Chapter Four: Decisions Made

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                "….no. You can go there, Gaz, but I'm staying. I've got a way to defend myself now, so it should be easier to find food. And people won't notice that you're gone for a while. I'll show you the way there, but after that I'm coming back home."

                Gaz stared at him. "Dib, I've always known you were crazy, but not to this extent. So you've got a weapon. The gangs will swarm the house once they find out I've left, and they've got plenty of cannon fodder. Eventually they'll kill you….or worse," she added darkly.

                Dib shuddered, but stood to his decision. "I'm staying. Come on, I'll get you there."

                At the base, Gaz turned around to face her brother once more. "One last chance, Dib. Is this really the decision you want to make?"

                "Yes. Uh….Dib reporting, with one confirmed associate by the name of Gaz. Request access to command."

                The hologram flickered and vanished, revealing again the elevator and the MiMi-like robot. It looked over them, apparently scanning their heat signatures. Possibly retinal scans. Who knows? It could have been anything.

                The little SIR unit opened the door, beckoning in Gaz but not, for some reason, Dib. It was almost uncanny how it could judge the situation.

                Dib waved goodbye to his sister, knowing full well that he probably wouldn't see her again.

                She waved back, the faintest traces of sorrow flickering across her face.

                As the elevator door closed, Dib started trudging back to his house. He was all alone now….nobody would be there to talk to him, not that Gaz had done that very much. But still….just having someone there was, in a way, a good feeling. That there's somebody, even if they don't care about you. Just having somebody….

                And now he had no one.

                The walk back to his house was longer and colder than he'd remembered. Strange how the sky seemed to be more gray, and the streets more desolate. Little details he hadn't noticed before stood out, like the stains of long-dried blood decorating so many of the building walls. The sounds of a scuffle made Dib jump, twitch, and instinctively start running….until he saw that it was just a rat fight.

                Huh. Even animals are affected by all this. I never saw rats fighting before last April, and now I see them practically whenever I go out. Or maybe it just means that they can't find any food, and kill each other for meager shares of stored trash.

                Had it been a year earlier, Dib would have shook the morbid thoughts out of his head. As it was, he didn't bother. Everything else about his life was morbid, so why not his thoughts? That at least made since, unlike anything else.

                I should have gone with her. I could save people, I could put away criminals, I could help restore our fractured life….but I didn't. And I don't even know why. Something inside me just screamed that it was WRONG.

                I never listened to that voice before, so why now?

                Once he'd reached his house, he sat quietly and ate a slice of pizza. Then he sat in the darkness(power companies couldn't supply electricity anymore), shivering at the cold. Dib stayed like that for a very long time.

                Days passed. The pizza lasted for a while, but after it was gone, he had to search for something else. This was made easier by the laser gun, though there were still problems. For one thing, he just couldn't find anything edible. Dib searched as far away from his house as he dared, still finding nothing. If it weren't for the fact that Zita dropped by every now and then with as much food as she could carry, he probably would have starved to death.

                Dib stared out his bedroom window, looking up at the stars. When I was a kid, I always thought the stars held my future. My one dream in life had been to go up there one day, to prove that there was somebody else out there…when I found Zim, I thought that goal was within my grasp. I thought I could expose him and show the world once and for all that I was right! I wanted to save my planet from certain doom, while at the same time get Zim on an autopsy table so he'd never bother us again.

                Now it turns out that the only certain doom facing Earth is one caused by humanity itself, and the local aliens are the ones trying to STOP that.

                I really, really hate it when I'm wrong about everything.

                Dib's thoughts were interrupted with the sound of a large CRASH outside. He nearly fell backwards, steadying his balance and grabbing the gun. As carefully as he could, Dib peeked down the stairs to see if it was safe.

                It wasn't. A gang had just broken down the door, and was tearing up the house. Dib's heart abruptly went still. They'd figured out that Gaz was gone much sooner than he thought they would….and now they were here.

                A particularly muscled and tattoo-covered man looked up, noticing him. "Hey! It's the kid! Grab him!"

                Dib ran into his bedroom, slamming the door behind him and readying his weapon. Maybe if they could only come in one or two at a time, he'd stand a chance….

                Loud footsteps pounded up the stairs, and the door was knocked down in an instant. A seemingly endless line of criminals faced him, all determined to be the one that caught the boy they'd been looking for ever since their first defeat at the hands of Gaz.

                Firing the gun, Dib managed to knock down the first rush mobbing him. They fell to the ground, gasping for breath and clutching vicious burns that seeped blood. Dib even hit some in the second rush, but then…

                He aimed the laser gun and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. There was just a clicking sound that stood out amongst all the noise. Dib stared down at it, sheer terror filling his mind. The gun was overcharged, it wouldn't be able to fire for at least another hour.

                As the mob overwhelmed him, the last thought he had before everything went black was that the little voice inside him was laughing.

End chapter four! Sorry for the lack of updating, school leaves me little time. This chapter's short, isn't it? And cliffhanger-y. But you won't get to find out what happens until I finish the next(and probably last) chapter! HAHAHAHAHA!

….well, it might not be that long of a wait. I've got the whole storyline plotted out, I just need to get it down on Word. 'Till next chapter, folks, and any reviews will send me into my happy place!