you might want to cause trouble there. I of course, only bought a ticket for myself so that I could thwart your attempts.” He cleared his throat, extending a ticket towards Zim. Zim snatched the ticket from his hand, scratching it in the process. Dib released a tiny hiss, almost distracting Zim from staring at the ticket. Silence permeates the air for a few seconds as Zim tries to process what just happened.
“Do you really think your supervision can really distract Zim from his plans?! I accept your offer stinky, but try not to be too disappointed when you fail to protect the measly human theatre, from all this!” He gesticulates wildly to himself, and Dib stifles a chuckle.