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Being Human	By : RotSeele Category: +G through L > Invader Zim > AU/AR-Alternate Universe-Alternate Reality Views: 2485 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Invader Zim. I do not make any money from this story.

Chapter List
- 1-Being Human
- 2-Two
- 3-Three
- 4-Four
- 5-Five
- 6-Six
- 7-Seven
- 8-Eight
- 9-Nine
- 10-Ten
- 11-Eleven
- 12-Twelve
- 13-Thirteen
- 14-Fourteen
- 15-Fifteen
- 16-Sixteen
- 17-Seventeen
- 18-Eighteen
- 19-Nineteen
- 20-Twenty
- 21-Twenty One
- 22-Twenty-Two
- 23-Twenty-Three
- 24-Twenty-Four
- 25-Twenty-Five
- 26-Twenty-Six
- 27-Twenty-Seven
- 28-Twenty-Eight
- 29-Twenty-Nine (Epilogue)
- 26
- 27
- 28
Twenty-seven - Dib POV
I stared at the empty cavity that was Zim's abdomen. Seerah had opened up his abdomen by cutting her own sutures and peeling back the layers of skin and muscle. She did the same to Zim's chest, displaying bone and his perforated lungs. Under her careful instruction, Gaz had set up an IV in Zim's left arm, providing him with fluids and blood, which meant he'd begun bleeding again, so it was up to me to scoop the blood out of his abdomen and drop it in a little container that purified the blood so Gaz could drain it into plastic bags that would be hung up on the IV pole, in order to be run through Zim's body again.
Seerah was focused on cleaning the edges of Zim's lungs, trying to smooth out the ragged cuts Aevnir's sword had caused. His lungs were still whole, if a bit ragged, so Seerah was focusing on fixing those first, so he could at least breathe. I couldn't comprehend how Zim was still alive when his insides had been torn out, but maybe that was an Irken thing - live long enough to store your memories into your PAK and then die. Maybe because Zim's PAK had been destroyed, there was still something keeping him alive until he could be found and his memories transferred. I didn't know. All I cared about was that he was still alive, even if he was hanging on by a literal thread. There was equipment scattered all around Seerah, including the silver box Gaz had brought. It was opened and turned so I couldn't see what was in it, but Seerah would pause now and then to look at something, then resume sewing up Zim's lungs.
Finally she pulled her hands and the stitching needle out of Zim's chest and leaned to wash her hands clean of blood. She washed the needle too, and the length of string she hadn't used. Then she turned to her silver box, looking at whatever was inside it.
"Seerah?" I asked, trying to get her to tell me what the hell she was waiting for.
She looked at me. "Okay, so, don't get mad and freak out or anything, but honestly, I don't know how to make Irken organs."
I stared. "And?"
"So I'm giving him Puuraki insides."
"And?"
"Well, it's not like they're like yours. I mean, as our outsides evolved so did our insides."
"Right. And? I'm still not seeing why this would freak me out."
Seerah stared at me for a moment, then shrugged. "Okay. And just as a disclaimer, I don't have much practice putting Irkens back together."
"I don't think anyone does," Gaz said. Her sentence seemed oddly unfinished, and I knew why. The only person who could put an Irken back together was the one lying in a state of catatonia on the floor.
"So it just means we're going to see strange looking things." I said.
"Yes." Seerah's answer was too quick, and I frowned at her as that voice of suspicion rose inside my head. I knew there was something she wasn't telling us, but right now, I didn't care. I just wanted Zim put back together and awake.
"Can you just go?" I snapped probably a little harsher than I should have.
Seerah didn't react. "The first part's almost done." She said in a quiet voice. "You can't rush things like this. The organs need to be precise, and there needs to be no chance that the body will reject them. It's not easy."
I stared at her for a moment and then scooped out more blood into the purifier. I wasn't a expert on alien physiology so I had no idea what was really going on from Seerah's end. All I knew was that Zim needed a new squeedlyspooch, veins, arteries, muscles, and skin, to finish it out. Until then, we were still fighting to keep him alive, to keep that tiny faint pulse from stopping entirely.
"Okay," Seerah whispered, "it's ready. Whatever you do, don't shake Zim. In. Any. Way."
I watched as she lifted out of the silver box what looked to be the lower half of an esophagus and the whole stomach. The colors seemed off to me - a bluish grey instead of the grey-brown of the true squeedlyspooch, but then, these organs were meant for a Puuraki body, not an Irken's, however modified it was. She lowered the organ into the cavity and eased it up to the remnants of the squeedlyspooch that hadn't been ripped out.
"Hold it there, Dib." Seerah instructed.
I took hold of the organ where she told me to. It felt cold, heavy, even a little slimy. Once I had it, she let go and retrieved her needle and thread, and then began to sew the two ends together. From where I was, I could see the suture thread disappearing into the organs the minute she pulled the needle out. The thread was actually fusing the two pieces together, leaving only the barest trace of a scar. As soon as she was finished, I watched at the stomach began to change color from bluish-grey to a maroon. Now that the blood had somewhere else to go instead of into an open cavity, my job got a little easier. The moment all the little blood vessels and veins were full, blood began to seep into the rest of Zim's body. It wasn't as fast as before, which was a good thing. Then we heard a soft intake of air and we all looked down at Zim.
His eyes had fully closed, like he was sleeping and not almost dead. His chest rose, stayed that way for about five minutes, then fell as he expelled the air. I heard a soft laugh from Seerah. "Isn't that a good thing?" I asked.
"Yes and no." She replied. "The fact he's breathing means he's decided to live. But now that he's no longer in the torpor, he's going to start bleeding that much faster. And if he wakes up before we're done, there's no telling what kind of damage there might be."
"Meaning you might not be able to finish." Gaz said.
Seerah nodded. "Exactly. All of this hinges on the fact that he stays unconscious. If he wakes up, he'll feel the pain."
Zim had a low pain tolerance. I didn't say it out loud, only because that would be confirming my own fear that he would wake up. I didn't know if his threshold had gone up over the years, considering I'd never seen him react to his injuries. But that didn't mean that he didn't go home and let out the scream he'd been keeping inside or the tears. I knew Zim cried, and I knew he did it where no one could see him. I'd only happened to see it once by pure chance, and I made sure Zim hadn't seen me watching him cry. Up until that point, I hadn't believed Irkens could cry, let alone show any emotion beyond anger and disappointment. I looked at Seerah and asked, "How much longer until you're finished?"
"The next two organs are almost done." She responded. "After that, there's six more things I have to make before I can start making the layers of muscle, veins, arteries, and lastly, the skin. In all, three to five hours. If I was on my planet in a facility, I could have ten machines going at once and we'd be done in half the time. Since I'm not, this is going to take as long as it takes and we're going to have to pray that Zim doesn't wake up in the meantime."
"And if he does?" I asked.
"Then we pray he doesn't feel anything."
Over the next hour, Seerah implanted what looked like a gall bladder, a pancreas, an actual bladder, and a liver. Of course, I wasn't sure if they were those things, and Seerah didn't say anything. She was sewing in some other organ, probably something exclusive to Puurakis when Zim made a noise. It was the second hour, close to the third. I watched his face screw up, and I knew he felt pain, felt Seerah's hands inside him, putting him back together. Then, his eyes cracked open.
"Zim," I said, taking hold of one of his hands with my own. "You gotta bear it, alright? Don't move."
He made a croaking sound, but quieted. He didn't seen inclined to talk, and I was glad he didn't. He just looked at me for a long moment and curled his fingers around my hand. His eyes closed, and he took a deep breath.
"Zim," Seerah said, "I've only got a little more to do, okay? You need to hold on just a bit longer."
He nodded. Didn't open his eyes or make noise, just nodded. Then when Seerah began sewing again, his hand tightened around mine to the point I thought my bones were going to break. Finally, she was finished sewing in that organ and reached for the intestines, which were the last organ she had to place. After that, she would graft muscle and skin to close up the wound. At least, that's what I hoped she had left to do. I didn't think Zim would survive any more surgeries.
"You okay, Zim?" Seerah asked as she settled the organs inside him.
"Yeah," he replied, so quietly I thought he hadn't spoken at all. He clutched my hand tighter as she began to sew. His eyes remained closed, but his face betrayed the fact he was in pain. I couldn't watch after a moment, and instead looked at what Seerah was doing. She was moving carefully and precisely. She was making soothing noises too, as if they would distract Zim from what she was doing.
It seemed like an eternity before she finally pulled her hands from Zim's body. She moved to discard the needle and thread, then washed her hands in a bucket of water Gaz had brought. Then she leaned toward Zim's face, and lightly touched his cheek. He opened his eyes and looked at her. "I'm done putting you back together." She said softly. "You're going to feel uncomfortable for a while, and maybe even sick. That's because your body was rebuilt the Puuraki way, not the Irken."
Zim made a noise, and his eyes closed briefly. "If..." He started, then paused. "If something goes wrong, I will find you and kill you."
Seerah gave him a smile that probably should've been comforting. Instead, it gave me the creeps when I saw it. So I asked, "He is fully healed, right?"
"Fully healed, just the way he was meant to be." Seerah replied. "All that's left is to get you some skin and flesh and muscle and you'll be good as new."
Zim let out a slow breath. "Then get to it."
"Patience, my friend, patience." Seerah closed the silver box that she'd made the organs from, and picked up a long thin metal rod that looked like a cauterizer. She also picked up a smaller silver box, one that was able to fit in the palm of her hand. "First, I need to make sure all your parts work before I close you up."
"And if these parts don't work?" I asked.
"Then I guess we're fucked." Seerah said joyfully. I glared at her. So did Gaz. Zim only took a deep breath and clenched my hand harder.
I watched Seerah slowly move the thin metal rod and the box along Zim's new organs. It seemed to take forever, because she was making sure everything was sealed and filled with working blood vessels and cells and whatever else she was looking for. Finally, she sat back and smiled as she looked at Zim.
"Everything's in working order, but I advise you to take it easy. No experimentation of any kind for at least six months. I'd prefer a full year, but I know you, and you'll be trying to see what exactly I did to you."
"What did you do to me?" Zim croaked.
Seerah hummed. "Only remade you the way you were meant to be." She set the box down and unscrewed part of the rid, putting another attachment on it that looked like it belonged on a portable vacuum cleaner or something. To the other end, she attached that small silver box, and turned a few thin dials on the box's surface. "Okay. Here comes the fun part."
I watched as Seerah put the vacuum cleaner end against Zim's side. Then she slowly began to strafe from left to right, and as she did, Irken muscles began to form, along with blood vessels, capillaries, and everything else that existed in the tissue. When she reached the opposite side, she turned another dial, and started backwards, laying down the second layer of what I thought was fat. She repeated this process going through every layer beneath actual skin, until finally, she started laying down skin. I thought Zim's new skin would be green, but it matched the color of the rest of him, despite being shiny like new scar tissue. Seerah finished putting the skin together and sat back, before she took her left hand and began to lightly tap the new skin. Zim's eyes closed, but he didn't display any more uncomfortableness than that.
"All right, Zim." Seerah said. "You're good to go. Remember - no experimentation, no strenuous activities like fighting, and definitely only eat soft foods for about two weeks. If any problems arise, don't panic and don't try to fix them yourself."
"If you're not here, I'll have to fix them myself." Zim replied quietly.
Seerah studied him for a minute, then leaned low until her mouth was by his ear. Whatever she whispered to him made him relax some, and he slowly, reluctantly, nodded. Then she sat up, and started putting away her equipment.
"That's it?" Gaz asked.
"That's it. Now we just let him rest. I have to go make an important phone call. So if you two wouldn't mind helping me clean up, we can let Zim get some rest."
Gaz and I looked at each other. I felt Zim let go of my hand. I looked down at him and saw him give me a little nod. "I'll be right back, okay?" I said quietly.
"Dib," Zim whispered. "I was ripped apart, then put back together, so I think I'll be okay without being watched."
I frowned, but nodded. The three of us had to work around Zim for awhile so we could clean up the blood and tools and everything else that Seerah had used to put Zim back together. When we'd cleaned up the immediate area, and disposed of the trash, it was up to me to move Zim to a more comfortable place to rest. Which meant I had to drag in a small couch from one of the little waiting room areas, wait for Gaz to finish cleaning Zim up, then pick him up and set him on the couch. I placed my hand on his forehead then pulled back to follow Gaz out of the room so Zim could rest.
"Dib, wait."
I paused and looked back at him. I felt Gaz close the door to the room behind me, leaving me no choice but to return to Zim's side. Mostly because I knew if I didn't jump on this chance, Gaz would probably dig my testicles out of my rectum with a dull and rusty spoon. I knelt beside Zim and reached to touch his cheek. His hand intercepted mine, then held on tight.
"There's something I have to tell you." He said, quietly.
"Well," I said, "there's something I have to tell you too."
- 26
- 27
- 28
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Being Human