They might hate Zim, but they had to admit he did send interesting stuff.
Humans were inferior and primitive creatures, but certain aspects of their culture were... fascinating. They had invented lots of snacks and pastries, such as 'appll pai', 'chiscak' and 'trimisu'. Purple's favorite human pastry was one that consisted of a sort of pudding made of chocolate with lashings of cream, caramel and something called 'mashmalows'.
Mental note: tell Zim to steal more of those puddings and send them to him.
Red was more interested in human literature. He had read many interesting novels of many genres, his personal favorites being science fiction, which coincidentally depicted many species even though humans have never left their solar system. The War of the Worlds was, in his opinion, the greatest of them all, though sadly in the end the martians perished when they had the planet in their grasp. The reason? Bacteria. They were microscopic and carried lots of illnesses to which aliens had no defenses; then he recalled that time Zim was acting like a maniac (well, more than usual) over something called germs, probably cousins to the bacteria.
Another mental note, stay as far away from Earth as possible. Thankfully, Zim would succumb to either the bacteria or the germs soon. Eventually. Right?
Then there were the movies. Most were a bit too cheesy, but just like in the books, some were surprisingly accurate for a species that is mostly ignorant about the universe's diverse lifestyles, like that Men in Black film's depiction of the Insecta race. They weren't actually that bad, though, they were one of the few races in league with the Irken Empire, who provided them with sugar in exchange for information from other planets. Don't ask how the Tallest were talked into 'sharing' snacks, you don't want to know. Really. Those who did were thrown out of the airlock.
Ilk loved the animated films from that earthen company with the talking mouse, most of those consisted of a sort of damsel in distress that needed to be saved by a 'prince charming' fella. (If that's how that backwater planet saw their females, they seriously were in the hole*) and at the end the two exchanged saliva. Puaj! There were others that were a bit more neutral and didn't depict humans at all, instead focusing solely on their planet's fauna (a whole kingdom of talking animals, who would have thought?).
Red hated those movies, though. He detested the fact that in those particular movies the characters randomly burst into song every five minutes for no apparent reason at all other than the sake of annoying the heck out of the audience. Of course, it seemed he was the only one, there were also the pea-brains who actually liked it. He was not mentioning any specific names... Purple. Ilk didn't count, she wasn't a pea-brain, she was just a smeet.
"Bid! Bid!" Ilk repeated as she stared at the screen of her father's tablet.
"What are you watching now, Ilk?" Red inquired curiously as he leaned in from behind.
"Baabiiii!" Ilk pointed at a strange, long-legged quadruped animal with spots on its back. It was staring at a tiny, blue avian that was fluttering around it, calling it 'bird'.
On the bright side, she was learning new words.
"Mind if I join you?" he said, sitting down next to her. It wasn't because he was curious about the movie, of course, he merely wanted to take a look at Earth's fauna and see if they could be useful.
Who knows? Zim's mission might be a fake, but that planet DID seem like a good option for conquest in a few years. Perhaps it could be a pastry factory or a zoo of some sorts, AFTER it went through at least three organic sweeps to get rid of all the bacteria.
Besides, most of his attention was actually on Ilk, as she kept pointing at certain characters and repeating their names.
Then the movie took a rather... surprising twist. The deer-thing and its mother fled from an unknown enemy, then a loud sound echoed in the background, and in the next scene the mother was gone to never appear in the rest of the film. The deer-thing's father said 'Men have taken her'.
Ilk clearly didn't understand it, but Red had an idea as to what had happened. Mental note: delete that movie from the tablet.
After tucking in Ilk for her nap when the movie was finally over, Red went over to the cafeteria to get those silly songs out of his head, but to his bad luck most of the crew (Purple included)were watching another movie, gathered around Stink, who held the irkpad. I swear to Irk, if it's that stupid crustacean singing underwater again...
To his confusion, however, many of the irkens were... weeping? What is this?!
"What is going on?!" he asked with a snarl. Irkens don't show weakness in public. Again, Ilk doesn't count, she's just a smeet and it's not really her fault.
"POOR DUMBO!" Skoodge cried, bursting out into a fit of tears and startling Red in the process.
"Who on Irk is Dumbo?!" he asked.
Seeing he'd get no reply, he pushed some soldiers out of the way and took a peek into the screen. There was a big, gray, fat animal with an unusually long nose being rocked in an even longer snake-like nose. "What's the big deal?" he asked, uninterested.
"His mom got locked just for defending him!" Tenn cried out, wiping some tears from her eyes with a napkin.
Larb yelled. "Damn you, humans!"
"We should put THEM in cages to see if they like it." Purple commented, to which he was met with nods of agreement.
Red took a hand to his temples. "Sweet Irk, we do that to inferior species on an almost daily basis, so what's the big deal with one earth-beast being locked up in a cage for her kid's fault?"
"We're not crying for that!" Purple exclaimed. "We're crying because that parental female unit is showing a level of affection that's very moving!"
Red blinked. What was that supposed to mean? Well, he better do something before all the crew became mopey. "Okay, that's enough earthen-movies for you." He said, snatching the Irkpad from Stink and turning it off, earning groans of disappointment.
One of the cooks called from the kitchen. "Everybody, here's another batch of trimisu!"
That was enough to instantly lift the mood, and the crowd rushed to the kitchen counter in a frenzy. Naturally, Purple somehow managed to grab most of the trimisu, leaving only a few pieces to the others, who started fighting for it savagely.
Red rolled his eyes. He'd make sure to delete all those silly movies from the databases; he wished he could say the same for his irkpad, but sadly even if he did Ilk always found a way to download them again.
Perhaps he should consider getting her an irkpad of her own.
A few hours later, after managing to eat some of that trimisu (he could understand why everyone liked it, it was tasty) he returned to his quarters to check on Ilk. Once again, she was already out of her basket, irkpad in front of her, and she was watching yet another movie...
He couldn't believe his luck.
"Seriously? Now you are watching that dumb movie too?" he half-groaned as he approached her.
She didn't pay him any attention. Instead, her eyes were fixed unto the screen; if she were older, he bet she'd be eating a bag of popcorn. Oh, well, since he had nothing to do for the time being, perhaps it wouldn't hurt if he stayed with her a while.
just like he imagined, it was cheesy, defied the laws of physics and involved talking earth-beasts (mainly the 'elfants', as he heard them call themselves). The whole issue was with one that was taken by a bird to its mother, and turned out to have ridiculously disproportionate ears, causing it to be laughed at.
Then the infamous part that got half the crew of the Massive into tears came.
Baby mine, don't you cry
Baby mine, dry your eyes
Rest your head close to my heart
Never to part, baby of mine...
To Red's surprise, he didn't find that song annoying, but... endearing. One could feel the motherly love in it... He found himself sympathizing with that earth-beast; both were parents who'd do anything to protect their kids. The difference was that he would have vaporized those humans on spot.
He noted how Ilk had stared at the scene intently, watching all those earth-beasts with their offspring have her another shine in her eyes she didn't have before. When the film was finally over, thank Irk for that, she whimpered. Luckily, it wasn't her diaper, considering she didn't smell like Skoodge's socks (don't ask how he knew that aroma). He fed her a bit of sweet-feed, but even after that she still whimpered.
"What's wrong, little one?" he asked, holding her in his hands.
"Mama..."
Red swore he nearly had a squeedly-spooch attack. Had she just asked what he thought?
"Mama..." Ilk repeated, rubbing one of her eyes.
"There, there, Ilk, it's okay..." Red said awkwardly, tucking Ilk in her basket again. "Daddy will figure something out." he tried to sound reassuring, but he was freaking out. Once he made sure she wouldn't leave her basket, he went into the bathroom, locked his door and activated the sound-proof barrier. The last was for two reason: the first one was to avoid awakening Ilk and have her throw another fit.
The second was that he didn't want her to learn any 'bad words' yet.
*IZ*
He had hoped she didn't really know what a 'mama' was, that she was merely parroting the word and would get over it eventually. However, soon it became evident she did know the meaning of that word and understood who 'mama' was supposed to be, and she was constantly 'calling' for her.
Red found himself at loss, and he wasn't the only one. Purple. Skoodge, Bob, everybody heard her whenever she said 'mama', and didn't know what to do about it either. After all, NONE of them knew what it felt like to have a female parental unit (or FPU, for short); the closest thing was the cold, robotic arm that shocked them into life. Thus, Red had no other choice but to do more research; don't worry, he managed to grab his irkpad before Ilk had a chance to claim it for the day.
It turned out the FPU, more commonly known as 'mother', held even much more importance than he initially thought. She was the one to 'give life', she was the one to raise the kids, and the kids in turn were much more attached to her than to the 'father'; this an evolutionary trait almost all universal species shared (except for the clone-relying Irkens, for obvious reasons).
Birthed-smeets, however, conserved this trait along with the other primal instincts usually removed by the DNA-engineering.
Sadly, 'mothers' were also not replaceable, as Red learned the hard way when he had one of the female navigators lend him a hand, if only to give Ilk some comfort for some time at the least. The navigator had to be sent to the infirmary to treat the bite marks in her arm.
"What are we going to do about Ilk?" he asked Purple a few days later, watching as Ilk played with some colorful blocks with characters of the Irken alphabet on them.
"Isn't it a phase? I mean, from what I've heard, puberty is a phase." Purple said with a shrug.
"Puberty hits when you're an irkager, she's barely a smeet!"
Surprisingly, Bob made a not-so-bad suggestion when he moved over to bring his leaders their drinks. "My Tallest, if I may make a suggestion, you could try and recreate whatever 'motherly affection' entails. Perhaps that would make her feel safer with you regardless of her FPU being missing."
Red looked at Purple. Purple looked at Bob. Bob kept his gaze down. Red glanced at Ilk. Ilk looked at Skoodge. Skoodge slipped and fell on top of Stink and Larb. Ilk laughed.
"You know, that's not such a bad idea," Red finally said, glancing at the service drone. "Even if it comes from you."
Before he could properly look for ways to 'recreate' motherly affection, however, the Armada ran into a big, solar-flare storm near one of the stars in one of the systems, which messed with communication lines, the irkenet, and even power. Not even the emergency lights worked, which made things harder, considering the crew inside the Massive had to move in the dark. Given the circumstances, the Armada would have to stay in place until it passed.
Red and Purple had been smart enough to hoard their quarters with already-made snacks, since not even the machines to cook food in the kitchen worked due to lack of energy. Usually they had no problem with solar flare storms and merely lounged around until it passed.
Ilk, however, hated it. She was afraid of the dark, and the loud thunder-like sound coming from the star whenever it released the flares frightened her further.
"There, there..." Red cooed gently, holding the whimpering smeet close and stroking her PAK-less back. "It'll be okay, sweetie..."
That offered little comfort to Ilk, and she gave a small cry when another flare resounded in space, burying her face in her father's sleeping robe. Red sighed and continued to stroke her back; he still hadn't figured out how to 'replicate' mother affection, in part because he had come to realize love just couldn't be... replicated. Either you felt it or not. And he did feel love for the little smeet that was currently sobbing against his chest, seeking his protection...
Wait a minute... This reminded him of that non-cheesy, sad song the earth-beast had sung to her infant son, he had also been looking for comfort she managed to give even though she was imprisoned and only her long olfactory organ could touch him. For some reason, that tune had stuck around in his head since he heard it.
When another thunder roared, sending Ilk into yet another heap of frightened sobs, he started cooing and shushing in the Irken native tongue, covering his smeet with part of his robe so she'd feel safe; it worked wonders, and she snuggled against the warmth of his body, though she was still sobbing a bit.
What happened next should NOT leave those four walls, at least not if you want to live. Making sure no one was around to hear him, he started to sing in a very low voice only loud enough for Ilk to hear it.
Smeetie mine don't you cry
Smeetie mine dry your eyes
Rest your head close to my squeedly-spooch
Never to part, smeetie of mine...
Okay, it wasn't exactly the same as the original, but who cares? He just wanted to comfort his daughter.
Ilk calmed down further when she recognized the tune of the song and started suckling on her thumb, her antennae twitching in unconscious delight. She was so fixed on it she completely forgot about the loud sounds coming from the outside.
Red almost felt like an idiot for doing what no Irken in his sane mind had ever done before, but frankly at the moment he didn't care about that; he just wanted to let Ilk know he was there for her. Speaking of which, how was the next part like...?
Little one, when you play,
Pay no heed what they say
Let your eyes sparkle and shine
Never a tear, smeetie of mine
Soon enough, Ilk let out a yawn and she started falling asleep, though it was pretty evident she was trying not to; Red started stroking her head to make it easier. Okay, just one more verse...
From your antennae down to your toes,
You're not much, Irk knows
But you're so precious to me
Sweet as can be, smeetie of mine...
Ilk had by then fallen asleep, completely forgetting about the noise outside. Red couldn't help it, he tenderly nuzzled against her cheek as he tucked her into her basket. She shifted for a bit, but she didn't awaken, she merely said a single word. "Dada..."
Red's antennae twitched when he heard the door moving, and lifted in gaze to catch a glimpse of a violet irkpad with the recording light on.
Wait, violet? Recording?!
No, he didn't!
Red screamed internally and snarled in direction of the doorway. "PURPLE!"
Once he realized he had been caught, the violet-clad Tallest darted away from the door, tablet in hand, laughing as Red chased after him.
*IZ*
*This refers to how Irkens don't seem to have gender roles, both males and females can have positions of power. The clearest example of this is Tallest Miyuki.
Well, who would have thought. Let's just hope that video doesn't see the light of day.
And, as usual, here's yet another head cannon on birthed smeets: they grow attached to both parents real quickly, and in case one is missing they get especially clingy to the other, which explains why Ilk is always after daddy. They somehow can even tell WHO their parent is.
It seems someone got addicted to Disney movies; I mean, given they've never seen that kind of films before (at least that's what I assume) because they are too busy conquering planets. And given disney movies tend to be VERY musical, some mind find it very annoying. But for the sake of investigation, somebody must watch them, right?
Also, here's some of the slangs used for some Earth words, in case you didn't understand:
Appll pai- apple pie.
Chiscak- Cheesecake.
Trimisu- Tiramisu.
Irkenet- the Irken version of the internet.
Irkpad- Irken version of a data tablet or iPad.