Never Could Have Been Worse

Chaotic Orchid Angel

Rated: R

Disclaimer: After my traumatic event with Jhonen, I have decided never to write Zim stories again… that's a big 'ole fat lie in'it? He still owns it and I am still very poor.

Author's Note: I have absolutely no idea where I'm going with this. I know what I want, I just have no idea where I want it to go, ya know?

Chapter Three

Gaz was awakened the next morning by Dib tapping her on the head.

"Did you sleep here all night?" Dib asked. Gaz stretched her muscles, wincing at the pain that shot through her neck. She reached her hand up to rub away the pain.

"Yeah, I guess I was really tired," she murmured. "What time is it?"

Dib glanced at the microwave clock. "It's a little after seven. You have time to take a quick shower to relax your neck."

She covered her eyes to shield them from the morning sunlight. "No, that's okay, I'll just take some ibuprofen." She stood and stretched. "By the way, thanks for helping me out last night, I guess you do have your uses."

He smiled. That was a bonafide Gaz compliment. 50 percent compliment, 50 percent insult.

She rubbed the back of her neck in annoyance. Why the hell did she have to fall asleep like that? She searched through her closet for an outfit to wear for skool. She didn't feel like her usual jumper and she enjoyed wearing the dress to skool, despite the nasty comments. She found a pair of boot cut black jeans and a black top. The top was tight and had a high cut that would bare her stomach, showing off her perfectly toned abs and skull belly ring. The sleeves were long which gave it a nice offset to the rest of her uncovered body. She topped off the look with her long purple trenchcoat. She had no idea where these clothes had come from, but she was glad she had them.

"Maybe they were a gift from someone." She said to herself.

She ran a brush through her hair and ran to the bathroom to brush her teeth and take something for the pain. Afterward she ran downstairs to find Dib waiting for her.

"Wow Gaz, you look really nice again! Someone you're trying to impress at skool?" he teased.

She looked at him in pure disgust.

"Have you seen the unwashed miscreants that go to our skool? I knew you were dumb, but this extends beyond all measures!"

Dib gave her a moronic look. "I'm not dumb."

She merely smiled her little condescending little smile.

"Keep telling yourself that."

They rode to skool in silence again. Gaz reached over and turned on the radio. Dib tried to switch it to his favorite station that had a program on paranormal activity. One look from Gaz and he relinquished the knob. She popped in a CD, and the strains of Radiohead's "Paranoid Android" filled the car.

"Come on Gaz, I can't listen to this depressing weird crap so early in the morning! It's…depressing."

"Give me one of my simple pleasures before I enter the depths of Hell once again," she replied.

"Gaz it's not that bad. I know you're bored in class, but hey, sometimes it sucks to be smart! I know that I pass the time by…" he trailed on, but she had tuned him out. Her mind was drifting to the music. She let the lyrics carry her away to a place where only she existed. She felt tears well in her eyes and she tried to flush them out again. Why the hell was she so emotional all of a sudden? Why was she prone to cry at every little thing? She squeezed her eyes shut and calmed herself before Dib could notice. She took a deep breath and choked when she heard Dib say,

"Dad called last night and said he was coming home tonight."

She blinked and shook her head.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?" she asked incredulously.

Dib turned to look at her. "I said that Dad is coming home tonight."

"That's what I thought you said."

Dib looked at her again. Something was wrong; her eyes were red, like she had been crying. He wanted to say something but he knew she would just lash out at him. Inside, he felt like he was dying. What was wrong with her? He prayed that she would be okay. Maybe this time Dad would stay and things would be okay again. They had both reached a point where they needed him the most in their lives, and when he wasn't there, they took the loss hard, especially Gaz. She was a girl on the cusp of womanhood without a mother or a father figure. Dib saw his father a bit more often than she did, only because he had to bug him over his paranormal research.

He remembered the time when Gaz nearly went insane trying to find him when he left during the annual Family Night Out. Their father took two hours off once a year to spend time with his children. He allowed them to choose their favorite restaurant and they would go and have a good time. One year, Gaz picked the restaurant but Dib was not at home to go. He had been kidnapped by Zim and taken to his space station. When Gaz suggested going without him, her father protested and told her that they would have to put if off till the next year if they didn't go that night with Dib. Gaz immediately rescued Dib and off to Bloatie's Pizza Hog they went.

Dib chuckled to himself. Gaz was not afraid of taking what she wanted. It seemed like she wasn't afraid of anything. Time seemed to change that. She still had her take-no-prisoners attitude, but she had become withdrawn. He hoped it was only a symptom of adolescence and girl hormones, and nothing serious, but he knew that it was so much more than that. There were times where she looked like she was about to shrivel up and die and he just wanted to hold her and let her know that it would be all right. He cursed himself for his cowardice. If he were a good older brother, he'd have taken better care of her, he would have never let her suffer.

His thoughts came to an end when he pulled into the skool parking lot.

Why was the skoolday so frickin' long? Gaz was ready to lose her mind. She ignored the usual taunts and told Zeeta and her Harpy squad to go fuck themselves when they tried to gang up on her. The harpies actually had the nerve to think they could accost her and then ran away like dogs when she glared at them. Zim tried to talk to her today about something stupid concerning her brother. Actually, it was more like he cursed the entire human race and her brother along with it. She half agreed with him. If there was a bigger misanthrope than she, it was Zim and for that, she respected him. The rest of the time, he was a bigger moron than her brother.

By the time three o'clock rolled by, she was squirming in agony. Inwardly of course. She raced outside to the car, praying that Dib was already there. She waited impatiently when she saw that he wasn't.

"Dib, where the hell are you? I want to go home now!" She yelled out loud.

"Talking to yourself, little Gaz? You're just as crazy as your brother," an oily voice sneered.

"Where is Dib, Zim?" she ground out angrily.

"Ha! Perhaps he has finally gotten what was coming to him and disappeared off the face of this stinking planet!" he laughed arrogantly.

Gaz looked down at the little green boy-thing. In all her years of knowing him, he had not grown a single inch. She now towered over him menacingly.

"I'll ask you one more time, where is Dib?"

"I am not his keeper, stink-child! I am Zim!" And with that, he ran away.

"You're an idiot." She turned and began to walk home.

When Gaz arrived home, she had the shock of her life. Her father was actually home, just like he said he would be. He had kept his promise! It took every ounce of self-control not to run screaming 'Daddy!' and throw her arms around him. She couldn't and she wouldn't. It's not like he'd appreciate it either.

"Hey Dad," she said casually as she strolled through the front door.

"Hello Gaz. How was your day at skool?" he replied, not even bothering to look up at her. She noticed and seethed.

"Fine." Not as if he would even know or care. When did he stop caring? Did he even care to begin with?

He tinkered with some little techno gadget and spoke again.

"Where's your brother? I was going to take the two of you out. It's…"

"The Annual Family Night Out," she finished for him. "Yeah, I know. I have no idea where he is. He was supposed to meet me after skool. He probably got ran over or something bad, I don't know," she muttered.

"That's nice," her father replied absently. "I just hope he gets here soon, I can't stay very long."

Gaz stared at him in shock. "But… you just got here! And you're leaving again so soon?" She felt her heart clench in pain. Sure, she had some resentment against him but that didn't mean she wanted him to leave again!

She started to voice her protest when Dib came through the door.

"Gaz, where were you? I looked everywhere for you," he whined.

She rolled her eyes. She didn't even bother to say anything. It wasn't worth the energy.

Dib then noticed his father standing nearby and frowned.

"Hi Dad, nice of you to come home for once," he said darkly.

The Professor took no heed of his son's dark tone. "Thank you son. I was just telling your sister that I won't be staying very long again. I just wanted to see you two and take you out for our Family Night Out."

The two siblings glanced at each other. Gaz shook her head. There was no use in hoping for him to change, none at all.

"Now, whose turn was it to pick the restaurant?" he asked.

Dib looked at Gaz. "It doesn't matter to me," he claimed.

"Me either," she said.

"Okay, I'll choose," the good doctor declared.

The atmosphere at dinner was tense, to say the least. Professor Membrane took them to a ritzy Japanese steakhouse and sushi bar. In-between courses, they tried to strike up conversations. They stuck to light subjects, mainly Dib's insanity and obsession with Zim, and the new games Gaz was playing on her GS2. It was mindless and inane, and completely agonizing.

At one point, the professor asked Gaz a serious question.

"How have you been lately? I know you don't have many friends at skool and don't participate in anything. Are you coping well?"

She nearly choked on her unagi roll. She swallowed hard and looked up at her father. Her mind was reeling. Was he really showing concern for her well being? A part of her was dying to tell him everything. About the isolation and the loathing. About the horrible things she did to herself to stop the pain, which in turn increased it. She stared into his eyes and said the first thing that came to mind.

"I'm fine."

As the professor made his final calculations on a project, Dib watched his sister in silent contemplation. She sat on the living room sofa, watching an old vampire movie. Her facial expressions were blank, but her eyes were filled with emotion. He was about to say something to her when his wrist communicator alarm beeped. His thoughts suddenly switched to those of a "paranormal investigator".

"Aha! I knew it! Zim is playing with temporal mechanics again! I'm gonna go stop him, we all remember what happened the last time he did this!"

He ran out the door into the dark night, without saying one word to Gaz or his father.

Gaz heard his little outburst and ignored him. Stupid boy. She returned to the movie but her thoughts were far from it. She thought of her father, and wondered if he would even care if she told him how upset she was. She fought with the idea of getting up to go talk to him. Her emotions won over her pride for once and she made her way to his laboratory. She knocked on the door and let herself in, not bothering to wait for his answer.

"Dad, I…"

"Oh Gaz, I'm glad you came down here, I wanted to tell you goodbye before I left."

She sighed. No way was she going to say anything now.

"How long will you be gone for this time?" she asked softly, her eyes cast down at the floor.

"A few months or so, but I'll call you every time I get the chance and I'll be home in time for graduation."

Gaz knew her voice would betray her emotions if she spoke, so she simply nodded her head.

"Good. Well then, I'll see you later. Tell Dib I said goodbye and be good."

She nodded again, refusing to look at him. She heard the door close and she stood in silence, her body tensed as if it were made of stone. A few moments later, she left the lab and went upstairs to her room.

"…stupid idiot robot. I hate that thing!" Dib exclaimed as he walked back to his house. It turned out that Zim was playing around with a temporal field again. And when Dib tried to interfere, GIR, the insane SIR, had a lapse in his insanity and jumped into defensive mode. Fortunately, it only lasted for about thirty seconds and then he started running around screaming something about chickens and taquitos. He then ran into Zim's temporal core and destroyed the whole thing, not without singeing Dib's clothes and destroying his camera.

He had an extra camera, but he had let Gaz borrow it. He knew she would make a fuss about giving it up, it was a very nice camera. He prepared himself for the upcoming argument and opened the door to a… very dark house.

"Dad? Gaz?" he called out in the darkness. He could hear music coming from upstairs. It was coming from Gaz's room.

He ran up the stairs. The music was deafening. She was listening to Portishead. God, she only listened to that when she was really depressed. He banged on the door to her room and when she didn't answer, he threw open the door.

She had just lowered a straightedge razor to her wrists.

"GAZ! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!?"

He raced over to her before she could press down and pulled her hand away from her wrist. She shrieked in protest.

"Get the hell off me Dib! Leave me alone!"

"NO!"

"LET GO!"

"NO!"

She struggled in his grasp, trying to reach the blade. She was crying. The way she was fighting him, she was going to end up cutting them both. Dib knew he had to calm her before she did some serious damage. She was strong and starting to break free of his grasp. He tried talking to her.

"Gaz, please calm down, you're gonna hurt yourself!"

"That's the idea moron!"

"You don't want to do this!"

"Yes I do, I hate this! I hate people! I hate Dad and I hate you! No one cares, no one ever cares!"

"That's not true Gaz! I care about you!"

"Shut up!"

"It's true Gaz! I do care! I love you!"

"I said shut up!"

She struggled even more. The blade had slipped from her grip somewhat and was now pointing toward her skin even more. She managed to nick herself again and Dib knew he had to do something to stop her, so he did the first thing that came to mind.

He kissed her.