I'm thinking that there should be some author note, disclaimer thingy here, but I can't think of one, so I'm just gonna start typing the chapter now.

Ever have a one night stand, especially with a friend, and then have to see them every day after that? You know; where you get really crazy (and maybe even drunk), not realize what you're doing, and then have to go on, pretending that nothing happened? Well, that's how things are with me and Zim; after he kissed me, and I thought he might…feel something for me (-shudders-). Then he goes and acts as though nothing happened. I thought that I might have a real problem with him…then the REAL problem showed up. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I really should just tell the story the way it happened, and let you decide where the real problem is.

I wake up slowly, becoming conscious hours before I drag myself out of bed. Usually. Today is different, though, as Gir decides to jump on my bed repeatedly until I'm awake enough to yell at him.

"Gir, what are you doing?"

"I'm waking you up."

"Why?"

"…I forgot."

"Damn bloody useless." I growl at him.

"Oooooooooh yeah. I remember now Gazzy!"

"Great. Why, now?"

"Master wants you."

"Well, you can tell your master to forcibly insert the request into his anus."

Gir cocks his head, sticks his tongue out, and just looks at me.

Sigh. "That means he can shove it up his ass, I'll get up when I'm damn good and ready."

Gir runs out, and I curl back up to sleep a bit longer. Within minutes, Gir is back with Zim in tow, and they are both saying stuff, trying, yet again, to wake me up.

"One. At. A. Time."

They pause for a moment, look at each other, and then resume babbling.

"Stop. Both of you. Zim, speak."

"Thank you, Gaz-human, for acknowledging my superiority over Gir. Not of course, that there was ever any doubt, but still, a superior being such as myself enjoys recognition, and to be told this by a slave without prompting is-"

"Zim, cut the crap and tell me why I'm being woken up."

"Zim will not be spoken to in such a way, Earth filthy."

"Tell me right this goddamn minute why I'm being woken up at such a godforsaken hour!"

"Because, oh wise one, today is the day that we reveal ourselves as supreme rulers to the mindless filthies out there. We are also supposed to be attending the funeral for your disgusting brother this afternoon."

"…When did they find the body?"

"They didn't. Professor Membrane had a free spot in his schedule, and decided to not wait for the body of his poor, insane son to surface."

"So we're not even sure he's dead!"

"Oh, believe you and me, Gaz, he's quite dead. I rigged the flowers, and none escapes the might of ZIIIIIIIIM."

"Fine. Just get out and let me sleep."

"Sorry hyooooman, but I can't let you do that."

:Twitch: "And why the fuck not?"

"Because of what you told me, about humans and their customs."

"Huh?"

"It is customary to wear black to one of these funerals, yes?"

"Well, yes, but-"

"And we don't own any suitable black clothing. So we need to go and acquire some by this afternoon, as well as a suitable disguise for Gir."

"Can't he just stay here?"

"Think about the last time we left him here by himself."

"Ah. Good point. We could just tell everyone he's your seeing eye dog because you're blind."

"Exxxcelent."

"Not excellent, Zim. This probably means a trip to the mall. Know who lives there? Preps and mallrats."

"I like preps. Yaaaaayy." Gir adds between bounces on my mattress."

"NO, Gir, that's BAD!" Zim yells.

"Awww, but I luvded those little preps. I luvded them good."

"Gir, do you even know what a prep is?" I interject.

"Wheeee, I have no idea what you just said." Gir runs screaming from the room.

"Riiight. Mall, then? Fine. Go, and have fun. Just know that I'm not going with you. I'm going back to sleep now. Leave."

"Fine, just tell me what horrid things I must wear to this…funeral. TELL ME or suffer the doom of the mighty Zim stomping boot!"

Shit. If I send him there as himself, or even with Gir, who knows what crap he'll come back with? On the other hand, the mall sucks, and I don't want to go there. Bed warm, no dignity for bringing the freak, bed warm, take crap from relatives and dad. Arg.

:SIGH: "FINE, Dib, I'll go with you."

"Stink-monkey?"

"DON'T call me that. And what?"

"…Why did you just call me Dib? That freakishly big-headed freak isn't here anymore, you know that. He's dead."

"…I didn't call you Dib."

"LIES! Filthy lies, you DID!"

"Maybe 'cause he always dragged me places I didn't want to go to, same as you're doing now."

Zim sits there for a few minutes, as if deciding whether or not a comeback is worth it.

"Up, so we can go to this filthy mall."

"Fine, I'll get up. YOU get to put Gir in some clever disguise and tell him to behave."

"Why me?"

"He's YOUR robotic slave, not mine."

"But he listens to you."

"You want me to come with you or not?"

"Fine."

twenty minutes later, Gir is in his little brother costume, and Zim and Gaz are trying to walk from the bus stop to the mall

"Gir! Come back here this instant."

"Whhhyyyyyy?"

"Because normal human worm babies don't go running after squirrels."

"Awww, but he's so cute. And stinky looking."

I can't help but chuckle at the stupidity of people…I mean, come on. There's no way that Zim and Gir can be human, but everyone ignores them as though nothing's wrong.

"We're here Zim, you can stop chasing Gir now."

"Finally. Where are we headed first?"

"ooooh, how about there?" Gir pipes up. "It's so shiny lookin."

'There' happens to be a Sam Goody with all of its silvery cds.

"Um Gir, I don't think that's a very good-"

"Excellent Gir, that's perfect."

"Zim, no."

Too late.

"Excuse me, counter slave, but I am going to require your assistance."

The 'counter slave' just looks at him with a typical girly 'like, I sooo am not getting paid enough to deal with this, like, loser, just because my rich daddy wouldn't pay for my, like, stuff anymore' look and says, "yeah, I'll, like, be with you in a second" and then under her breath mutters "freak."

"Come on Zim, this isn't the place to get what we need."

"Nonsense Gaz, Gir pointed this out as the perfect location. I say we stay here, and don't worry about the foolish counter slave that won't wait on ZIM!"

"Fine. You want her attention? You get it. Just don't say I didn't warn you."

"Come on Zim, this isn't the place to get what we need." I repeat loudly, and this time the bimbo comes running.

"Like, welcome to Sam…uh…Goody. I'm Amber, can I, like, help you?"

"Greetings, Amber. We're going to a funeral today, and we-"

"Oh, like dark goth-y stuff. Yeah, we got that. Right here." And points to a Marilyn Manson cd.

"No, foolish counter slave, we need-"

"Or, like, this is better if you want real music for afterward, there's this." She hands us an Ashlee Simpson cd.

"Ewww goddamn preps" I growl at her. Unfortunately, she didn't hear me. Zim did.

"I think you were right Gaz, let us go elsewhere."

"'bout damn time."I growl.

"Where to now?" He asks me after we leave the prep behind and fight our way out of the store.

"Why are you asking me?"

"You're the human, in case you're forgetting, and that makes you the expert here."

"And how the hell does being human make me an expert?"

"You've lived here all of your filthy life. I haven't."

"But you make it sound as though I've been to a zillion funerals. Just one, and I was too young to remember much of any of it."

"That's one more than I've dealt with. Besides, I know where you spend most of your time."

"How did you find out about that?"

"You don't exactly hide it."

"True, but it's so quiet there, and nobody bothers me. Ever hear the phrase 'silent as the grave'?"

"Well, you still have to see a lot of funeral hyoomans while you're sitting lounged up on the tombstones."

"Not really. I play Gameslave the entire time. I don't pay attention to any of them."

"Figures. Still, were do we go now?"

"I still don't know, Zim." He is really starting to get on my nerves, and being here isn't helping. For fucking sake, how many times do I have to say that I don't know before he gets it?

"How about there?" I look to see where he's pointing, and I think that I may be sick. Hot Topic, where all of the wannabe goths go. What's only ironic is that, in trying to escape the preppy hold, they only feed it. (A/N: true. Hot Topic is owned by Abercrombie and Fitch.)

"Are you sure that's where you want to check Zim?"

"Unless you have a better idea?"

I don't. "Allright, let's go. The sooner we get this over with, the better. Just don't expect me to be nice to all the wannabes in there."

Instead of a bubbly prep, Hot Topic's counter slave looks like a stoned zombie, one that hasn't been washed in over a month. He reeks, and is possibly dumber than Paris Hilton. I don't know if you know the type, you know, the guy with long hair, perpetually stoned, slurs all his words together and those that aren't slurred are so horribly shortened you can hardly understand him.

"…uh, 'ni help 'uguys wi'n'thing?" (Translation: uh, can I help you guys with anything?)

"What did you just say to Ziiim?"

"I think he just asked if he can help us with anything."

"Fascinating. What language does he speak?"

"It's called stoner."

"Well, then tell him why we're here. I can not speak this…stoner language."

"Tell him yourself Zim, just don't speak too fast or use any big words."

"Greetings, stoner counter slave. We require clothing to attend a funeral this afternoon, and since you offered your assistance, you can go find us some."

Blank look from stoner guy.

"What my friend is trying to say is that we need something black to wear later today."

"Du', yur fren' 's weir'-ass, man." (Translation: Dude, your friend is weird-ass, man.)

"I know he is, just tell me where to get what we came for."

"r'lax, du, 're's black shi' ev'whr. uguys blin' or sumpin?" (Translation: Relax, dude, there's black shit everywhere. Are you guys blind or something?)

"No, we're just not used going to funerals all the time, our friends aren't junkies getting shot or OD'ing every other day."

"du, yura bitch. S'no nee' f' that. 's'only trina help ya." (Translation: Dude, you're a bitch. There's no need for that, I was only trying to help you.)

"Allright Zim, I don't think there's anything of any use in here. Let's go."

"'bou' time…freaks."

"Shut up stoner, or I will destroy you."

Gir got next pick, he took us into some 6th grade girl store. I'll spare you all the details of the trip to that store, in the interest of keeping this manageably short, and also the interest of blocking out that memory. It was horrible. Pink, glitter, and over exposed little girls everywhere, screaming and running away from those horrible horrible freaks. It was kind of funny, the expressions on their make up crusted faces. We couldn't get any employees to talk to us there, the management just asked us to leave, because we were disturbing the (over)paying customers.

"Ok, Zim, Gir, this is getting really stupid. Let me pick the store."

"Finally the almighty stinkbeast offers her assistance."

"Shut up."

"Make me."

Silence.

"I thought not. You need me too much."

"Lead on then, instead of gloating over your neededness."

"Here. This place should work." This place turned out to be some random generic department store, complete with old ladies fighting over bargains. Kind of pathetic, really, but still…the place to pick up what we needed.

"What are we looking for today folks?" drawls a woman who looks bored to death with her job. Very fake looking dye job, to give her blond hair, she looks like some tired, used 40-something has-been who's trying to be young again. It's not working too well for her.

"My normal friend and I are searching for funeral clothing, like any other normal worm baby would be doing. Where can we find such clothing?"

"boy's department and misses, probably." as she gives an overloud and obviously fake yawn.

"Thanks…for nothing you old hag." I muttered the last bit so as not to attract her attention all over again. We all know I don't need that. We walked over to the misses section first, found me a black dress that I can probably get away with wearing to mine and Zim's ceremony later, and headed over to boy's, wherewe started (started, ahahaha) having problems with this little jaunt. Zim hates ties.

"Come on Zim, this is what all normal humans wear to a funeral."

"You're not wearing one."

"That's because I'm a girl."

"So what? That doesn't mean anything."

"I don't know how it is on Irk, but here gender makes a big difference. Believe me, dresses and skirts are worse. I would trade you in an instant."

"Ok. You wear the tie, I'll wear the skirt."

"No trade Zim."

"B-but you just said we could."

No, I said that if we could, then I would. But we can't."

"Why not?"

"It wouldn't be…normal to trade like that."

It didn't help matters any that Gir chose that precise moment to declare that ties are for short people to look prettier, and he found one with a moose that he wanted.

"Gaaar, that's it. No ties will make ZIM look short and pathetic. I am ruler of EARTH and all of it's filthies, and no ruler is short. Do you hear me! I AM-"

He broke off abruptly when he realized that people were staring at us, and finished with "-heh, heh, a normal worm baby buying a normal tie. Now GO and stop staring at my wonderful NORMALNESS!"

Surprisingly, most of them did go, except the woman that tried to help us earlier.

"Is that all you're going to need?"

"Hmm? Yes, this is all Zim will require today."

"Good, can you pay for it and leave? You're disturbing the rest of the customers."

We did just that, paid for the dress and ties (we decided to let Gir have the moose tie) and left. We had to take the bus back to the base, but Gir chasing pigeons no longer seemed to be a big deal. Until the attack of the stupid person.

"Aww, that kid is just so kyooooot, he looks just like you…are you his mommy and daddy?"

"Eh? No! Gir is my rob-"

"Robbie, his nephew. He wanted to go see, uh, santa at the mall."

"It's April, lady." Yells some random jerk on the sidewalk.

"Right, I meant the easter bunny."

"Aww, how sweet." Croons the lady.

And then she walked away, just like that.

Next chapter funeral, although it might take awhile. I've been neglecting my work a bit to get this one finished, because it wouldn't leave me alone until I took care of it…my poor, tortured brainmeats. Oh well, they'll live, I hope.

On a side note, I have decided to take a leaf out of thejennamonster's book, and start putting random references to outside sources in here. (Not counting the bunch of lines from different IZ episodes.) One of them is pretty obscure (Stagger, if you're reading this, you had better get the really obscure one), but the other ones should be guess-able. Your name in the next chapter if you can let me know what any of them are, just use your brainmeats and DON'T put the answers in your reviews, mkay? ((hears mumbled whisper in the background)) Yes, reviews. You know, the lovely reviews that you were going to leave me telling me what you think thus far, nice or not, I don't really care as long as you say something. Those reviews. Don't give away my answers in them. ((hears whisper again)) Don't be ridiculous, voice-that-isn't-really-there, of course the readers are leaving me reviews. Right?