The Scientists of Vort Research Station 9

I am not entirely sure where to start here so I’ll start with Vort.

I like to imagine Vort before OID2 was the exact opposite to Irk despite being allies, and long standing ones at that. Whereas Irk and everything they touch seems to be an extremely industrial, dystopian world with no room for nature and natural life, preferring everything as cold and gloomy as possible, I like to imagine Vort was incredibly eco friendly, bordering utopic. They’re an incredibly advanced, intelligent species, but somehow I always imagine them as very respectable to and about nature, to the point it invades every inch of their lives in harmony with everything they do. Must be the goat vibes, plus I enjoy making them different from irk.

As for Station 9, I’m not alone in headcanoning that zim was young when he was sent there. They essentially raised him, but unfortunately the irken empire has its claws deep in zim and we all know how tragically that ends. But before all that, I like to think that things were actually nice for a long time. Zim probably has the closest thing to a childhood that an irken has received in hundreds, or even thousands of years.

As for the vortians, the only vortian we Know is Lard Nar, and his name is well known as a Thai/Lao food dish, so I decided to have a theme of fitting meals for each vortian scientist.

Khao Soi:

Let’s start with her. I by FAR have the most to say about her.

Her name is inspired by a dish known for being complex and balancing several contrasting flavors and textures at once. Easy to see why I picked that one. Originally I had planned to pick an extremely old fashioned, traditional Style meal for her but wound up really liking the sound of this name and theme instead

As the lead researcher of the “brightest minds” working for the irken empire and head of the scientific lab leading such projects as designing the future Massive, I think the lead scientist would know the current state of their “Alliance” with Irk. So aware is she in fact, that she’s quite literally waiting for the penny to drop and for war to break out. Almost nobody is aware of just how controlling the empire has become and how little say Vort has in their current standing with them, but she is, and she understands fully the repercussions for disobeying or underperforming.

She’s incredibly uncomfortable and afraid of any and all irkens and it just gets worse with time, and it seeps over into her relationship with zim. She watches his violent tendencies and proclivity for chaos and destruction and watches the crew try to curb it and make it useful, teach him to use these talents for creative over-the-top inventions more beneficially, and worries. She is afraid of the day he’ll turn on them with the rest of Irk, because no irken could ever resist or deny the empire. It’s in their very coding, and Zim is so loyal to his empire, exactly how they like it.

And she worries too because he’s so clearly different from the other irkens, and that won’t be good for him one day. He cares. So much and about so many things. He’s so excitable over everything, so earnest, always trying to please and be praised and going about it in every possible wrong way. And despite it all he’s gentle, he’s soft, he has a heart that the crew is always feeding and nurturing and helping to grow, and Khao watches and knows it will cause him nothing but pain, grief, and trouble in the future. It will do him more harm than good, coddling him the way they are. There is no place for a caring nature In the Irken Empire. They will strip it out of him and leave him with scars where gentleness once made a home.

And despite herself she does care about him, because he's a child, despite everything she had thought when she was informed she would be gaining an irken coworker. And by Irken standards he may not be considered a smeet anymore. He has been taken from the smeetery and given a job and has been sent off planet, he certainly may feel like an adult. He is certainly intelligent enough to keep up with 6 adults in an incredibly complex job. But to everyone at Station 9 they see him for the child he is. Eventually, that is.

It certainly was a hard pill to swallow to acknowledge that she had been quite cold and snappish to what basically amounts to a toddler. She was the last of the group to accept it as truth in fact, so stubborn in admitting it to herself. It makes it incredibly hard to not feel any instinctive care for him, and only makes her guilt for fearing him so much stronger. It doesn't feel good, fearing a child.

She's not good with children in general, let alone such a complicated one. She already has issues connecting on a personal level with her other employees. She's just too stiff and distant.

Kai Palo tries his best to help her and mediate but he can't snap his fingers and make her magically better at expressing herself. Her solution has always just been to keep her distance from people, and she uses the same method on Zim, despite his desperation to get on her good side and get her to like him. He's always tried to get approval from authority figures and she's just the start of many failures in his life.

He probably never fully realizes how much she did care and the issues were all her own.

She is the reason Irk never found out Zim caused the Miyuki incident.

Kai Palo:

As said above, he's the second in command and takes over keeping the station in check and making sure it runs smoothly.

His name is inspired from a sort of stew. A slight kick to it but very filling and wholesome. What really stuck out to me is that it’s specially stated to also have “rules” to properly eating it; i made him the second in command and sort of the voice of reason, if we’re looking into symbolism here, so it fits that there’s a slight “stiffness” and posturing to it despite it being a hearty kind of meal.

He is incredibly emotionally knowledgeable and mature, knowing how to settle things down when tempers and emotions fly, especially useful given who he's married to. They always matched very well because of his ability to calm her down and ease her temper and knowing it's just part of her and how she knows to express the sheer amount of emotion in her, and this knowledge carries over to all the other employees.

As far as connecting to them all, he understands each person on a deep fundamental level and is easy to get along with everyone but isn't particularly closer to any of them in particular, (excluding his wife). They're all very much on the same level of importance to him; he understands he needs to stay impartial and fair, as the second in command, and keeps a personable relationship to even out Khao Soi's distance and sharpness as the dual leaders of the group. He also tries to soften the blow a bit occasionally on her orders, punishments, and anything in between.

For being as empathetic as he is, he does keep a professional distance and always places the rules and regulations first, before any and all. Employees are still people but they are still employees. He walks that line and balances it very well. If he has been given the chance to exceed Khao Soi as head director of the research facility one day, he would have been fantastic at the job and carried it with immense grace.

As stated he is nearly 50% cybernetic, his arm has any number of uses and tools, as well as his leg and eye. Inspiration taken directly from Silver from Treasure Planet, as stated above, but also automail from Full Metal Alchemist. Highly recommend watching silvers introduction scene for some awesome visuals of the things Kai would be able to do with his limbs.

Not sure how or why he would be so heavily cybernetic, maybe he had an accident at some point of his life, maybe he was born with some disabilities, maybe he was attacked and barely survived, maybe he just did it for fun to himself. Any number of ways for his prosthetics to have become part of him. I just knew from the start with the eye on the original concept sketch that I wanted him to be a cyborg.

He and Zim enjoy comparing cybernetic parts, given the majority of Kai's are external and the majority of Zim's are internal. They will frequently swap information and blueprints and upgrade their respective parts together as a bonding time. Kai is also responsible for a great deal of Zim's patience when it comes to building and experimenting with things. Whereas Lard Nar will try to curb zim's impatience and excitement, but more often then not gets swept up in the chaos instead, Kai will successfully get Zim to give the time he needs to get his projects to be successful.

(The fact that Zim in the show is so impatient for everything except when he's creating something is a very fascinating detail to me. He rushes through nearly everything he has to deal with and yet somehow has the patience in spades for Most Of™️ Gir's antics as well as his machines, inventions, and experiments. I like to imagine he got that from SOMEWHERE, and the Research Lab seems like a very good place for him to have learned that skill for his scientific endeavors specifically)

Pad Ped:

Mama Bear. If you know Izumi Curtis from Full Metal Alchemist you know the type of woman we're talking about here. Cares a whole lot and shows it best through anger and rage.

Her theme and type of meal was picked right from the start based off her concept art, she's always looked like a very angry snappish sort of person based off her expression, so it was the immediate choice to name her off something incredibly spicy and hot. "Intense" chili paste was an immediate sell, and the double P in her name suits all the pink on her incredibly well.

She's so, so spicy and yes so, so sweet. Just don't point out that she's sweet, ever.

At first she was very indifferent to Zim being on the crew, but once she realized he wasn't just an incredibly small Irken, but was in fact a smeet, a CHILD, and nobody had informed the research lab of this fact, she was livid. Without realizing it she became very protective of him, worrying over having a child in the lab and wanting to make sure they didn't Fuck Him Up in the process.

Where Khao Soi isn't good with children, and became very distant with Zim as a result, The Opposite happened with Pad Pen. She had absolutely zero interest in children prior, having no patience for them, but quickly gained a soft spot for Zim and a tenderness that nobody in the lab had known she was capable of having for anyone outside her husband. She will very quickly take Zim's side against Khao Soi if he's gotten into trouble and she's being too harsh, and pushes the blame on Lard Nar not stopping him when they get derailed and start experimenting with dangerous materials. She's a little older than Lard Nar and scolds him quite a bit like a younger brother for not being a little more responsible given how attached Zim is to him.

That's not to say she doesn't hold Zim accountable however. She will scold him herself once Khao Soi isn't within earshot, and often is the one catching and yelling at he and Lard Nar when they're getting up to something they shouldn't be, but she's much gentler about it than the director . She's much more a tough love type of person.

Coral Anne looks up to her a great deal and thinks she's "just the COOLEST!!" and she watches out for the young girl herself as well. As stated, Zim adores her vicious nature and feistiness, I could see him exercising with her as their own bonding time and showing her some Irken fighting moves. She'd likely enjoy sparring and fighting for fitness.

She's by far the kindest and most patient with Grimmick, given how much of a softie he is. She harsher with her own husband more than she is with Grimmick.

Lard Nar:

I really don't have much to say on him, we all pretty much collectively agree that Zim imprinted on him like a baby duckling and he was swept along for the ride of sudden Fatherhood. I think he refused to admit it however, not wanting to admit that he could be anyone's father figure. Zim being Irken is unaware of what a father truly is as well, so he doesn't have the knowledge or words for what Lard Nar actually is to him. He just knows that Lard Nar is his favorite and he hates upsetting and disappointing him more than anyone.

Based off the little bit that we saw of Lard Nar in his episode, he very much seems like a Follower who was forced to take on the role of being the Leader. He gets swept up in the decisions of everyone else and gets muddled in the process. He seems scatterbrained and hectic, nervous and unprepared for the situation he has found himself in. He takes the advice of people he shouldn't and ABSOLUTELY jumps into things without a plan or even looking first. He feels like he has a bit of a wild streak from that as well, given despite being so scared he is still going through with it. I can see him enjoying the chaos and excitement of the rebellion, he's just bitten off more than he can chew too quickly.

And yet he DOES possess the qualities to become a good Leader. He took charge very well once he found his confidence and got everyone into the escape pods and got away from the Armada successfully. I believe when he buckles down and gets his rhythm he is extremely good at whatever he puts his mind to. All of this can apply to raising Zim very, very easily.

I can see him watching Zim blow things up in the lab and being fascinated by the sheer amount of destruction he managed to do with the small amount of equipment he used. He'd want to see if they can make the explosions even bigger lmao. I also believe he's the third youngest of the whole crew, still just a bit young and reckless.

He's a sense of comfort for Zim, he feels like "home", and I think this description I found for the "Lard Nar" dish sums up how I see him very well.

Grimmick:

First off, inspiration for his name comes entirely from a figure sheet naming him "Grimmikke" that I found while looking for reference pictures on him. I absolutely adored the name so I tweaked the spelling and it's the one I use for the moment, though I do have other options for him as well; i would prefer something related to 3-headed figures for him but nothing feels quite right.

(Side note I unfortunately have had absolutely no luck reverse searching to find the artist of the figure sheet either, I've tried every trick I know)

As for his personality, the brief glimpse we saw of him on the resisty ship had him picking up that one alien a few times that kept falling over, and it just made me feel that he has a very gentle giant nature. Looks out for people, always helping in little ways, that sort of character. Small gestures like that don't go unnoticed, it can be good groundwork for personality.

I imagine he was the first non vortian of station 9 in all honesty, and I think he may be the second oldest as well. He feels like he'd be a good older character with some wisdom when he cares to share it. He puts much more care into Coral Anne and Zim's uniforms than his own, he likely made due for a long time just popping holes in the oversized shirt and got used to it. It doesn't bother him at all, but he makes sure that the other two have their clothes fit their needs once they join the crew.

As the three non vortians they all tend to get along and identify with eachother very easily, Grimmick in particular being very paternal and an immediate mentor towards Coral Anne since she's so young and unsure of herself, and sees the same care and love in Lard Nar once Zim attaches himself to the vortian. He enjoys teasing Lard Nar about being a young single parent and watching him fluster. I'm sure they're very close given he's the only one of the crew we saw with Lard Nar on the ship.

Coral Anne:

I will admit I'm torn between Coral Anne and Pearl for her. Both suit her very well.

You want an easy summary of her personality, it's essentially Bubbles from The Powerpuff Girls. Sweet, loving, eager to help and care, loves cute things, the epitome of sunshine rainbows and kindness with a hidden killer temper buried so deep down even she didn't know she had it.

Like I said, she idolizes Pad Ped a bit.

She just felt like a peppy, quirky, little bit dorky and ditzy character based off the expression the character has in the concept art, and the odd blobs on the head reminded me of bouncy, cute pigtails.

She's quite large and maybe a little clumsy since she has no fingers to her appendages, id imagine the surface of her skin/the water conforms to help grip things and her form is able to do quite a few neat useful things.

As the youngest until Zim arrived, probably the equivalent of a 19 year old or so, she understands the desire to get Khao Soi's approval that Zim is always struggling with, and has quite a bit of fear of the woman herself. She adores Zim, constantly babying and fawning on him like a little brother. He both loves and hates the attention. He adores the praise and affection, but he hates when it gets to the point of treating him like a child, which is something he grows to resent as he gets older, from everyone.

He hates being coddled more than anything.

Coral Anne loves seeing the things Zim creates from a healthy distance. His inventions and creations tend to go awry for one reason or another and she has a tendency to go a little non corporeal from the fright, so it's just best if she is safely placed behind the largest thing in the room (Grimmick). It doesn't stop her from appreciating his creativity and ingenuity however, she's particularly fond of Cthulhu and adores the little horror blob to bits.

For a long time I think they all had a very nice thing going, I think it was possibly the happiest Zim was in his life, but good things never last. Accidents happen, tragedies strike, the Irken Empire is never far behind. But even a century later, long after they're all a distant memory, Zim still retains several personality traits he gained from his time around these 6. Little things, little habits, the way he acts or things he does.

It's just always been worth something to me that in the trial, despite ALL the scientists being present, nobody ratted Zim out as the cause of Miyuki's death.

Did nobody tell on him? Did they all keep quiet and agree to never share what happened? They DIDNT TELL on him, and with how much everyone in the universe hates Zim, I think that means something.