Hey, everyone. Sorry it took a while to get this chapter up. It's a kind of short one, but---

If it's so short, you should have been able to get it up faster.

Yeah, but I'm trying to stay ahead, and the next chapter's a long one. And I did warn everyone it might be a while. Anyway, the point is, here's the new chapter, so everyone stop bugging me. Enjoy.

Chapter Thirteen
Keef Quiet

Dear Log,

Contact with Subject D has been made. Further investigation to take place this afternoon. Am still wondering if I should have been so direct about the issue, but given how difficult things have been up until now I'm hoping that this will be the best way to figure out what's up. I'm also not sure if I made the right idea about not looking into Zim. He isn't in class right now; could he be skipping on purpose? Almost definitely yes; maybe he's even left the planet already, for all I know, with his real identity exposed.

At least, I think so. I mean, I can't be totally sure...but seeing that weird eye thing is pretty hard to explain otherwise.

Well, in lighter news, Keef is back to normal. I'm guessing that yesterday was just a twenty-four hour bug. He still seems a bit spacey today, at least in the sense that yesterday seems like a blank to him, but he's acting much more "Keefy," which is just fine with me. (No matter what Gaz or anyone else thinks.) Still, he was so weird yesterday. I'd almost think---no, Louie, stop that, don't get all paranoid. He was not hypnotized/brainwashed/an alien in disguise/whatever else your psycho mind can come up with. Besides, he hardly seemed to be a slave to Zim or anything, and Tak…well, somehow I just don't think she'd be behind that.

---From the Log of Ajunt Mofman, dated August 27

Keef was having a kind of weird day.

First of all, he still couldn't remember anything about the day before. Or not much, at least; it was all kind of a blur. He could remember going to skool, classes, lunches (including, when Louie reminded him, the spaghetti incident), but everything was kind of…weirdly foggy and vague.

The other big thing was that Louie was treating him funny. Apparently he'd acted "really, really weird" the day before, and at first his best friend seemed reluctant to be around him. That made Keef sad. Seeing this, Louie seemed to be a bit more open to idea that things were back to normal, which made Keef happy again. He hated it was Louie was mad at him. Not that Louie ever was. But just the thought of it was so scary, that his absolute bestest friend in the whole wide universe might want to stop being friends…ugh, it was too horrible to think about!

"So I sure am happy that you're not mad at me anymore," Keef said during lunchtime, nodding decisively and taking a sip from the straw of his milk.

Louie snorted a bit into his food.

Keef frowned. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing," Louie said with a smile. "I guess I'm just happy your Keefness is back."

Keef grinned. Across the table, Gaz glared up from her Game Slave through heavily lidded eyes.

"Would you two stop talking? It's filling me with rage."

"Oh, go jump in a ball pit, Gothika," Louie said, rolling his eyes.

Keef laughed, until Gaz's Game Slave collided with his head.

He had forgotten: Louie might be safe from Gaz's violence, but Keef wasn't family, at least as far as she was concerned.

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"Now class, I hope you've all read today's horrible assignment, because now we're going to break into pairs to work on the problems at the back of the chapter," Ms. Bitters said.

Keef smiled. Oh boy! He loved it when they did things like that. It meant he would be allowed to talk to people during class.

"Now, everyone break up into teams and get to work," Ms. Bitters said, waving her hand. "If you need me for anything, I don't care." And she took out a book and disappeared behind it.

As all the kids in the room began to stir, Keef got up and began to walk over to Louie, who had already turned in his seat, expecting him. Keef was just reaching out to grab the chair when he suddenly felt himself stop. Something had grabbed him and was now pulling on the back of his collar, dragging him away.

"Ah, yes! Keef, old, er…pall. Come! You will be working with Zim today!"

"Huh?"

He looked back, startled, as Zim dragged him by the shirt away from Louie and back to his own desk.

"Huh? Zim? When did you get here, I thought you were absent---"

"Yes, yes, you think many stupid things. Now come!"

Keef was dragged helplessly back towards his own desk in the back of the room. Louie's mouth dropped open. He was so surprised by Zim's sudden appearance, not to mention the forcible kidnapping of his best friend, that he failed to notice Gretchen trying to talk to him until he felt her tap on his shoulder.

"What?!" he snarled, spinning around before noticing her.

Gretchen jumped back. "Oh---sorry, Louie---I just---th-thought you might like to be my partner---but, uh---"

"What? Oh---no, no, sorry, Gretchen," he said quickly, feeling his face burn with shame. "Um, sorry---I was just---distracted---" He looked back towards Zim and Keef. "Um, sure, I'd…love to work with you."

"Oh." Gretchen gave a nervous smile as she sat down next to him. Across the room Zita---who had tripped over her own backpack in her mad rush to get to Louie---was glaring up at Gretchen with positively Gaz-ish rage.

--------------------------------

"So, um…what pages did Ms. Bitters say to do?"

Keef flipped through the skoolbook, glancing up at Zim and feeling unusually nervous. He liked Zim, he really did, even though Louie didn't. He liked everybody, after all. But still…there was something kind of…weird about the way Zim was looking at him right now. And Keef couldn't help but recall what Louie had said about Zim's eyes, though like most of the previous days, he couldn't really remember the incident well.

Zim waved his hand airily. "Oh, let's not worry about that, shall we?" he asked, taking the top of Keef's book and lowering it to the table with his gloved hand. "Why don't we just talk, hmm? As, erm…friends?"

Keef blinked. "We're friends?" He had always considered Zim and him friends---just as he did with most fellow carbon-based life forms, and most silicon-based ones too---but he was surprised, although pleasantly, to hear Zim refer to him that way.

"Why, yes, of course we are," Zim spat out quickly. "So," he leaned forward, violet eyes narrowing, "I was wondering if you could help me with a few little…erm, problems I have."

"What kind of problems?"

"They have to do with Louie."

"What kind of problems with L---"

He broke off in mid-sentence, his small Keefish mind suddenly going on the alert. He wasn't supposed to talk to Zim about Louie, he remembered. Louie had told him that…though he hadn't always listened before. Once, Keef had accidentally told Zim some things about Louie's home security systems, and the next day Louie had screamed at Keef that Zim had managed to break in and destroy what little evidence Louie had been able to obtain against him. It was one of the few times that Louie had ever yelled at Keef, and stood out vividly in his memory as something he didn't want to repeat.

Zim was watching him expectantly. Keef drew slowly away. "I'm…not sure that I can help you, Zim."

Zim blinked. His face faltered for a moment, looking confused. But it returned to normal after just a moment, gazing at him shrewdly.

"Oh, come now, Keef old pall of mine," he said, giving him a playful (but rather hard) punch on the shoulder. ("Ow!") "Just a little question! You can do that, can't you? CAN'T YOU?!"

"Well---"

"Excellent! So tell me---" He leaned forward conspiratorially again, and Keef, unable to restrain himself, bent down closer to hear him, "did you ever know of a hyuman by the name of…Dib?"

Keef drew back, startled. "Dib?!"

"Yeah, that's what I said. You knew him, didn't you?"

Keef frowned. They were really in forbidden territory now. "Um…yeah. He used to be my best friend."

Zim smiled. "Excellent! So tell me about him. Was he like Louie?"

"Well…a little, I guess. I mean, they're kind of brothers, so---"

"Excellent! So, how are they different?"

"Huh?"

"Does Louie have any---oh, I don't know---weaknesses that the Dib-monkey lacked? Extra stupidness? Breakable organs? Allergy to peanuts? Tell me."

"I---"

Zim leaned in closer; Keef leaned back. He shot a look across the room at Louie, who, he noticed, was looking out at him out of the corner of one eye even as Gretchen was talking to him. He gulped.

"I…really don't think I'm supposed to be talking to you about him, Zim. That's…private."

Zim blinked. This was not the answer he had been expecting at all, at least not from Keef. "What now?"

"Dib. He's…not really…any of your business." He gulped again, feeling a bead of sweat slither down from his head. "He was Louie and Gaz's brother, and they really don't like---"

"Oh, forget them!" Zim snapped, making a sudden fist. "Give me your Dib-related datas! Give them to Zim!"

"I---uh---"

He looked around wildly, trembling slightly, feeling trapped between the hungry look in Zim's eyes and the cautious one visible from Louie across the room.

Suddenly he shot his fist into the air. "BATHROOM!" he screamed, before jumping up and running out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Everybody spun around to stare at Keef as he ran by, shocked by the sudden outburst. Even Ms. Bitters looked up briefly from her book, only to shrug and turn right back to it as the others stared at the closed door.

Within moments, though, Zim knew who the second person to look away was, as he felt Louie's eyes glaring into the back of his head.

How was this? It feels a bit...I don't know, rushed to me. Anybody else think so? Like I said, this could have been longer, but some scenes that could have been here got put into the next chapter. Anyway, until next time, please feel free to leave a review!