Chapter Text
“What are we doing out here so late, Master?” GIR asked, rubbing at his optic. He had pulled his hood down to do so, and Zim shot him a look.
“Pull your hood back on before you’re seen,” he hissed, before looking back at the scanner in his hands.
GIR tugged his disguise back on. “I’m tired,” he complained.
“You don’t need to sleep, GIR, you’re a robot,” Zim said impatiently.
“I do too!”
Zim didn’t feel like arguing with him. He began tuning the scanner. “The reason we’re out here is because my base picked up on a strange wave of radiation. Health-wise it isn’t a concern, it was infrared, but… Its frequency seemed to suggest it wasn’t natural. Like… Like someone scanned the planet like it was one big barcode. But what were they looking for? And who are they?”
“I dunno.” GIR slowly laid down, crossing his arms under his head and beginning to snooze.
Zim examined the electromagnetic waves on his device, reading the information on their wavelengths and peak heights, a frown tugging at his lip. This spectrum wasn’t in his databases. Whoever created it must be from beyond Irk’s reach. So… Past Earth, then. Into space they have not yet traveled. That was worrisome, it meant he would have no way of researching who they were.
Then again, he told himself, maybe it was just some rogue group of aliens. That could be it too. Operating with unusual, cobbled together equipment. Nothing to be concerned about. But he was still curious. He’s been working here for five of Earth’s orbits around the Sun and there was no way he was letting someone else interfere with his mission.
He quickly sent out a message toward the source of the radiation. Back off, this planet is mine! -Irken Invader Zim.
Satisfied, he turned the scanner off. No one would dare interfere with an Invader. Not if they didn’t want to incur the wrath of the entire armada.
“Alright, that should scare them off, whoever they are,” Zim said. “Come on, GIR, let’s go-”
A blast of air from above knocked him flat on his back. He let out a yelp as he landed painfully on his PAK, and he looked up in shock as a ship descended toward the hill. It was shoddy, barely held together, with exposed wiring, shaking as it sank down. But despite its trashy appearance, it moved fast. When it was just a few feet up, a door opened and an alien hopped out. It stood easily six feet tall and had a thick build like an Earth football player, with skin like a rock. Its stony eyes glared at Zim, and then it grabbed GIR in a beefy hand and jumped back into the ship.
“H-hey!” Zim yelled, scrambling up. “That’s mine!”
“Not anymore, irken scum,” it grumbled. Zim finally realized it was a member of the rock person race. Their planet was conquered ages ago, why was this one all the way out here?
“You’re a rock person!” Zim shouted, pointing at it. “How did you get off your homeworld?”
“As if I would tell you. And I’m not a ‘rock person’, I am of the mighty race of Gnarlbushers, and you would do good to remember our name when we destroy your people and liberate our world!” The alien shook GIR, who seemed only mildly concerned by the proceedings. “And we’ll use the information on this SIR unit to find your weaknesses. Goodbye, Invader.” It disappeared into the ship, which turned tail and fled.
Zim growled and launched himself after it using his PAK legs. When he hit it, he managed to grab onto a piece of metal that was peeled back, and rummaged in his PAK. Finding what he was looking for, he slammed a tracker deep into the hull. He felt victorious for a few seconds, until the ship suddenly spun and dislodged him.
He screamed as he fell, PAK legs deploying to hit the ground first, but the impact still jolted up his spine and made him wince. He lowered himself down and landed on his feet, rubbing his back as he stared at the ship, which had disappeared into the atmosphere.
“GIR,” he whispered fearfully. Then he got a hold of himself and growled, “Gah, those, those blasted thieves, stealing irken tech! From me, the mighty Zim? They’re going to regret that, ohh they’re going to pay.” He made sure his disguise was intact, then sprinted back to his base. First he checked the vector of the tracker. It wasn’t heading toward any space he was familiar with. Scowling, he pulled up another monitor and called his Tallest.
They seemed very disinterested when they answered, and he gave a curt salute before saying, “My Tallest, I apologize for contacting you on such short notice, but I must report an emergency.”
“Are you out of fun dip again?” Red asked, resting his head on his hand.
“What? No, my fun dip reserves are quite high. Anyway! I was sitting in my base plotting earlier, when I said to GIR, I told him… This next plan is going to be great! The humans would never expect their own vacuum cleaners to turn on them! And he totally agreed with me, and we were working on it, trying to get the suction juuust right, when the base detected a weird signal, and it reported that it was infrared, but not the same as what the Sun emits, which was pretty weird, am I right? So I decided to go investigate it, and-”
“Get to the point,” Purple ordered.
“Aliens took GIR!” Zim shouted.
They stared at him, sitting up.
“GIR… Your SIR unit?” Red asked.
“Yes! This ship came down and one of those rock people guys, you know that Flobee conquered ages ago, jumped out and grabbed GIR and stole him! He’s… He’s been botnapped!” Zim typed a command into his keyboard, sending them the readout from his tracker. “This is where they’re heading, see?”
The Tallest examined it. Then Red said, “I don't particularly care about GIR, but... if anything this could be a serious security breach.”
“Oh please, like anyone could break through SIR unit encryption,” Purple replied.
Red started to agree, then frowned. “Oh. Ah… Remember how we got GIR from the… special bin?”
“Uh…” Purple thought about it.
“That’s right, I remember it like it was yesterday,” Zim said proudly. “You guys giving me a top-secret model of SIR unit! It was so generous, though no offense, but I think something went defective. Lots of things, actually.”
“Uh… Right. Right, I’m so sorry, we meant to tell you,” Red said, gesturing vaguely. “That model er… Was discontinued shortly after you left, due to its tendency to misbehave. But you always seemed to handle it well, so we let you keep it.”
Zim shrugged. “Fair enough, but anyway, what are we going to do?”
“That’s what I was getting at. GIR’s components have another flaw. His encryption software is outdated and no doubt our enemies know how to decrypt it.”
“That’s not good.”
“No, it isn’t, because every single SIR unit is programmed with top secret information about our military capabilities. They have to know it to best assist their Invaders. And now one is in non-irken hands.” Red crossed his arms, giving Zim a reproachful look.
“Sirs, I’m sorry,” he apologized.
“You just can’t do anything right, can you?” Purple said. Zim grimaced, looking away. Purple sighed and said to Red, “So what do we do? How much is on that old SIR?”
“A lot, to a skilled enough hacker.” Red consulted the information Zim had sent. “They seem to be taking him into deep space, far beyond anywhere our ships have gone. Zim, we can’t assist you here, our resources are all going to the new bases we’re setting up on the newly invaded planets. So I’m leaving it up to you. Go get your SIR unit back from those thieves, and if you have to, kill them all. We can’t let our military secrets get out.”
Zim nodded and saluted. “Yes sir, I’ll have him back before you know it!”
The screen went dark, and he hurried to gather supplies. It was going to be a long trip, he could tell that the ship had made a hyperspace jump, but no matter, his ship could at least manage one of those, it didn’t really matter how long the return trip was. As long as he got GIR back.
“Computer, do a perimeter scan before I leave,” he called, examining a gun and deciding to bring it. It was shoved into a bag, and he began collecting other items that could potentially come in handy.
After a brief hum, Computer reported, “That Dib kid is lurking around as usual. He’s in your backyard.”
Zim groaned and pulled the bag onto his shoulders. “Alright. Warm up my ship’s engines, I’ll be right back.”