Zim was taken aboard the Massive and given a more thorough look over. There had been a great deal of stress laid upon Zim, apparently, and his body didn't seem to be taking it well, so at the advice of the doctors Zim was given a luxurious room to stay in. The room came complete with a bigger than needed bed, a sofa with many comfy cushions, a matching chair that could either rock or not, the setting controlled by a lever on the side, a small mini fridge, and lighting fixtures everywhere that were more for decoration than anything, along with other bedroom furniture.

This was, of course, all for show. This was an ambassador's suite, for when the Tallests had those important meetings with other races. Not that they had many of those so there weren't any excuses as to why Zim couldn't relax there.

Zim, of course, loved every minute of this arrangement. This was what he'd wanted all along. Some respect, some sort of fine treatment. Of course it wasn't really him that the Tallests were concerned about, it was the baby, but DAMNIT Zim couldn't seem to wipe that smile off his face!

Though he was, naturally, worried. He knew he'd be disposed of once the baby was born, and for another thing he needed to get back to Dib before then! No doubt the human was already worrying. But Zim was being shown around the ship and followed by a procession of guards. He'd have to escape some other time.

Once everything had been arranged Zim was put in his room and locked in there. Guards were positioned outside of the door and several teams of them patrolled the hall ways. Apparently the Tallests wanted to be sure the room was getting some use.

Zim paced anxiously. There was no way, no way he would make it three months like this. Locked in a room with nothing to do but think and eat. Not that either of those were bad things, he was just a usually hyperactive creature, and it's usually when someone tried to keep him secluded that bad things happened (Like Horrible Painful Overload Day One.)

Zim moved to lie on the overly plush bed, staring at the ceiling. Irken architecture was not as flawed as humans', so there were no vents he could crawl through or any cranny like that period.

"This is quite the predicament you're in, Zim." He said to himself before sitting up. He stared at the door, and stared at it some more before going over and pounding on it.

"I'm hungry!" He yelled as though angry, which he was, but not because of his stomach. "My blood sugar get's low really easy with a parasite living in my stomach!"

One of the guards outside could be heard grumbling to the other as he marched off to go get the whiney irken some food.

Zim smirked. He kneeled down and began to hack the keypad that was now in front of his face. He put in the most likely sequences of random numbers, getting the door to swish open for him in four minutes.

He grinned victoriously as this caught the remaining guard by surprise.

The slightly smaller irken jumped and turned to raise his shocky stick at Zim, but the taller was quick to point out, through use of his pointer finger, that he was pregnant, and when the guard began to hesitate he kicked the smaller in the face before dashing down the hall.

It didn't take very long for the guards that were on patrol to apprehend him.

"That's ok." Zim thought to himself with a grin as he was escorted back to his room. "That was just a trial run."

Dib woke up that morning with a horrible sinking feeling. That feeling came from the fact that he'd woken himself up, instead of being woken up an hour ago to his irken lover bent double and groaning from stomach pains.

The human sat up quickly and looked at the bed next to him, then around. There... was no alien lover. No Zim.

In a panic Dib leaped from bed and checked the bathroom, then his sister's room (this only ended with her waking up and throwing something at him.)

He checked the cafeteria, the labs, the med bay. Zim couldn't be found.

"DAD!" Dib called, running into the special Membrane Labs section of the space station. "Dad! Zim's missing I can't find him any-"

"Anywhere?" Membrane asked, almost looking like he wasn't paying attention. "On the station."

"What?" Dib asked, looking around confused. That's when it dawned on him. "What did you do!?"

"Me? Nothing." Membrane finally turned to his son, giving the boy his full attention. "He left."

Dib paused to let this information sink in. "Left? Like, just-...?"

"He left your room, snuck into the docking bay (though sneak is a term I use loosely) and took his ship and left." Membrane explained.

"No!" Dib shouted, shaking his head. That couldn't be true, Zim wouldn't just leave him! "You're lying! Why would you do that!?"

"I'm not lying." Membrane said in a commanding tone. "Go check the security feeds yourself."

Dib's form shook. Why would Zim leave? Why!? They had something good! Sure he was sick now but-....

Dib gasped and ran to find Nils.

"Nils! NILS!" He cried loudly, banging on the door to her room.

There was a sound of quiet rustling behind the door and a sharp squeak accompanied the sound of a trip. Finally though she made it to the door, looking annoyed, tired, but in one piece.

"Wha- what?" She mumbled, rubbing a tired eye.

"Nils, I need to see the sonogram again. Whatever it is, was, whatever it was that Zim was sick with... we'd found it but... he ran off. I think he went back to the Empire to have it taken care of!" Dib explained, voice pleading.

"Good," She mumbled, glaring slightly. "He's out of our hair, so to speak."

"Nils!" Dib pleaded. "You have to help me! We have to figure out what was wrong with Zim!"

"No," She said, her mouth curving into a deep frown. "Look, I said I'd take a look, but I didn't see anything. Zim is just doing what Zim does. Being unfailingly loyal to the Tallest at the expense of those around him. It's his MO. I tried to warn you, but you wouldn't listen. Now you have to deal with this broken heart of yours."

"Nils, PLEASSE. They'll kill him!" Dib exclaimed. He was being so loud though that people were starting to peak their heads out of their rooms.

"Good!" Someone shouted, but they didn't get time to say anything else as Dib whirled on them and clocked them in the eye, not even caring who it was. He then quickly turned back to Nils.

"I'll do ANYthing!"

Nils stared at Dib, mouth agape before scowling and saying, "Fine. But if anything comes around that looks like even remotely good technology I want it. I wasn't trained for this obsolete technology of yours."

"Deal!" Dib said, suddenly grinning like a mad man. He waited for her to get dressed as the crowd began to creep back into their rooms, shooting Dib glares, one of which was housed by a black eye.

Zim leaned his head against the wall to his right as he sat at a small table that had been provided for him in his room, not touching the food in front of him. He'd been trapped in that room for a month. He wasn't even let out for the bathroom, being that there was one attached to the room. Even the doctors came to HIM when it was time for a checkup and Zim thought he was going to go insane!

Well, more insane.

And what of Dib?

Zim's heart gave a lurch. His human... he probably hated him.

'I should have left a note.' He thought to himself. 'I should have left something.'

Or maybe he just shouldn't have left? That thought crossed his mind a few times, but he always came back to the same conclusion. No, he had to leave. Dib didn't want a child, so he couldn't force that on the human.

One month, two months. Zim counted on his fingers. How long had he been pregnant now? Almost three months? It should be close to being born at this point, right? Or... laid was a much more accurate description of how irkens gave birth. They laid pouches of usually two or three eggs when their body could no long house them, and then they were separated into their own incubation tubes and were hatched in there, then born (born being the name for the process in which the computer cracks open their incubation tube and they are fitted with a pak.)

According to the doctor at that point Zim's egg pouch only contained one egg, which was rather good for Zim, being that the doctors had to cut him open and pull the egg pouch out. The smaller the hole, the better it would be for Zim.

He felt at his stomach as he ate, idly chewing some kind of goop that he was provided with. It tasted nasty but was supposedly full of nutrition. There was something odd about the way his stomach felt, like, there was something pushing against it from the inside. He was pretty sure that wasn't supposed to happen but he ignored it, all but for the occasional rub, just to make sure it wasn't a tumor or something.

The third month marker came and went and since then Zim had tried to escape five times. He'd manipulated the guards to try and sneak out twice, tried to break through the bathroom walls, only to end up in an actual ambassador's room (to his credit Zim knew that was a stupid idea, he was just desperate. They were both provided new rooms for Zim's effort.) And he'd even almost gotten the doctor's to unlock the door for him a couple of times, but, in the end, he always ended up back behind a door and guards.

But something was wrong; him and the doctors all knew it. Three months was the maximum times something like that should last. All the tests showed that both Zim and the smeet were healthy, and yet something was wrong and Zim should have gone into the irken equivalent of labor by that point!

When five months came around the doctors were considering inducing their own labor on Zim and making the smeet be laid. After all, Zim was male, maybe his body just wasn't telling him it was time like female bodies did.

They were horrified when, as they were giving serious thought to it, Zim was suddenly wracked with pain.

"Shit! What's happening!?" He cried, clutching at his stomach, face screwed up in intense pain. One of the doctors quickly pulled up a scanner and began to examine Zim's stomach.

"It-it's hatching!" He cried, moving so the other doctors could see as well.

In the egg pouch was a round, solid object, cracked and broken in some areas. Shell pieces, showing up bright on the scanner, were digging into the egg pouch and around organs; causing Zim's pain and more were breaking off.

"How is this possible!?" One cried.

"I don't know, I don't know!"

"Should we get Zim to surgery!?"

"No, no, we can't do that! If we expose the smeet too soon-!"

Voices ran together as more of the egg broke and dug into sensitive organs. After an egg is laid and incubated the liquid in the tube was supposed to dissolve the shell, since the smeet, not being alive yet, couldn't break through it themselves.

"It's alive." Zim gasped, sitting up slightly from the bed. "It's breaking through the shell, it's alive!"

The doctors all paused and looked back at the monitor. He was right. There was a little, three clawed fist sticking out through the shell, clawing at it and trying to get out.

"There's nothing for it then." One said. "We can't even get into there to remove the shell pieces. It's alive but it's not fully developed."

"But it HURTS!" Zim protested.

"Sorry, but the smeet comes first." Another doctor argued. "We will, however, give you something for the pain. Your body will take care of the fragments on its own."

Zim gave a groan as one doctor stuck him in the arm with more pain killers. These weren't the dizzying kind, he was thankful to learn, but they still made him feel sick.

Two more months passed and Zim's belly grew an abnormal amount for just a short period of time. Of course, any amount of weight gain was weird to a race who's health food was sugary sweets, but this was a degree of unconventional that made even Zim worry.

He'd grown at least five inches around the waist, but just forward, leaving him with ugly trails of stretch marks because his skin was not meant to stretch like that. The baby, apparently, kept growing in the irken tummy. Not by much, but by enough that every movement the smeety made as noticeable as if Zim was holding the thing in his arms.

Zim sat on the counter in the rather large bathroom he was provided with, running a marker over his stomach boredly. He had nothing better to do, and he found the marker in the nightstand drawer.

Boredom+marker+pregnant belly= a weird array of drawings and chemical formulas.

The door to the adjoining room swished open and Zim gasped, throwing the marker into the shower quickly and pulling his shirt down over his stomach.

"Zim!?" Barked the familiar voice of Tallest Red as he floated around the room, looking for him.

Zim tripped over himself getting out of the bathroom and asking, "What!?"

Purple almost said something about Zim's lack of salute when he realized he didn't care. As long as the defect was getting what he deserved after they got his smeet.

"How did that last check up go?" Red asked, almost like he was concerned. Which he was, just not about Zim.

Zim scowled. "Fine, fine. No damage was done to the smeet from the hatching and the shell fragments have all worked their way out of my system, causing no damage to me, meaning no damage to the smeet."

Zim hesitated before adding, "You could have asked the doctors this."

"Oh we did." Red said with a small smirk, Purple joining him when he realized what his partner was referring to.

Zim looked confused. "What?"

"We'd like you to go to the med bay now." Purple said, steepling his fingers.

Zim shook his head. "Why?"

"Just do so." Red commanded. "Or we'll have you dragged there."

Zim was lead to the med bay and the doctor pulled a scanner out, humming as he looked the smeety over.

"Yes, it should be fine."

"What!?" Zim suddenly snapped. "What should be fine?"

"I'll start the procedure." The doctor told Red and Purple, ignoring Zim as he was told to do.

Zim looked around in panic.

"You see Zim." Red began."We don't like you... pretty much at all. So we decided to birth the smeet a LITTLE prematurely. That way we can get rid of you faster."

Zim stared at his Tallests a moment before yelling obscene things at them. He quickly had to be restrained and tied down to the bed when he tried to lunge at the two tall leaders.

"You're going to kill me! You're just going to take what you want from me then kill me! It's not fair! You can't do this! I won't be erased!"

"Nighty, night." Purple said gleefully as a wire was hooked up to Zim's pak and he was sent into a dreamless sleep.

When Zim woke up he was cold, and starving, and uncomfortable. His antennae twitched against metal and he rolled over to see that he'd been lying on a floor in the prison hold. His whole body was in pain, but he could tell most of it was centered around his torso.

Zim's eyes widened and he sat upright and pulled his shirt up to see a line of paste, holding together his skin from just below his ribs, down to almost his hip on his right side. The smeet! They've taken the smeet!

'Wait, calm down, that's good, right?' He thought to himself, leaning his back against the wall and pulling his knees up. 'You wanted to get rid of it anyway. Now you can go back to Dib!'

But something about this just wasn't right. He'd heard of irken mother's defecting sometimes, wanting to keep their child, like some old fashioned religious.

Zim shook his head. He was being stupid, he didn't need the smeet. Just Dib, all the irken needed was Dib.

"For crying out loud!" Red yelled over the small and yet incredibly noisy smeet. They hadn't been able to do any sort of research on the young irken because it kept crying these horrible stinging acid tears and doing just anything in it power to hinder their examination. They couldn't even fit it was a pak until they did some testing, but it wouldn't let them!

The smeet, a boy, it was discovered, cried continuously, and in the three days it was alive it wouldn't eat anything. And what was worse it looked almost exactly like Zim, but with bright orange eyes, so it was all either Tallest could do not to be tempted to kill it!

"Shut him up!" I don't care if you have to force feed him! Just make it stop crying!" Purple wailed, almost on the verge of sobbing himself.

"Nothing's working!" The caretaker cried, bouncing the smeet on her lap. She was in charge of taking care of the smeet for his special training, but nothing she was doing seemed to make him feel better.

"It's a mixed breed!" A doctor yelled. "Maybe-" He gulped audibly. "Maybe Zim would know enough of the other race to know what it needs!"

"Zim!" Red shouted, smashing his gauntlet into a wall and denting it. He hesitated a moment before yelling, "FINE! Go get him!"

Zim was left alone, completely alone for three days, and the entire time a longing grew in him. Not just for food, which he was deprived of. But, thoughts began to float through his head. What did it look like? What was its gender? Was he at all human?

He gasped as he was jerked from his thoughts with the door slamming open and one of the doctors ran up to his cell.

"You!" Zim hissed, throwing himself at the bars of his cell. "You took my smeet away!"

"Shush, shush," The doctor said, lowering his voice to try and make Zim listen. "Look, something's wrong with the smeet. We need to know what race the other parent was."

Zim scowled. "I'm not telling you! Not unless you let me see the smeet!"

The doctor, to Zim's surprise, nodding and had the guard unlock the cell. Slowly the doctor lead Zim to the Tallests' lounge, where the smeet and his caretaker and the Tallests were all hanging out, trying to make the smeet eat something.

The moment he saw his crying smeety... boy, Zim lunged, snatching him from the arms of the pretty female caretaker.

"What's wrong with you people!?" He yelled, this had everyone shutting up, including the smeet, who didn't make any noise other than little hiccupping whimpers. "You can't just take a smeet away from its birther like that! Serves you right! Having to deal with all that crying!"

The baby babbled something, which only had Zim responding with an, "I know! Stupid people!"

The Tallests gave each other quick glance as Zim sat himself down and began to feed the smeet the food that the caretaker had tried to give him, the smeet eagerly accepting the mush, barely coordinated enough to open his mouth, much less feed himself.

It was astonishing for any irken to watch. At every little thing the smeet did Zim's antennae would perk and he'd smile, and visa verse. They were enamored with each other and the mighty leaders of the irken race were at a loss as to what to do.

"We can't let him stay Red, we can't!" Purple whined softly, under his voice.

"We have to! This could save our race!" Red argued.

"No, our race is fine! I'm more worried about our LIVES!"

"We're the Tallests! We're supposed to worry about our race!"

"You worry about the race! I'm not gonna let him kill us!"

"Purple, you're being paranoid again. Look, it's just until the smeet understands that we can be friends too. Then you can kill him yourself!"

Purple hesitated. "Really?"

"Yes, really." Red said, crossing his arms.

Purple thought about this a moment before sighing and saying, "Fiiiiine."

"Good." Red said, walking over to Zim with a wide grin and announcing, "GOOD NEWS!"