A/N available on Ao3 at Brickmaster_Guy

It had been a few days since Zim and Dib's mission on the Massive. So much had happened during their departure from Earth, and it was taking quite a while to recoup after it all. Zim continued to keep from going to school, which was really only noticed by Dib. The communication lines Zim had set up with Dib's phone as they prepared for their attack were particularly useful; not for any more planning or anything, but simply for talking.

One of the first things Dib had done after returning from the mission was finding and speaking with his father. What more proof of aliens could there be than their largest ship turning up on— But Dib should've expected, after the whole Florpus thing, that his father wouldn't be influenced at all.

Indeed, Membrane claimed he saw some sort of aurora, of fantastic quality. As he explained to the progressively more disappointed Dib, he saw naturally occurring lights in the sky, most likely caused by a geomagnetic storm. When Dib pushed on his claims further, in vain, which Dib knew, Dr. Membrane simply replied that, indeed, if one was to stretch their imagination, it could have resembled some sort of futuristic, massive, alien spacecraft. But there was no value in doing so, and it was just a waste of one's time. Dib relented, knowing that further arguing would accomplish nothing.

Zim's manic and cocky attitude took a dive again. Dib was worried that he might end up in the same state as before— moping incessantly and belittling himself at every turn. But, Zim turned to talking to Dib. He tried to respond to Zim's messages in between classes, making sure to try and provide a strange sort of moral support. And after school, he returned to Zim's base. His house. Dib, with GIR and Minimoose's presence, hung out with Zim as he unsteadily worked through everything mentally.

Years and years of Irken propaganda, dating back an indeterminate number of generations, influenced Zim in ways untold. His language, his goals, his personality, his whole life had been sculpted for a purpose— one that Zim, as a result, was enthusiastic about fulfilling. But Zim, as he had always tried to ignore, was never able to. And it had all culminated in the Massive, with a gun pointed at a nearly crying Purple, with the knowledge that any baseless hopes of good relations with the Tallest were just that: hopes. And it would take a while, years, perhaps, to even begin to erase all of that's influence on him. To stop the worship of the Empire, of the Tallest, and of sacrifices. To erase the decades of ideology embedded within that had held him back while simultaneously classifying him as defective.

And yet still, the things that had happened on the Massive, as well as in Zim's past, were not good in different ways. Zim would have never really paid attention to the people killed as a result of his actions, or to the violence he dealt out. But, increasingly, as he slowly came to understand the new, no, the real normal, he realized how horrible some of the actions were. Dib was clearly affected by it all, and seemed to feel indeterminately guilty and regretful. Zim didn't quite feel those things, but through much extrapolating and thinking, he was beginning to understand, and he was starting to see how much unfettered violence was morally wrong.

But the small patchwork of those around him helped him through trying to reorient 'normal'— not with the violence and killing, though; that was for him to atone for himself. But, serving to help with everything, Dib was a near-constant presence of comfort that aided him in trying to deal with his own self-doubt as well as confirming for Zim what 'normal' was, as he tried to rework its meaning in his head. GIR and Minimoose were simple, unnaturally effective means to take his mind off of it all, and GIR's occasional concern for Zim was strangely comforting in and of itself. Gaz played video games with Zim occasionally, as both a good way to take his mind off of things and an example of what normal was. Zim even spoke with Keef a few times. Zim was still troubled by him and the whole 'friendship' thing, but Dib assured him he'd figure it out eventually if he kept trying.

Back on the Massive, the Tallest and their subservients were yet still handling the job of cleaning up. Despite the threat of assassination, the Tallest had survived through it all, as had the Empire.

Earth, as well as the whole system around it, for good measure, was essentially disconnected from everything else. The region, and any transmissions or signals or anything from there, were blacklisted and desperately ignored. The Empire wouldn't touch that area. Perhaps ever. Indeed, the Tallest had briefly discussed plans to physically put some sort of barrier between them and the Empire— encasing it in some sort of sphere to keep it blocked from everybody else. The Tallest planned to talk about it in depth more later.

The Tallest had their own troubles closer to home. They were still recovering from their injuries, with Red's being particularly nasty. And there was still quite a bit of trauma to deal with; Purple was nearly shot in the head, at the whim of a seemingly uncaring assailant. Red focused on it often, and took it as a warning about Zim. Purple, more affected by it— after all, it happened to him— was beginning to see it as more of a foreboding sort of thing. And with the things the teary-eyed Earthling had shouted in defense of Zim… Purple was planning on discussing certain things about the Empire with Red.

The Empire was a bit unstable after everything. Any semblance of secrecy in Red and Purple's relationship was gone, and it was now commonly known, in open circles, that they were together. That, compared with Zim's path of destruction through the Massive— well, it didn't sit well with Irkens at large. There was rising sentiment that Red and Purple were too weak and not good enough, which was paired with rumors that the Tallest had artificially increased their height, and weren't suited for their positions in the slightest. The Tallest tried to fall back on certain tried-and-true methods; they tried to get the populace brought together in hatred of Zim, and they tried to turn the blame on the soldiers as being unfit for the job. It wasn't clear if it was working, though. The Empire always needed an enemy, but it seemed that the next one might turn out to be its own leaders.

Back on Earth, Zim was thinking. Again, he thought about the issues that had found his weak spots and drilled into them to no end. Zim wasn't an invader. His life's purpose, invalidated. And then again, was that a bad thing? The Empire was, well, it wasn't good. Even that alone was difficult to think about. And even still, he would never be on good terms with the Empire, let alone any present or future Tallest. And while he felt the constant urge to fight back against this thinking, and the knowledge that serving the Empire was good, he couldn't reconcile it with the progressively harder to ignore thinking about what good the Irken Empire actually did.

And that was ignoring the issues Zim had to deal with, now that he accepted his exile. Zim was a permanent resident of Earth, if things kept going the way they were. He would need to figure out permanent plans for living and for what to do. And there was the culture of Earth that he'd need to understand. And just the thought of trying to get what was right in his head was—

"Do you wanna piece of this chocolate bar?" Dib asked, looking over his shoulder, sitting on the ground with GIR, holding a candy bar in his hand.

Zim looked up, having been ripped from his train of thought. Zim smiled. "Of course, Zim would like a piece of the bar!"

Dib broke off a chunk and handed it to Zim who happily began to eat the sweet candy.

"Get your chocolate outta the way," Gaz grumbled, furiously mashing buttons on her controller, trying to get a good look at the TV in front of her.

"...Do you wanna piece?" Dib asked Gaz.

"Yeah." Dib broke off another chunk and handed it to Gaz, who chewed on it while continuing to play, "You know, this game's got multiplayer, Zim."

"Oh, you should try it, Zim! I'm not good at this game, but you might be able to beat her." Dib reached over and grabbed a second controller and placed it in Zim's lap.

Zim looked down at the controller, then back up at Dib, holding GIR up in the air with one hand like a cat. Then, looking to his right, Gaz focused on her game as Minimoose floated in front of the TV. "Tell your moose to get out of the way."

"Minimoose! Move! We're going to play video games now!" Zim swatted. Minimoose squeaked and floated over to Dib, where they bounced off of the back of Dib's head. Zim picked up his controller. "I'm going to win," he smirked, hunching over, ready.

"You need to plug it in first," Gaz explained.

"Oh."