I HAVE NO WORDS

So I came up with this great idea for a fake beard using fiber mascara and I realized there were no tutorials out there for this already. So I made one myself. It works really well and is very realistic!!

here are some links to some fiber mascaras as well as the type I used (I’m sure you guys can find one at a cheaper price though)

here is the absolute best crossplay makeup tutorial I highly recommend it

I’m so sorry for my handwriting I did my best I swear

THERE HE IS

THERE HE IS

M Y P U R P L E S O N

Invader Zim Linguistics AU Masterpost

(A.K.A: Irkens can’t have nice things: the series.)

Synopsis: Zim finds out that Gir was never programmed to understand Irken. Deciding to teach Gir himself, Zim soon uncovers some alarming gaps in his own knowledge, and discovers that maybe some things are better left buried.

Here’s where I’ll be collecting all the links for the comics from now on! Thanks again to the lovely anon for the suggestion.

Content Warning: Contains Blood, Violence, Depictions of Trauma and Mental health issues, References to Psychological Abuse, References to War, Mind Control/Manipulation, Medical Experimentation, Death, and themes of Neglect and Abandonment.

This AU also runs on the commonly-held theory that Irkens are raised from birth to be soldiers, so please be careful and read through the warnings. All comics are tagged “iz linguistics au” if you need to blacklist.  

That being said, most of this horribleness is only hinted at and happens off screen. Anything especially graphic will be marked below with a *** 

Main Comics

Part 1: Broken

Part 2: Close Enough

Part 3: Enter Dib

Part 4: The Dark Room ***

Side Comic: I’m Fine Now

Part 5: Culture Shock

Part 6: Helpful Sibling Advice

Part 7: End Transmission

Part 8: Ghosts

Part 9: Cracks

Part 10: Errors, Secrets and Half-Truths

Part 10.5: What’s in a Name?

Extras 

Connection Lost (part 8 preview)

Creative Discipline 

Irken Faux Pas

Baby Zim

Skoodge and the Weird Kid

Study Time (gif)

Ghosts

Cracks (part 9 preview)

A Concerned Dibble (gif)

Hug-seeking missile (gif)

If Zim met his younger self

Sleepless nights and last resorts (future comic preview)🌃✨

It’s not that deep (and other meme redraws)

Bad Ending (part1)

Bad Ending (part2)

Computer sees Zim’s PAK for the first time (mini comic)

This is beautiful

The mashup you never thought would work

Our Zim’s “thing” and why he’s the Ultimate Zim

I have talked about this a great length with many people privately since Zimvoid arc ended,

@paketdimensioncomic​ @sweetiepie08​ and @xryn-art​ 

But I don’t think I really made a whole post about it. What our Zim’s “thing” is. No, it’s not choking on styrofoam packing peanuts no matter what Zib thinks. And I can explain why really easily. 

Because this:

Is one hundred percent correct. 

Zim is really the ultimate Zim for way more reasons then he thinks. 

And it’s made even way more obvious when you reread the whole Zimvoid arc as a whole narrative.  

It’s not just because Zim was the one to completely erase the Zimvoid from his reality…

HE WAS THE ONLY ZIM WHO WAS CAPABLE OF DOING THIS.

Let’s see, what does our Zim have that the other Zims in the Zimvoid don’t?

He has a GIR. He was only able to interface with the frequency due to GIR. 

And Zim causing realities to collapse in on themselves wouldn’t have been possible at all without GIR. Zim would have honestly messed this up without him (he could have easily erased himself from existence) GIR is way more competent than he appears to be. 

Zim was able to destroy the Zimvoid because of direct assistance from GIR. 

And as we all remember: 

The zapper absolutely fried every single GIR on entry to the Zimvoid. According to Spotted Zim here, every single GIR was destroyed completely due to the zapper.

Not many people give it too much thought because before the arc was over people were predicting GIR would have a large role to play in what Zim’s “thing” is. And he does, because Zim couldn’t have taken down the entire Zimvoid without GIR.

But HOW did GIR survive? Why did GIR survive? what makes GIR so special?

D I B

If Dib did not stubbornly follow Zim blindly into the Zimvoid, GIR wouldn’t have survived.

(That and Dib keeps a close eye on GIR and slips easily into his protective big brother mode with him) 

IT’S THE REASON ALL THE OTHER GIRS perished.

ZIB EVEN SAYS AS MUCH:

Zib finds that weird and hilarious that out of all the Dibs, he’s the only one who comes, but he never really properly check what Dib’s “thing” is because it’s so obvious to him. 

But here’s the kicker about what our Zim’s “thing” is… or what Zib assumes from his thing…

He’s scanning his Memory for variations based on the timeline he came from, not the current events that are happening. 

Because as it stands….

Zim could have only destroyed the Zimvoid with GIR’s help.

GIR could have only survived with Dib’s assistance/interference… and 

Dib needed to follow Zim for this to happen. 

You know what else needed to happen?

Dib had to be there to pull Zim out of his own head and focus on the task at hand…

This sounds vaguely familiar 

So what am I getting at with all these connections? What does it all mean? Well… I have a bit of a theory, and I kinda think the Zimvoid proved it. 

There are a few things that set our Zim apart from all the other Zim and make him the Ultimate Zim..

Zim does not abide by the laws of this society very well. He does what he needs to do in the stadium, but he really is resistant to how bureaucratic the system is. Even 2k and Palindrome who do have their own resistance group, are still functioning within the rules of their society and the Elder Zim says as much. No Zim ever thinks to destroy this dimension altogether and take out all the other Zims with them. Even as a resistance group they are clearly playing by Zib’s rules.

There’s a reason that the Resistance has existed for six months and hasn’t even gotten close to beating much less confronting Number One until Dib showed up. They never really left the game and are really chasing their own tails. It’s just another way to feed into their competitive egos without directly competing in the stadium. If any of these Zim’s were as driven as OUR Zim, they would of confronted number One a very long time ago. 

Because our Zim is the most driven out of any Zim in the Zimvoid.

Zim rose in rank way faster in 24 hours than any progress that the Zim-Resisty made in six months. 

If half or even one of the Zims in the Zimvoid were as driven as our Zim, can you imagine how quickly this establishment could be abolished?! 

Every Zim has a role to fill and they will gladly fill those roles when they have a specific trait given to them… Like… THEY WILL OWN IT. IT IS WHAT DEFINES THEM AS AN INDIVIDUAL NOW.

For all these Zims in the Zimvoid…. and Carl… this defines what they are and who they are now. Every Zim takes great pride in their “Thing”  

For Zim, this is completely unacceptable. No version of Zim would just accept their role like this and he KNOWS that. It’s why he resists so hard and calls them all horrible variations of him. Zim has been fighting tooth and nail to carve his own identity and stand out as Irk’s finest invader for centuries. To get the Tallest and his people to look at him for who he is and praise him for how awesome he is. And now he’s being told that in order to be “unique” he has to “follow the crowd” You see where Zim’s whole conflict comes from here.

 This is why Zim falls to pieces when he is actually given a “Thing” and it’s the stupidest thing in the world. All these inferior Zims are the ones calling HIM the worst…. because of packing peanuts. 

The identity he’s been trying so hard to stand out isn’t important after all…. he isn’t a unique Zim, he’s the worst of the worst out of many Zims. You can see how that can easily break him and he would have stayed in his existentialism if Dib wasn’t there. 

And the thing about having a Dib in the Zimvoid….

It’s pretty obvious that not all of these Zim’s “THINGS” are exclusive. Throughout the multiverse, they don’t do the exact same things with the exact same people. Their Dibs and relationships and histories they have with Dib are extremely different. Zib didn’t take into account our Zim’s relationship with his Dib. 

And why would Zib even care about that? Since he claims that he killed his Zim. he lies about a lot of things 

To Zib, a Dib’s relationship to a Zim DOES NOT MATTER

So much so that he denies his own identity, falsifies so much information, lies to Dib’s face to make a good first impression, and above all else, never looks at any Zim’s timeline to determine what their Dib is like. He never checked to see what Dib’s thing is. He just assumed “oh you’re the only Dib who came, of course, that’s your thing” 

But he was wrong.

Really wrong about this, because Zim’s relationship to Dib is really the core factor in what sets Zim apart from the other Zims. 

Dib not only was the factor in keeping GIR alive, but was the factor in getting Zim promoted to the inner circle so quickly in the first place. 

Dib was also the factor in getting 2k and the rest of the Zim-Resisty wound up enough to actually DO something and storm the gate. Like I said, they’ve been sitting around following the rules of Zim-society as a “rebel” for like six months before Dib showed up.

Dib was able to motive the Zims into doing what they set out to do

Dib actually did a lot to boost Zim up into “Ultimate Zim” status. Wether intentional or not, and judged by 2k’s and Palindrome’s reactions to Dib throughout the arc….

I don’t think any other Zim has ever worked with a Dib before.

We get a lot of hints of this from how every Zim talks and refers to their Dib.

We never know how the Boloney effect was reversed in the show, and that’s part of the joke. But it is very clear that the Boloney effect was only reversed because Zim and Dib worked together to find a solution. THIS ZIM DID NOT WORK WITH DIB AND THIS IS WHY HE IS STILL MEAT.

And from all the context clues I showed before, it’s really clear no Zib and Dib throughout the multiverse have even worked together once, just from how all the Zims tend to regard Dib. 

And ESPECIALLY with how Zib regards HIS Zim.

It’s blatantly obvious to me that Zib has never worked together with his Zim. 

But as GIR has stated: 

If a “real” Zim has never worked with a Dib before…. This is the thing that really sets Zim apart.

Dib was the factor in keeping GIR alive.

Dib was the factor in rallying the Resistance.

Dib was the reason Zim got an audience with number One.

Dib was the one who motivated/inspired Zim to actually look deeper into the irken technology

AND DIB WAS THE REASON ZIM WAS ABLE TO DESTROY THE ZIMVOID

You can call this deep-seated denial from both of them, but they are both right in more ways then they know. 

Dib is the Ultimate Dib because Zim is the Ultimate Zim because they unintentionally, fall into teamwork roles and help each other out. They are both the “worst” because they can work together better then any other Dib and Zim in the multiverse, and that is why they are the best.

Zim was the only possible Zim in the multiverse who could actually do this. Because of Dib. 

And I really think that’s what makes him the Ultimate Zim. 

Like I really don’t doubt it. 

NAVIGATION

ALL - Everything, in chronological order.

ART - Stuff drawn for the AU, either by me or other people, but mostly me. This includes both comics and still images.

PROSE - Writing and fanfiction set in the AU.

LORE - Information about characters, places, and plot arcs.

ASKS - Questions asked by readers! See what’s already been covered.

FAQ - General questions about this blog or contents of the AU that are more meta than story focused.

FAEFOLK - Questions about faeries and magic in this AU. Non-character specific world-building stuff.

Lexicon:

TRUE FAE - A full-blooded fae, with no human ancestry. Considered more powerful and ‘pure’ than their changeling counterparts.

CHANGELING - A catch all word to describe beings that are some mixture of human and fae. Applies to both faebloods and faetouched.

FAEBLOODED - A changeling that has faerie ancestry, especially within the most recent generation. In some situations, the blood may be diluted past the point of qualifying.

FAETOUCHED - A human or earthly animal that has been significantly changed or infected with the magic of Faerie. Usually this applies to humans that have been stolen away as slaves, but can be used in other circumstances.

FAERIE QUEENS - The rulers of the Courts of Light, and the AU equivalent of the Diamond Authority.

COURTS OF LIGHT - The kingdom of Light Fae, ruled by the Empress of Light and Stone. Within this court there are three subdivisions: The Court of Thunder and Flames, the Court of Waves and Rivers, and the Court of Flowers and Thorns. Each court is ruled by its own Queen, but ultimately they all answer to the Empress.

REALM OF SHADE - A world of Faerie Shades, opposite to the Courts of Light. Generally considered to be lawless and savage, shades are sometimes uplifted to serving in the Courts of Light. Though they have no formal leadership, they bow to the Empress’s rule in most circumstances.

THE HEDGE - An endless sea of thorns and brambles that inhabits the spaces between Faerie and Earth. More or less a space between dimensions, and is typically hostile to humans and fae alike.

HEDGE WITCH - A human with high sensitivity to the Hedge and its inhabitants, giving them heightened perception of supernatural phenomenon. All humans have some potential ability to tap into magic given the right situation, but Hedge Witches are those either with natural talent or who have trained themselves to access those energies. Generally used to describe humans who have retained more humanity than faetouched.

HEDGEBEAST - One of the various creatures that manages to make its home within the Hedge. Generally considered fearsome for their ability to coexist with such an inhospitable landscape. Tend to be violent towards outsiders.

Character Tags:

STEVEN - Faeblooded prince and inheritor of the Court of Flowers and Thorns. On the run from the Court of Light. Third changeling child of the Maiden.

CONNIE - Overworked human teenager, brand new Knight of Flowers and Thorns. Swept up in this nonsense due to chance and also destiny.

PEARL - Faetouched servant of the Courts of Light. Guardian and protector of Steven. At least, she used to be.

AMETHYST - The second changeling child of the Maiden. Steven’s half sibling, has a history of getting in trouble with fae.

GARNET - Ostensible half-fae prophet and spiritualist, with mysterious properties. Location unknown.

GREG - Human hedge witch and father of Steven. Location unknown.

LARS - Faetouched weirdness magnet living in Empire City. Doing his best to avoid the supernatural and failing utterly.

ROSE QUARTZ - Referred to as “The Maiden of Flowers and Thorns” in this AU. Gifted the entire of her being to Steven and ceased to exist. 

WHITE DIAMOND - Referred to as “The Empress of Light and Stone”. The Queen of all fae and the ruler of the Courts of Light. 

Gift by Zezhou Chen

“We’ll protect each other, in the ways we can. If one of us needs help, the other will come dashing in like the hero who saves peoples’ hearts!”

Happy Mother’s Day! (in case the photoset gifs break)