A.N. Well this is a first for me. An Alternate Universe fic for a first story in a new category. Well, yeah, so this is my first Invader Zim story. Yes, it is Dib and Zim Romance, no like, no read, it's that simple. -

Disclaimer: …. Really, are you expecting me to out right say, "YES I DO OWN IT!" Because… obviously, if I'm writing smut about two of the characters on a non-profit site, I don't. Sorry, to disappoint.

Project D.I.B.

Chapter: 00

Alarms were ringing, blaring out in warning that the security had been breeched. Lights flickered as soldiers ran hurriedly down the corridors, their long metal legs aiding them in their hurry, as their smaller, true legs, could not.

"The breech is in the smeet room!" The leader said with a tight voice, holding his weapon of choice to his chest in anger. It was a rule in all galactic warfare that the offspring of the race not be touched. It was appalling to think that this new, inferior, enemy was so stupid as to not know such a basic rule.

Red eyes narrowed in hate as the young soldier led his troop towards the door. He was smaller than most of his troop, but his commander had left him in charge while the real battle was taking place outside.

The room rocked violently as another hit was taken by the Irken ship. Lights flickered ominously, and some of the other Irkens started, looking around the room with light fear.

"Attacking a smeet shipment! How low can these stink beasts get!" The low snarl came from the lavender eyed female to the leader's left. Ruby eyes stared at her for a moment, understanding her detest and anger completely. They weren't even with in the planet's vicinity, hell, by all accounts, they weren't even in the war, being too short to be counted on.

"Quite low, Tak. Quite low." The leader said, with a low growl, turning and missing her saddened look as he moved back toward the door that led to the smeet's containment room.

It was a fairly usual, routine trip—now that war had started—to relocate certain batches of smeet to be raised and trained elsewhere for battle. Most, still were unready to be out of their incubating tubes.

Feeling sick to his stomach, the ruby eyed Irken marched through the doors, that opened with a shrill hiss, and entered the darkened room. Rows of glowing purple faces greeted him, showing him that the undeveloped smeet were still growing and soundly sleeping in their make shift wombs.

It was unnervingly silent in the room, not a single shadow moved in the inky darkness. Narrowed, pupil-less eyes, gazed over each glowing marker, senses tuned into the emptiness of the room.

"Any sign of them?" Tak's voice asked from behind, and the leader just quirked an antennae. The other Irken used to take pleasure in tormenting him, and arguing with him. After all, they were the closest thing to a family any Irken got, being from the same smeet batch and all. But, Tak had seemed to grow out of that stage rapidly, after the first attack had been initiated by the filthy stink-beasts.

"Zim?"

"No," Zim finally answered, lowering his weapon after a moment. Tak seemed to relax next to him, and lowered her own. "It seems that they have already left."

"So, they were here." Tak asked, and Zim scowled, moving deeper into the room, still not quite satisfied with what his instincts told him.

"Yes, but they are no longer." Zim answered, looking over each smeet holding unit as he passed. What could they possibly want from here? Unless… A deep dread filled the small Irken, and he let out a low growl picking up pace.

"Zim?" Tak sounded worried, before following after the smaller Irken soldier. Her fear for the Human's must have abated with his words. But it was only natural, after all, Zim had been the first and only survivor from the planet Earth. He was half crazy when he returned to the empire, sporting numerous wounds from the experimentations that the human butchers, that had caught him, had dealt to him. Where once he'd been the source of the Tallest's amusement, he was now the only Irken who could sense, smell, and feel a human presence. A talent an Irken only gained through intense hatred or pain.

Zim had both.

Which was probably the reason as to why he had been taken seriously and placed on the smeet ship, instead of booted off to food courtia again. It was probably due to the recent death of Tallest Purple as well.

Purple had succumbed to the tests the stink-beasts had preformed when he had been sent to check on Zim's claims. No one from his ship returned alive. The joke mission had turned serious, and Red wasn't laughing anymore.

The sound of crunching glass froze the angered Irken in his place. Looking down in irritation, he found that he had walked into the broken remnants of a smeet tube. Zim's heart clenched in his chest as he inspected the green liquid substance that gleamed in the darkness of the room.

Horrified he looked up the walls for the blank face that the little Irk would have come from, but found only an empty place in the racks, where the heat lights glowed from the circular hole in the wall. The machine had not responded to a grown smeet.

Looking back to the ground, Zim felt his stomach curl in disgust, finding the purple, sleeping-faced, capsule lid laying to the side of the broken glass and incubating fluids. Zim let out a curse in Irken, slamming a fist against one the legs that extended from his PAK.

"Zim, what happened?"

"Get to the bridge and have commander Rak send a message to Red." Tak frown at Zim's lack of respect to their remaining leader, but the small Irken paid it no mind. "Tell him that they got a hold of a premature smeet."

Tak gave a grim look and nodded, leaving quickly, her metallic legs making a soft clinking nose as she retreated. Zim frown, retracting his legs and kneeling beside the fluid, and picked up a shard with a sympathetic glare. Premature, and with out a PAK. It has no chance of surviving… still there is no telling what those human's can find out about us from it… With a snarl he chucked the glass and turned to leave the room.

Life could be so cruel sometimes.

A.N. Well, this is a VERY short chapter for me. - But I guess this is more like a prologue anyway. Well, what do you think? Should I continue, should I make this as AU as possible or perhaps tie it in some sadistic way to the original story? Drop me a line till then.

Mora