Irken Empire Collapse Au Part 3
Okay we left off at the Massive arriving to Earth after tracking down the signal from the receiver located in Zim's base.
Upon seeing that stupid blue and green orb shining in the distance as soon as they've floated past the big gas giants in the Sol system, there's a rush of excitement and relief from the Massive and the rest of the fleet's crew, including the Tallest. At this point it's been like 9 years since the disaster that tore the Irken Empire (and the rest of the Universe but yk pshh who cares about them?) apart. The Massive and its fleet has been limping around the unknown regions for years subsisting off of heavily rationed snacks from their main storage supply on the Massive.
Of course, as soon as they come close enough to the planet (shields on of course) they encounter a forcefield that prevents them from getting too close.
Now let's guess who put that there? Dib? No, he's been thoroughly convinced by Zim that the Irken Armada will never come to Earth. Professor Membrane? Pshhh he doesn't even believe in Aliens! (Yet...) Who could it be?
Now while Zim has long accepted that the Irken Armada and the Tallest will never arrive to Earth to invade it, he has not ruled out other extraterrestrial threats. After all he's racked up quite a few enemies over the years. Not to mention Irkens aren't the only fearsome alien species in the galaxy that likes to go around bullying primitive alien planets.
So as a safety precaution Zim decided to set up a forcefield around the planet (and its moon) in order to make sure that if any alien threats ever decided to attack Earth (or even contemplate landing on the planet) Zim would be able to stop them in time.
Of course, he also has other alarms and defense systems in place to alert him of approaching alien spacecraft so that he can put a stop to them before they ever get close enough to the planet to potentially cause it harm. But uh, he's unfortunately been a bit busy the last few weeks.... (◡ ω ◡)
So as soon as the Massive and the fleet realize what's happening, they begin to panic. Like full blown panic! If they can't get to supplies soon, they're dead in space. Literally. The taller among them are already suffering from malnutrition and the side effects that come with (very bad). So, it's in their best interest that they get in contact with the creator of the shield.
Of course, they figure out very quickly that the technology, while not Irken, is made using methods that only a few select classes of Irken society would know how to use (that is their top science, technology and industrial divisions). So, they naturally assume that Zim is behind the shield. Probably an effort on his part to hide himself (they're correct).
So as a last-ditch effort to try and reach supplies before their entire race is doomed to extinction via starvation, they trace the signature of Zim's technology back to, what they hope to be, Zim's new base.
They succeed, and instead of waiting around for Zim to actually answer, they remotely hack the monitor to turn it on.
The very first thing that they notice is that there's no one actually there. There's further panic as everyone wonders if Zim is even at this base and whether he'll be back anytime soon to talk to them (he is, he's actually racing back home to check out the strange signals that are coming up on his systems).
While there's some fear regarding this, they end up gathering the attention of the occupants of the house. One of whom happens to wake up. Can you guess who?
Hehe it's Dulce! (◠‿◕)
You see at the time of the Massive's arrival. Dib and Zim were away at a science seminar explaining their latest breakthroughs in their respective fields. Because this seminar was happening over the course of a weekend, they had called Gaz up and asked her to babysit Dulce for them. She, of course, agreed and brought along her own son to stay the weekend at Dib's house.
(Sidetrack, Gaz works as a video game developer from home and so that's why it was very easy for her to come over and watch Dulce for the weekend)
Diego and Dulce end up staying up way past their bedtime to watch some movies, and Gaz herself worked very late into the night. By the time the monitor turned on in the early morning, everyone was so tired and wiped out by the night before that they weren't immediately woken up.
At least, the humans weren't.
Because Dulce is half Irken, she has much better hearing, even without all the implants that Irkens are given at birth. So, she wakes up in the early morning to yelling coming from the basement where her parents' labs are located.
While she's been told numerous times that she's not allowed down into the labs without supervisions she still, naturally, goes downstairs to investigate (she is Zim and Dib's daughter as you can see).
Now one of the main reasons she decides to go down and investigate is because the language in which the numerous voices are speaking in is Irken. A language that only her Papa and herself can speak fluently in (poor Dib's mouth is not constructed in a way that is easy for him to speak it to his family, try as he might). So instead of letting Gaz know that she's hearing voices in the house, she decides to investigate herself because surely, she's better equipped to handle someone(s) that speaks her language, right?
So, she toddles her little butt down the stairs, down the elevators, and into the main room of the base where the monitor is located.
And comes face to face with the Tallest themselves on the monitor.
Yeah, everyone is in for a surprise then. Dulce because she's never so much as seen a picture of another Irken, much less a video feed of one. The Tallest and their followers, because "yo what is a smeet doing all by itself all the way out here???"
Of course, they get their answers when they question little Dulce on who she is and why she's alone in Zim's base. Dulce, being 2 "almost three!", let's them know her name, the fact that Zim's her dad and that they're disturbing her "Beauty Sleep!".
Jaws drop at that revelation. First off, Zim procreated?!? Secondly, is that even scientifically possible?? Third off, where is he???
Now keep in mind in this AU, Irkens aren't aware they can still procreate "the old fashion way", their first assumption upon meeting Dulce is that she must be a science experiment/clone. After all she LOOKS Irken enough, if you can look past the weirdly colored eyes. Except for the fact that while she resembles Zim (entirely too much in their opinion), she mentions another progenitor that lives with her and Zim in their base.
Which...okay, when did another Irken leave the Empire and join Zim in his exile in unknown space. Secondly, WHY would any Irken in their right mind do that as well as choose to procreate with the Defective terrorist? So many questions, so few answers.
Eventually it's decided, okay whatever, they can question Zim and this unknown Irken at a later point in time, ONCE they've actually solved their food supply issue.
Next step, order the smeet to lower the shields so they can get to that point faster.
Of course, waving around their status as superiors doesn't work, waving around the Tallest's status as their people's supreme leaders doesn't work, not even promising some vague reward to her in exchange for her help gets her do agree.
All she does is tell them something about Stranger Danger and that she's not getting herself in trouble just to help them!
Okay but have you considered-No.
And if we offered you-NO!
So that doesn't work. Now what are they left to do?
Why threaten her of course!
They pull out every trick in the book. They threaten bodily harm. They threaten mental anguish. They threaten to take both themselves AND the Earth out with them if they don't get what they want!
Just smiles at them and keeps repeating no.
Everyone on the other line is this 🤏close to crashing out. (They see where Zim's genes really kicked in. She's so easily capable of driving other Irkens into insanity despite her small size).
Finally, right when they're about ready to just start begging her on their hands and knees to lower the shields BAM!
Elevator doors slam open. And lo and behold who walks through.
None other than Defective Irken Zim himself.
