The Future Past's Present
part fourSurprisingly, Zim never followed Dib up into his room. Dib had sat on the end of his bed facing the door, waiting for Zim to open it so he could shout at him for lying, but it never happened. After half an hour of waiting, he laid down on his bed, his tired head (which was NOT big!) falling gratefully into the fluffy softness of his pillow. He was too tired to sleep though. The drugs they had given him still coursed through his system. He was never quite sure why or how they did it, but they always seemed to turn him into a zombie, some waking creature of the undead wandering around in search of blood. Well, not the blood part anyway. But it kinda made him thirsty in some disgusting chain of thought. It soon became unbearable, the thirst that had only been an idea suddenly filling his mouth with sandy shores beckoning for a crested wave. He made up his mind and climbed back down the stairs, aiming for the kitchen.
Zim still sat on the couch, looking bored and slightly pissed.
"What are you still doing here?" Dib asked, his eyes wide even without his helpful glasses aiding their appearance.
Zim grunted. "I waiting to take your sister out on a date and she's still getting ready. What does it look like I'm doing?"
Dib looked around. Gaz hadn't come home yet. And his dad was working late. He knew Zim was being facetious, but it gave him pause for thought. He was alone with the potentially dangerous alien. Well, dangerous only if he left the couch, which didn't seem to be any time soon.
"Look, I'm going to get a soda. You want anything?"
Zim shrugged. "Sure, ya got Poop?"
Dib nodded and headed off for the kitchen, grabbing the last two Poop's (Gaz was going to kill him for it later) and walking back into the living room. He handed Zim one of the sodas.
"Thank you." Zim popped the top and took a drink. Dib sat across from him in one of the chairs, his feet resting on the footrest (ingenious name!).
"You really want to talk to me," Dib said more to himself, but aware Zim could hear him.
"Either that or I like the view from your couch." The alien's left eye quirked up. "So, are you going to tell me or am I going to become part of the décor?"
"I don't know. You'd look pretty nice sitting next to the Official Professor Membrane lamp." Dib laughed lightly before coughing and resuming a more solemn pace. "This is kinda weird, ya know? I'm used to fighting you and outsmarting you. Talking isn't a daily thing with us."
"So?"
Dib sighed. "Alright. I doubt you'd have time to use it against me anyway. To be blunt, I'm dying."
Zim nearly fell out of the couch. "What?! How can this be? You? Dying? And it's not MY fault?"
Dib repressed a chuckle. "Sorry, they beat you to it."
"They? Who's They?"
"The aliens who abducted me when I was a baby."
Zim pursed his lips together to refrain from making any stupid remarks. The first one that came to mind was what alien race in their right mind would abduct someone from a stupid planet like Earth and the second one was a direct assault on Dib. Both he kept to himself though.
"I know it sounds crazy. I've tried to tell my dad, my doctors, everyone, but they still think it's a birth defect. But I remember being abducted. It's what made me look to the stars for every answer! It's what made me a paranormalist."
"So, you were abducted by aliens. What's that got to do with you dying?" Zim asked.
"They messed around with my brain. Gave me some kind of weird disease. For the most part it just eats at my body tissue, my brain to be specific. Lately it's gotten in the way of important electrical pulses causing me to have seizures. The way the doctors have it planned out, the disease will corrode my involuntary motor skills before I'm twenty."
Zim whistled. "Very smooth. If your assumption is correct; you were abducted and they are the cause of this, they did a very good job disguising their interference." Zim took a sip of his drink. "But your father, this world famous scientist, he can't do anything to help you?"
"He's been working on a cure since we found out about it." Dib became subdued. Zim found it odd that he spoke with more sadness about his father than he did his own physical tribulations. "Gaz hates me because I drove him into his lab. And I drove mom away as well. She didn't want to believe her son was going to die and she'd rather not have had any sort of emotional attachment to me knowing I wouldn't be around for long. So she left. Gaz's never forgiven me even, though it all happened when I was a year or so old."
Zim stretched. He was growing quite tired of the couch, no mater how comfy it had been at first. "You know, I only asked about what as wrong with you physically, not for you to unload all your emotional baggage with it."
Dib's empty Poop can crunched in his fist. "You brought it all up, not me!"
"I was joking, Dib!" Zim rolled his eyes. "Not that I completely grasp your silly human humor. Frankly though, I'm not surprised your father hasn't been able to find a cure. If it was aliens, only an alien could locate the problem." Zim lifted what would have been an eyebrow, insinuating his thoughts.
Dib caught on quickly but took a few moments to process. "You'd...help me?"
"I've said it before, Dib and you know it as well as I do. I won't let anyone kill you but me, including your stupid stinking body full of peas!"
"...I haven't been eating any peas..."
"That's not the point!" Zim frowned, realizing his butt had succeeded in falling asleep. "The point is that I can aid you with my superior technology if you ask nicely."
"Why should I trust you?" Dib countered.
"I stayed on the couch, didn't I?"
Dib worried his bottom lip, looking from Zim's sly features to his own thoughts on the idea. True, Zim had been sincere to his word so far. He was fidgiting enough on the couch for it to be known he was growing rather restless and uncomfortable. And what did he have to loose?
"Alright, Zim. Tomorrow at your place."
Zim nodded, happily jumping out of the couch and dashing to the door. "Don't worry, Dib beast. My superior technology will no doubt find what's wrong and cure you. And then you can go back to trying to stop me from conquering the world!"