My Only The Only One

Chapter 9

Zim was reinstated into the irken race as 'caretaker'. This was a position mostly given to females, and their job usually included watching over the smeets and their education, making sure they got their nutrients on time, measured them, and trained them. The reason females mostly did it was because, well, they looked better in the uniform.

Zim was to be his smeet's caretaker alone though because the Tallest did not want him anywhere near their other soldiers. The only reason they were even letting him live at that point was because the half breed didn't seem to be able to separate from him.

Over the next couple days a few things were figured out about the smeet. It was impervious to the acid H2O, it had an astounding growth rate, and its skin had an odd pigment mixed in with the green. Not that anyone could tell this just from looking, but the green of its skin, when under a microscope, was off green, making it look darker from farther away.

It was definite that Zim's child would be standing out in a crowd.

There were a few rules that came with Zim's new position, however.

First, Zim was not to be involved in the education of his smeet. That would be the Tallests' job. They wanted to teach him of the irken ways personally.

Second, Zim was not to go anywhere that housed any chemicals or engineering equipment unless escorted by a high ranking guard.

Last, He was not to tell the smeet of their relation. This had Zim's antennae wilting. The other two he figured he could handle. But the smeet couldn't know who Zim really was?

"Of course not. That would create an unnecessary bound." Tallest Red had said. "Can you imagine if anything were to happen to you? He would be devastated. Nope, better off if he doesn't know."

"Yeah," Purple said with a small laugh as he chowed down on some chips. "Besides, who would want you for a mother anyway? You're the laughing stock of the entire planet. You're a traitor!"

Zim frowned, but they were right. So he agreed to all of the conditions and he was allowed to raise his smeet.

The first few months of life for Lix (that's what the smeet ended up named) were a learning experience... for everyone. Once he had a pak he became a little too independent for both Zim and the Tallest, and would often wander off when they weren't paying attention.

Of course he never got very far. His muscles were very human in nature and weren't strong enough in his first few months of life to allow him to walk, so despite the pak he had to crawl everywhere until he was strong enough to walk.

His personality, it was quickly discovered, was very much like his mother's. Or so the Tallest thought, Zim was convince Lix was more like Dib than himself. Zim was, admittedly, very single minded, and while he did show a lot of interest in a lot of different things, like Dib, he wasn't able to multitask very well. Lix had a million things he found interest in and would often be trying several of them all at once. Like he would tinker with a gadget while reading up on Invader files and medical reports with a schematic of one of the main control brain fortresses off to the side somewhere.

While Lix was very irken he had some very human habits. Like, for a while Zim was allowed to keep the nice room he'd been staying in, simply for the fact that Lix had to spend the night with him. He would wake up in the middle of the night hungry or thirsty, or he would have to go to the bathroom, and Zim had to help him with all of these things. This led to nights of almost no sleep for the irken, but deep in his exhausted brain he just enjoyed the fact that Lix needed him and was more than glad to help his offspring.

The Tallest seemed to enjoy Lix as well. He was a very quick learner, despite how often his attention wandered. They didn't really care though, as long as Lix turned out to be less destructive than his mother.