A Parade of Indignities

Chapter 26: Of Drinking Games and Dead Air

Content warning: drunk Irkens/humans ahead.

Chapter art created and owned by Starpaw0007.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

If there was a God, he was having a hell of a laugh at Dib's expense.

That's all he could think as he sat in the cell, as far away as he could from Zim, pressed up against the wall with his chin in both hands.

Countless instances of being shepherded through different prisons and shoved into a diverse selection of cells had wearied Dib to the point of exasperation. It was strong enough that it very nearly overshadowed the sensation of failure.

Everything always fell apart at the oddest of times, too. When things were going just a little too smoothly. When the dreaded voice in the back of Dib's head cropped up to ask: Was this it? Was it this easy?

No. It was never that easy.

Getting Zim medical care wasn't that easy. Getting back to Earth wasn't that easy. And now, as he was learning, getting to Irk's Supreme Control Brain wasn't that easy.

This time, though, the universe decided to kick things up a notch. After all, what could be funnier than seeing Dib shoved in yet another jail cell? Ah! Seeing Dib shoved in yet another jail cell with the one individual he wanted to see the least.

Said individual was currently sitting petulantly on the other end of the cell, knees pulled up to his chest as he glared out through the bars. Aside from the occasional cough, he didn't make a sound.

For a city designed by a technologically advanced alien race, Dib was somewhat taken aback by the almost dungeon-like nature of their confinement.

He had been swiftly removed from the warehouse that had received the shipment from Vort, seeing only a glimpse of his surroundings. Altua was enormous, industrial, and completely bathed with an almost-nauseating shade of pink that was cast from its sun.

From there, he was quickly ushered into the wing of another building through a set of double doors. Through there, the guards beelined towards yet another, larger set of doors that opened into a long corridor.

The space was constructed almost entirely of concrete. The hall went on for a few hundred feet before turning a corner. At the end was a plain, simple jail cell and a closed door adjacent to it. Gone were the lasers and forcefields, replaced instead by thick, narrowly spaced bars.

There were some similarities to the other cells he'd been in, though. Just like the others, this one was dimly lit and almost frigidly cold.

Dib rubbed his upper arms with his hands, trying to quell the goosebumps that had appeared.

"Are you just going to spend this whole time sulking?" he said flatly, sneaking a side-eyed glance over at the Irken.

Zim responded by readjusting his position so that his back was turned to him.

Dib had noticed that he was wearing some gaudy military uniform, complete with a mark on his forehead and some sort of device that spanned from the lower ports of his PAK and met at his chest.

"What are you even doing here? What did you think was going to happen?" he went on, his voice husky.

"That's rich coming from you, Dib-filth. I could ask you the same things."

Dib narrowed his eyes. "Well, I couldn't just do nothing. I had to try to save Earth. I thought I could reason with the—"

A loud creaking began at the end of the corridor and echoed down to where the two sat. What followed were the sounds of clacking boots on the concrete flooring and ended with two tall Irken guards standing in front of their cell.