Hey everyone! Sorry I'm so late with this chapter! I was a bit busy with my DeviantArt account until I remembered I had a story to write. ::sheepish grin::

I blame my head things. YOU GUYS AREN'T DOING YOUR JOB GOOD!

It was quiet.

Too quiet.

That was the second thing Dib noticed as he slowed down to catch his breath. Of course, he probably would have noticed it sooner except his mind had been occupied with interesting thoughts of him torturing Zim.

Zim. It was amazing how many times a day he thought about the alien.

Dib narrowed his eyes yet again as his thoughts skipped back to the impending war. Yes, this war was all Zim's fault. A war!! He still couldn't believe it. A war. What had possessed that idiot to start a war?! How had he started a war?! A "stolen moose"? God, that was unbelievable!

He slowed down some more until he was somewhere between a speed walk and a jog – there was no point wasting his energy just getting to Zim's house when he was going to confront him – and glanced around.

This was just too strange…

There were no children running outside and no people watering their lawns or walking around yelling at hobos. The streets were empty. There weren't even any of the Hi Skool dropouts who tried to sell crack to passersby hanging out outside their usual spot at the pharmacy.

And the shops were already closed and dark. At three pm? Whoever heard of shops closing at three pm?! And wasn't 7/11 supposed to be open all day every day? What the fuck was going on?

Dib turned his head as he jogged past a couple of houses, a look of suspicious confusion etched on his face.

And since when did everyone own an old fashioned black Cadillac?

And most importantly…why was one following him?

Dib had caught a flash of black behind him in a window reflection as he had rounded a corner. Picking up the pace, he shot a cautious look over his shoulder.

Yep, a Cadillac, identical to all the ones he had seen, was following him.

Dib was full on sprinting now. Why the fuck was that creepy car trailing him? The driver of the Cadillac seemed to realize that its quarry had suddenly found out he was being followed and accelerated to try and pull up alongside Dib.

Shit!

This was so not good. Old fashioned black Cadillacs didn't normally try and pull up alongside people they had been tailing unless they had something bad intended. Hell, they didn't normally follow anyone in the first place!

Dib suddenly had an idea. Without warning, the teenager fell to his left and into someone's front yard before dodging around to the back and clambering over the picketed wooden fence. He knew where he was going now. This was his usual shortcut to Zim's house. It was a good thing that in his haste he hadn't accidentally run past it, but the most important thing was that he had gotten rid of the Cadillac.

Go him.

A few more silent backyards and wooden fences later and Dib found himself at the Cul-de-sac where Zim lived. He glanced around cautiously for the Cadillac before running up to Zim's freakish house. He was going to get his answers.

And he was going to get them NOW.

Luckily for him it seemed that Zim's stupid robot dog thing had left a window open…again. For an alien base it was quite easily broken into, unless the gnomes where activated on extra alert.

Which they weren't, thankfully.

With a determined look Dib ran up to the window and leapt in, doing a fancy roll before hitting the orange tiled floor and standing up. Now! Now was the moment of truth! Now was the –

"HIIIII BIG HEADED BOOOOY!!!!"

Dib was snapped out of his reverie as Zim's robot – what was its name? Gir? That was it – screamed at him from the couch. The human realized he had his finger pointed in the air in a bad imitation of his father and lowered his arm in embarrassment.

"Ummm…hey. Where's Zim?" Dib asked. Gir stared at him blankly before suddenly laughing hysterically.

Well, that was helpful. Not.

"Gir!" A portion of the floor opened up as a disguised Zim ascended from the deeper bowels of his base, a rather pissed off expression on his face. Dib noted smugly that Zim's cheeks were still a slightly darker green than the rest of his skin colour.

"Your psychotic laughter has- hhhwwwhaaaat?! The Dib-human!? What is he doing here?! GIR! Defensive mode!"

Gir diligently leapt up from the couch, before once again cackling insanely. The two of them watched as the dysfunctional robot skipped over to the open window and jumped out.

Dib raised an eyebrow and turned back to Zim, who had his head in his hands.

"Why does he always do that?" Zim muttered exasperatedly, "Anyway…" He lowered his hands and curled them into tight fists as he glared at Dib.

But Dib was ready for him. Before the Irken could even open his mouth to yell at him, Dib had started yelling first.

"You've gone too far now Zim!"

"Eh?"

"I've found out all about your latest plan for world domination! Did you really think you could get away with it?!"

"HOW DID YOU EVER FIND OUT ABOUT THE -"

"War?" Dib pointed a finger at Zim accusingly, "That's right ZIM! I know about the war!

"War?" Zim repeated, then, "War?! Has the Armada finally come to doom this worthless ball of dirt?!" He threw his arms up in the air gleefully.

"NO! The war you started! Rather clever of you to make it so that it looked like the leader from the East picked a fight with ours, but I saw right through it! Did you really think I was so stupid that I wouldn't realize that you were behind it?! Now you'd better stop this evil that you've started!"

The human took a deep breath and looked fiercely at Zim. To his surprise, the alien was staring at him as if he were crazy. If Zim had had eyebrows, one would surely be cocked right now.

"What are you talking about?"

Dib was momentarily taken aback. Did this mean that Zim wasn't behind the war and mankind had really just started it by themselves? A feeling of disbelief swept through him.

Fucking mankind had let him down.

…But wait.

What was he thinking? This was Zim he was talking to!

"Don't play dumb ZIM. You know exactly what I'm talking about!" Dib screamed, a sudden anger, burning hot and red, beginning to overtake him and cloud his senses. How dare Zim think he could get away with it by lying to him! There was going to be a war! Millions of people were going to die! In his mind he could see Zim standing there and laughing triumphantly, flames licking up in the background.

This was all Zim's fault this was all Zim's fault this was all ZIM'S FAULT!

Zim stared apprehensively at the human, whose eye had started to twitch dangerously. What had gotten into the dirt child now?

"THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT ZIM!"

Zim let out a sharp cry as he was propelled backwards, hitting the floor with a thud with the Dib on his chest.

He was starting to get the distinct impression that Dib had a somewhat perverse enjoyment in being on top of him.

Dib grabbed the lapels of Zim's overly baggy uniform and pulled him off the floor slightly so that they were almost face to face – a rather uncomfortable position on Zim's half. The human looked down at him with an almost evil expression on his face.

"You had better stop this war from happening Zim." Dib hissed, shaking the Irken slightly.

"Stupid human! I have no idea what you are talking about, and even if I did I wouldn't stop it!" Zim growled back and punched Dib in the head, the action causing Dib to yowl in pain and fall off him. No one threatened ZIM in his own base! No one!

The alien scrambled to his feet and was just about to deliver a vicious kick to Dib's side when the human unexpectedly leapt up and tackled him. They both landed awkwardly on the couch, where Zim – much to his disgust and chagrin – again found himself in the more submissive position.

Curse humans and their long legged-ness! …And their heaviness!

"Ggaaaghhh!" Zim gritted his teeth as his arm was wrenched behind his back painfully, "COMPU-!"

He didn't get time to finish his yell for assistance as Dib shoved his face into the couch, effectively muffling his cry and almost suffocating him.

A sudden screech outside brought a halt to their fighting. Zim found he could breathe again as Dib removed his hand from his head and they both looked up and out the window.

Cadillacs!

Two of them!

"Those Cadillacs again!" Dib muttered. "They must be part of your plan! Am I right Zim? Huh Zim? Am I right? Huh? Huh? Huh?"

"Are you crazy?! I have no need for inferior human technology to help me! Those human…things…have nothing to do with the brain sucking demon squid!"

"Brain sucking demon squid?!"

"…YOU DID NOT HEAR THAT!!"

Dib had a puzzled expression on his face. "But if those cars don't belong to you…then…why was one following me?"

"One was following you?! And you led them right here?! Oh you wretched human!"

"Hey, it wasn't my fault and – why the hell am I even bothering to have this conversation with you?!"

BANG!

Their argument was again interrupted as the door was kicked open and four men in clean pressed black suits jumped in through the doorway.

"AGGGHHH!!"

"WHO ARE YOU!?"

"That's not important right now." One of the men answered, ignoring the strange positions Zim and Dib were in. He pulled out an electronic notepad and scanned down it.

"Dib?" Dib nodded dumbly.

"Ah good. Your scary sister said we would find you here. And Zim?"

" Yes I AM ZIIIM!!" Zim yelled in response, glaring daggers at these new intruders.

"Oooo-kay." The man turned to the other three and nodded, "These are our missing recruits. 777, 666 you take the green one. Me and 345 will take Mr. Dib."

"Recruits?!" Dib released Zim's arm and jumped off the couch, "What's going on?!"

The one labeled 345 stared at him, "The war. You're the last recruits the government asked us to fetch."

It suddenly all clicked together.

"This is conscription! You can't do this!" Dib yelled, struggling as 345 and the first man took him by the arms and dragged him out to a waiting Cadillac. He dug his heels into the ground, trying every trick in the book to break free before finally giving up. Geez, what were these guys on? Steroids?

Behind him he could hear the sounds of a scuffle and angry yelling. It sounded like Zim wasn't having that much luck either.

"GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!! :crash: AGH! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! :bang: HEY! LET GO OF ME! YOU SHALL NOT TAKE ZIIIM!! :crunch: AWOAAHAA MY SQUEEDILYSPOOCH!"

Dib would have laughed if the situation wasn't so dire. He craned his neck to look behind him.

666 and 777 had finally stepped out of the house holding a rather battered Zim between them. Zim was still yelling and was kicking his legs in the air, seeing as he was too short to touch the ground from his position.

The last thing Dib heard before he was forcefully pushed into a leather interiored Cadillac was 777 exclaiming jovially, "We've got a fighter in this one! He'll be good for the front lines!"

Hehe. Another apology for the lame ending. I was running out of inspiration (again, I blame the head things.)

Dib: It's not our fault you write like crap!

::Gives Zim a laser and tells him to go after Dib. Dib screams and runs.::

Now, where were we? Ah yes.

The war scenes are still a long way away unfortunately, I just want to build up some momentum without jumping in the deep end straight away. =)

And they will be angsty! All wars need angstiness. You wouldn't tell with my previous chapters could you? They're all very…ironic.

Anyway! Please R/R! Cause I like reviews! I am a review whore!…and yet…not…0o;