Note: I know it took me forever and it's a short chapter, I'm sorry. Finals are coming up and I'm stressed out of my mind.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

"You're lucky he didn't get your eye." Zim muttered as he watched the computer seal Gaz' wounds. She bit her lip as the instruments passed back and forth over her face.

"Will it scar?" Gaz rolled her eyes at her overanxious brother.

Zim pushed back the machinery and grasped her chin, examining the work as he turned her face. She winced, but relaxed when his claws didn't bite into her skin. He's being deliberately gentle. The realization surprised her.

"A little," Zim admitted, "But not half as bad as it would have if she had been treated at a primitive Earth-healing center."

She reached out and seized Dib's jacket collar, pulling his face down. Ignoring his protest, she studied the reflection in his glasses. Three, fine pink scars ran across her face, mere traces of what they had been, but enough to remind her not to tangle with psycho Irkens.

She shoved Dib back, mumbling to Zim, "Thanks, I guess." Glancing around moodily, she grunted, "Where's that stupid robot? Usually he's here making idiotic comments at this point."

Dib forced a smile. "He would be, but he's… busy." Gaz raised an eyebrow. "He's replacing the broken ship part right now."

She laughed. "GIR fixing the ship? We're doomed."

"You misunderstand, Gaz," Zim cut in, "He is the part, at least for now.

……………………………………………………………………………………………

A red one, a blue one a-yella one

A green one, a pink one a-purple one

A gray one, a white one a-or'nge one

Th' wires all stickin' outta meeeee!

……………………………………………………………………………………………

"Gaz?" She refused to glance up from her GameSlave. Dib inched into her room. "Gaz, I'm sorry, I don't know what happened."

"I do," she spat, "you froze up like the idiot coward you are."

Stung, he yelled, "What was I supposed to do, Gaz? You're better trained than me and he trounced you. I wouldn't have been able to stop him!"

"You could have tried!" She flipped the controls faster and faster. "You didn't even try to save me!" Her GameSlave began smoking. "I would have died and he would have walked away scott-free, and you would have stood there looking after him, going 'duh, huh?'" The game exploded, pelting Dib with hot circuits and plastic shreds. "Get out." She rasped.

Fuming, Dib retreated to his quarters. He punched a button in the wall and shouted, "Computer? Combat simulation!" The room melted away to a crowded, indoor arena, overflowing with spectators. Dib stood in the corner of a raised platform, shirtless, his bony chest heaving in and out with anticipation and rage. The computer's personified projection, the referee, stepped forward.

Who is your opponent?It asked. Twenty yards away, at the other end of the platform, a shapeless form wavered.

"Gaz," he said bitterly.

The form morphed, shortening, developing feminine features. Ragged purple hair curled around her angry face. She smacked her fist into her hand in challenge. The referee, knowing better than to interfere, stepped down from the platform to watch at a safe distance.

Gaz charged forward, whipping out one spiderleg and positioning it like a sword. Dib smirked. It was so like his sister to dispense with opening pleasantries. Two can do that, Gaz.

He dodged her first stroke, not bothering with his spiderlegs. He caught her chin with his left fist and socked her stomach with the other. She grunted in surprise, stepping back, but he didn't give her the chance to recover. He swung with calculated vengeance, over and over. Her lip split, teeth flew, and huge bruises developed. Long after she had gone down for the 8-second count, he pummeled her.

Someone was crying.

Shocked, he lowered his clenched hands. Gaz crying? Not even a hologram of Gaz could cry! But it wasn't the hologram. At the corner of the platform, watching with wide, tear-filled eyes, was GIR.

Guilt pounded Dib. "Computer, end simulation."

Whatever you say. Dib's room reappeared, reality was restored, and GIR sat on his bed, staring at him as though he were a stranger.

"GIR… I…" GIR's lip trembled. "I… that wasn't really her… I wouldn't really… I…. I…." he trailed off, feeling lame. GIR sniffled. Dib moved forward to assure GIR he was really sorry, but the bot let out a piercing scream and bolted from the room, leaving a shamefaced Dib in his wake.

………………………………………………………………………………………………

She scanned the small Voot cruiser for data, snorting derisively at the recordings of Zim attempting to teach PAK functions to a hyuman smeet. "Pity all that training will go to waste." she sniffed. The equipment picked up a voice outside of the Voot in the recording. She lowered the quality of the inside sounds and tuned in to the outside noise.

"So where ya gotta go that this ship can't take ya? I mean, a Voot can go pretty far, why d'ya need a bigger ship?"

"Shut your meat-holes, the reasons of selling are Zim's, and not yours. Now how much for that Vortian cruiser?"

Frowning, she refocused on inside noises. The negotiations of ship-buyers would give her no clues. She rolled her eyes as the idiotic little SIR unit danced across the screen, singing happily, "Under da seee, under da seeeeee."

Her eyes widened. Why didn't I think of it before? Hundredacy, the nexus of the Shatnirka galaxy. Her fingers flew over her computer's keyboard, pulling up coordinates to the supply planet. With so many thousands of species passing through on that planet every day, it would be easy to lose oneself and one's unwanted past. She grinned as the bright turquoise ball was located, and patted the screen where GIR was still broadcasting their destination for all to hear. "Many thanks, little SIR."

"Under da seeee!"