Adaptations

Chapter 1 – A Series of Failed Experiments

It was just any ordinary day at the Skool on Earth. Ms. Bitters was teaching the kids about something crude about the human body, often referencing discomforting things that none of the kids wanted to hear. Zim didn't seem to be too fazed by the uncomfortable comments, but that was mainly because he had already done his research on the human body when he went over to Earth.

Zim, losing interest in the lecture, propped his legs up onto the desk. He felt the need to fall asleep since he had been up all night devising a new plan to invade the Earth, but he knew he had to stay awake to watch one of his plans unfold.

He kept his eyes on Ms. Bitters, but then something hit him on the left side of his head. He let out a light grunt and looked over to see that Dib was glaring at him. Zim simply rolled his eyes and looked down to see a crumpled piece of paper lying right next to his desk. He picked it up and unraveled it. There was a message:

"Zim," it read. "You look very proud of yourself today. What's the plan to destroy the Earth this time? You DO know that it's going to fail like all of your other pathetic plans."

Zim sighed. He grabbed his pencil and sloppily wrote, "Zim doesn't know what you're talking about. And even if Zim devised a plan, then it would be brilliant and well-designed and is bound to cause serious damage." Zim put his pencil aside and re-crumpled the paper. He tossed it back to Dib when Ms. Bitters' back was turned.

It didn't take long for the message to be returned. "You have terrible writing, you know that? And it WILL fail. I'll make sure of that, and then I'll expose you to everyone."

Zim gave a light chuckle. He simply wrote "Silly human doesn't bother Zim!" before tossing it back to Dib. He gave him ample time of a few moments to read that message before messing with a device attached to the glove on his wrist. He pressed a few buttons and then a whirring sound was heard from the top of the room. Zim looked up and smirked. His plan was in motion.

The whirring sound grew a bit louder until eventually it stopped immediately, creating an eerie silence before a sloshing sound was heard. Zim had installed little tubes on the ceiling that dropped mud on everyone in the room but him when he gave the command. Even Ms. Bitters was covered from head to toe with mud. He looked around at his "dirty" work and smiled.

"Oh, my," Zim said with his fake innocent tone. "Don't you all look so messy, except for ZIM! You all should probably get washed-up before someone catches you for being so FILTHY!"

Ms. Bitters grunted. "Yes, thank you Zim for that wonderful announcement." She pointed to the door. "Everyone out. Don't come back until you're spotless, but don't you dare leave skool grounds."

Zim smirked as he kicked his feet onto the desk. Ms. Bitters opened the door and walked out. Only… she didn't walk into the hallway like everyone expected her to. In fact, the minute that she walked through the doorway, she disappeared.

Dib saw this immediately and blinked. "Did anyone else see that? Ms. Bitters just disappeared through the door."

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about, Dib," Zim said. "Who would want to listen to a stupid human boy like you?"

"Yeah, what Zim said," a boy said before walking through the door and disappearing as well. One-by-one, students walked through the door. Dib was aghast, but wasn't entirely shocked by the behavior. He was used to getting ignored.

"Alright, well… great," Dib said. "What did you do with them, Zim?"

Zim chuckled before standing up and putting his face up close to Dib's. "Zim is not fond of telling his plans to the stupid earthling boy, but you're about to go crazy, so Zim will spare your curiosity just this once. That door is a portal to the almighty room with a moose. I believe your classmates are being driven MAD right now."

Dib chuckled. "Well, thanks for getting rid of them for me," he said. "They've been making a mockery of my life anyways, so I'm glad they're gone."

Zim laughed. "Hah!" He smirked at Dib. "You're going to join them, stupid human." Zim's mechanical arms came out of his PAK, and wrapped themselves around Dib.

Dib yelped and tried to fend off the arms, but he couldn't manage to keep them away. They ensnared him and picked him up. "Zim, stop! What are you doing?"

"Finishing this, Dib boy!" Zim yelled. He centered Dib with the door and prepared to throw him in. "Say hi to the moose for me."

"Zim, no!"

Zim didn't listen to Dib's yells. He threw Dib in without a second thought about him. When he passed through the door, Dib's yells were no longer heard and the room remained silent with Zim.

"Hehehehehe," Zim cackled. "Victory!" He ran to the door and shut off the teleporter, making it a regular door again. He smiled. "No more stupid school kids to get in Zim's way anymore, and especially… no DIB!" Zim let out his trademark laugh.

He continued to laugh until he eventually felt a slight burning on his shoulder. "Ah!" He yelled as he fell to the ground.

It was Dib. He had a wet hand after getting cleaned up in the bathroom and had placed it on Zim's shoulder.

"W-what?!" Zim exclaimed. "Impossible. You should be in the room with the moose!"

Dib rolled his eyes and sighed. "That little teleporter of yours brought us into the cafeteria. I think you missed the room with the moose by… oh, I don't know, A FEW LIGHT YEARS!"

Zim growled and walked outside of the door before anyone could see. "Uuurgh, I can't believe Zim messed up so much. Mark Zim's words, Dib. I will get rid of you."

Dib touched Zim's arm with his wet hand again, making him sizzle a bit. "Yeah, I'd like to see you try."

Zim got his arm away from Dib and yelled from the pain of the burning. He ran down the hallway, avoiding Ms. Bitters' class in the hallway as he left the Skool.

Dib sighed and returned to his seat, his palm in his face. In most cases, he would simply say that Zim's plan just failed, but the plan was so much of a failure that he wondered if it was intentional. He thought for a moment, planning his next investigation of Zim… and his revenge for throwing him into the portal.

The rest of the week seemed to puzzle Dib even more. There was a routine to each day from Tuesday to Friday for Zim. He would walk into class, kick his feet up onto the desk, wait a couple of hours, and then unleash a scheme of his that either didn't seem very intuitive or was just downright terrible. Zim would then leave school early to return to his house and devise a new plan for the following school day.

The only difference between each day was that Zim was slowly beginning to fade a bit. He began to look a little pale; a little tired. His confidence was faltering, and he was running out of witty things to comeback all of Dibs' remarks. He even remained silent on Friday when Dib went on a huge rant, saying that Zim was an alien. No one listened to him of course.

Dib's mind was boggled a bit. He wondered why Zim was being so persistent, yet not so clever.

Monday rolled around and Dib expected the cycle to restart again, but something was a bit different. Zim walked into class slowly, and as soon as he reached his seat, he sat down and laid his head onto the desk.

Dib had no idea how to respond to that, and was even more curious when Zim began to make soft breathing noises with his mouth, showing that he was beginning to fall asleep.

For whatever reason, this irritated Dib. Zim wasn't being himself, and he was about to get to the bottom of it. He walked up to Zim's desk and pounded his fist onto it, making sure to make a loud noise to wake Zim up.

"W-what?!" Zim exclaimed as his head flew up. He then glared at Dib. "Why did you do that?!" he yelled.

"Getting a little tired, Zim?" Dib asked, still a bit irritated.

"Zim hasn't been getting his sleep," Zim said with a yawn. "That's none of your concern though, Dib."

Dib grunted. "It is my concern. I'm trying to save the human race, and you being tired concerns me. You must've been up all night devising a plan to destroy us like you've been doing all week."

"Dib, lay off him," a girl close-by said. "He's just got the case of the Mondays like we all do."

"Shut up!" Dib exclaimed. "I'm trying to save you, too."

"Silence!" Zim yelled. "Dib's incessant yelling is making Zim's head hurt. I'll give you ten seconds to go back to your seat, or Zim will give Dib what the humans call a swirly in the bathroom. It will be most unpleasant."

Dib grunted. "Fine." He returned to his seat and returned his glare back to Zim. "But if you do anything even relatively fishy, then I'll be here to stop you."

Zim growled. "Nonsense. Zim has not done anything to involve himself with fish."

Dib rolled his eyes, finding it both amusing and saddening that Zim still didn't have a grip on some of the Earth terminology, even after being there for nearly a year.

The day went as normal. Once the bell rang, Zim stood up and began to walk home. He didn't even have to look behind himself to know that Dib was right behind him, spying on him as he walked.

Zim walked into his home and was greeted by his "robot parents" and was later greeted by Gir who was, as always, watching something silly on TV while chewing on a piece of cheese pizza. He turned around for a brief moment and noticed Dib spying on him through his window.

Zim sighed as he popped out his "eyes" and hair and turned to Gir. "Gir, will you tell the Dib-boy to get lost. I would not like to deal with him right now."

"Okay!" Gir exclaimed in his cheery voice. He got off the couch and ran towards the door.

Zim then turned back around and went to his room. He rolled up his sleeves and then slowly sat down on his bed. "Honestly… Zim doesn't understand why stupid Dib is so keen on yelling at him when he is so tired. Zim hasn't even done anything wrong… yet."

He yawned and laid down in the bed, making sure that he wasn't too uncomfortable since he had to avoid sleeping on his PAK. He closed his eyes and began to fall asleep.

Just outside of the room, Dib was spying in through the window. He had given Gir a little piggy in order for him to leave him alone (he was often prepared like that).

He looked in through the glass and simply watched as Zim slept. He sighed, almost bored by the turn of events. Dib climbed down from the house, making sure that he didn't fall.

"I can't believe it… Zim's really starting to fail as an invader," Dib whispered to himself. "He hasn't done anything even a little successful in weeks."

Dib climbed off, and looked back at the house. He smirked a bit before turning around and saying to himself, "Maybe Zim just needs a little reminder of what he's doing on this planet in the first place. I'll have a niiiiiice surprise for him when he gets into class tomorrow." Dib laughed to himself, almost feeling a bit dirty for fighting back against Zim. He didn't often throw the first punch in these wars. At this point, these fights with Zim were a game to him. And he was determined to win.