A/N: Another short, but fairly eventful chapter, with another minor deviation from canon in it.

Zerinim: (zair-ih-nim) male name of Irken origin, meaning: world destroyer (contraction of 'ze' (zay), world, and 'rinimikk' (rih-nim-ick), destroyer). As mentioned elsewhere Irkens often shorten their names to a single syllable upon reaching a certain age, traditionally by combining the first letter with the last syllable, though lately they've taken more liberties. The most common alterations of 'Zerinim' are as follows: Rin, Rim, Nim, Zer, and Zim, though this last is rarely used in recent years due to its negative connotations. Tip: If you are planning to call your baby Zim, make sure you keep him fairly sheltered, as the teasing will shortly become quite terrible. Aside To Earth Parents: It's a bit like naming your baby Hitler.
~Starscapes Publishing, 'The Universal Baby Name Book,' circa 2046

He's a real nowhere man
Sitting in his nowhere land
Making all his nowhere plans
For nobody
~The Beatles, 'Nowhere Man'

7:21 AM

The trip back home was fairly uneventful. Zim's guidance chip led him right to his base, and he immediately set upon reprogramming his new robot.

His first step was to remove the old programming. He successfully did so, then he was suddenly interrupted by the computer informing him a brick had just flown through the window in the living room.

He ran upstairs to find it on the floor with a piece of paper wrapped around it. The paper read-

Zidiot
I has GIR
Meet me at skool
-YOU NO WHO D

"WHO?" Zim cried, frantically searching the note for any clues to the writer's identity. He bent his head and swept the tips of his antennae over the piece of paper- then promptly recoiled, gagging, at the strong human smell.

There was only one human Zim knew who smelled that terrible. He bared his teeth, pressing his antennae to his head.

12:01 PM

Dib poked at his food, frowning. It was ketchup-and-rice day.

He was trying to decide which would be worse, going hungry or spending the next hour in the bathroom, when he had a sudden misgiving and glanced sideways to see Zim seated next to him on the bench, glowering up at him. His scales were darkish green in the middle, but paler and more yellowy at the edges. Huh. Cool.

"Where's GIR?" he demanded.

"My house," Dib said calmly, loading his fork. He wasn't all that surprised to see Zim, despite the fact that he'd been missing all morning... he'd waited until recess to show up yesterday, so logic dictated that he might do something similar today. And lo, he had.

"Give him back."

"Oh, you're not just getting him back without a fight, Zim." He took a liberal mouthful of ketchup-and-rice.

"What do you want from me?" he snapped, grabbing Dib's sleeve. He didn't react.

"Okay, listen. When you bit me, it did something weird to me. And it made you sick."

"I'm not sick. I'm fine."

"You need my help and I need yours. Come over to my house after skool and we'll work on it. And if you don't trick me, you can have GIR back."

He continued eating. Zim glared at him. "You expect me to just give in to your demands?"

"That'd be smart," he said simply.

"No it wouldn't! Your demands are STUPID!"

"It'd be in your best interest to go along with me."

Zim's eyes narrowed. "How do you know what my best interests are?"

Dib was careful to remain expressionless. "Well, one of them is to not die."

Zim got to his feet. (Dib noticed his hands were trembling.) "I'll see you after skool, Dib-stink," he hissed.

12:11 PM

Oh, now what...

Zim kicked at a rock. It went skittering into the road.

Folding his skinny arms over his chest he reran the conversation in his mind. Dib had GIR. Dib wanted Zim to help him with some sort of condition he had. Dib had offered to give him GIR and help cure the toxin if his demands were met.

Zim did not want to help Dib. However, he couldn't just retrieve GIR by force. He was ill and weak, and not up to a physical battle with the (as much as it pained him to admit it) larger, stronger Dib-monkey. He didn't currently have any non-broken weapons but his Paklegs.
Also, maybe he needed the help...

He pulled his Invader medallion out of his pocket and held it in the palm of one hand, scowling. No, he didn't need help, he was an Invader! A thought struck him and he pulled out the communicator from his Pak. "GIR! Come in, GIR!"

"Hello! Wheee!"

Zim's eyes widened. "GIR! Where are you?"

"Dibby's basement! We's having a tea party!"

Another voice cut in. "I will destroy you, GIR..."

"Gazzy's helpin! Whee!"

"Forget the tea party! I want you home, GIR! Now!"

"Teeeea!"

And he hung up.

Zim paused on the curb and began to soundly bludgeon himself about the head. This was, on occasion, the only way to deal with a conversation with GIR.

His thoughts thus cleared he turned the corner and headed into his house. Obviously GIR would be no help in this situation. Hmm, what to be done...

As he entered the base, the disembodied voice of the computer rang out above him.

"Hey, master? That thing you brought home this morning is awake. She's wandering around the lab asking me stupid questions."

Zim looked up, frowning. "Thing?"

"That robot." The computer didn't often sound unsettled, but it did now. Just a little bit, but it was there. "The one from the Alliance."

"It woke up? It wasn't supposed to do that," he mused.

"Yeah, and she's poking around. You should stop her."

"It's a she?" Since when could a robot be 'she'? Then again, GIR and Minimoose could apparently be 'he'...

"To some extent, yeah."

Zim headed into the toilet.

12:15

He entered the lab to see the small robot standing there, looking about her. Her posture was stiff and rather military in character. (Now that he was looking out for it, her design was sort of feminine... sort of. Really more... tin-can than anything.)

"So. You're back online," he said.

She whipped around, slapping a spot on her wrist. It took him a moment to realize what she was doing, then he chuckled. "I thought you might try to attack me. I thought it would be in your inferior defense programming. So I disabled your weapons."

She was silent for a moment, giving him time to muse over why on Irk someone had thought it a good idea to install a weapon in the wrist. Weird place for one.

"What language are we speaking?" she asked. (And the voice was indeed female. Huh. Okay, then. Go figure.) He stared at her for a moment, dumbstruck by her stupidity, then he remembered she'd been programmed with an unfamiliar language when he'd looked into her coding and he'd downloaded the English language into her brain from his Pak. "English."

Another pause, she seemed to be chewing this over.

"You called me inferior?" she asked finally.

"Obviously," he rasped, tossing his head.

"I'll have you know I'm the most sophisticated machinery ever to come out of Star Command!" she snapped. "I am not inferior!"

He rolled his eyes. Like he cared. "Pfft. Star Command. Nothing Star Command can turn out can possibly come close to Irken technology."

"Irken?" she said slowly. "Then you are Irken."

"Of course!" he snapped. "What else would I be?"

She said nothing, fixing him with a look of clear, deep-seated distrust. He met her stare boldly.

"Who are you?" she said finally.

"Zerinim." He blinked, disconnected surprise coming into his eyes. He hadn't been called by his full name in over a century. In fact, he hadn't spoken it himself in that long... something about her had called it to mind. "But to you I am ZIM! INVADER Zim! Or sir. Or master." He raised his left foot and scratched the back of his right leg with it. "Cuz... that's what I am now. Your master." She gave him a disapproving stare. He scowled at her. "So I would suggest treating me with respect."

"You don't own me," she said with a toss of her head. "Star Command does. They'll come after me any time now. So you have wasted your time, 'Zim'."

He snorted laughter. "Foolish unit! Do you know where you are?"

Her small mouth pursed into a frown. "Admittedly no. But I'll be found. I'll be found soon."

He grinned. It was partly, it must be said, a grin of relief. Zim had sort of been worrying that GIR might not come back- not that much, but some.
Now, however, he didn't have to worry. When he'd been examining this robot's programming he'd found she was mainly built to be a weapon. Quite a strong weapon. He'd disabled her guns but he judged she was still sorta weapon-minded, and if he could turn her to his ally (and of course he could!) he could just send her in to retrieve GIR. And if Dib destroyed her somehow, whatever. She wasn't... his-his. GIR was his-his. GIR was one of Zim's possessions and Dib just couldn't have him. That was it.

He stalked around her in a circle, observing her reaction. She was wary, but not outright fearful. That could be good or bad, someone afraid of him wouldn't fight back, but might be too paralyzed by their fear to obey orders. (Also, he didn't realize this consciously, but someone too afraid to do much would cease to hold Zim's interest and he might outright forget they were there.)

"You happen to be out on the other side of the Galactic Federation," he informed her finally. "No one will be coming for you. No one even knows where you are."

"You expect me to believe you?" she hissed.

"Oh, you'll find you have no choice."

Her probing gaze went over his face again, and once again he met it without a trace of discomfort. She looked away. He drew the conclusion she was accepting defeat (and for once, he was correct, to a small degree).

"What are you called?" he demanded.

"MALIK." She made a face. "Sir."

A/N: A WILD CROSSOVER FEMALE FAN CHARACTER APPEARED!

Yeah, I could have warned for that, but then even less people would be reading this. So. Ha. I'm sneaky.

Buh-bye 'til tomorrow now.