Author's Note: Surprise! I've decided that all of you lovely readers deserved a quick update to the story after that stretch without inter-dimensional madness. Unfortunately, this is the last part of the story. Don't worry, I'll try to keep staying true to both movie and show, even though I don't own them. Now lay back, relax, and enjoy the show.
It was dark and dreary, and yet it was home. Jack could make out the Pumpkin Sun begin its descent through the windows of the laboratory. At least before he was nudged by Zero, who was barking happily at his return. Jack smiled and patted his dog on the head before his sockets wandered to quite a sight. Oogie Boogie was strapped to a metallic table, yelling at Lock, and Shock, and Barrel to free him.
"About time you all got back! Get these things off of me!" Oogie demanded as Lock, Shock, and Barrel went about releasing him.
"Why is he tied up?" Sally asked the Mayor, who was sitting at Oogie's side.
"Oogie's been a bad boy while you were all gone," the Mayor said, getting up and walking over to Jack. "I have reason to believe he was trying to get you stuck in another dimension permanently, Jack."
"You can't prove anything!" Oogie Boogie said to the Mayor as he got up from the table.
"We don't need to. Oogie, I suggest that you go home now," Jack said.
"And what if I don't, Bone Head?" Oogie asked Jack, getting in his face and pointing at him with his left arm.
""I'll do this," Jack said, tugging a loose seam on Oogie Boogie's arm, watching it unravel and bugs begin to fall out.
"AHHHH!" Oogie screeched, taking back the remains of his arm. "You'll pay for that, Bone Head! Kids, we're going home. Don't forget my cowboy," he finished as he walked out of the room.
"How are we going to carry that thing out of here?" Barrel asked Lock and Shock as all three of them looked at the metal cowboy lying on the ground.
"I'll take it down with you, if you promise to behave," the Mayor said in a slightly regretful tone.
"Oh, we'll behave," Shock said in an innocent voice.
"When don't we?" Lock asked, causing all three of them to burst into giggles.
"Oh, what have I gotten myself into," the Mayor said sadly as he picked up part of the cowboy and took it out of the room with the trio.
"I can't believe we're home," Jack said to Sally.
"Neither can I," she replied before voiced from the hall caught their attention.
"Careful now, Igor, I'm feeling a little light-headed," Doctor Finkelstein said as he wheeled himself into the room.
"Master's better now," Igor said, grinning.
"If I ever have my brain taken out like that again it will be too soon," Doctor Finkelstein said before turning to the Continuum Portal. "And as for this infernal thing... Igor?"
"Yes, Master?"
"Help me destroy it."
"What?" Jack asked in disbelief.
"Jack, my boy, surely you cannot be serious about going back into that thing, can you?" Doctor Finkelstein asked.
"Well, not to the same dimension, Doctor. Not yet. Sir, please, there are so many different places we can visit through the portal, things we could never imagine if we dreamed for years and years."
"Jack, my brain has had plugs in it and was installed into a firing range object within the past twenty-four hours. It gave me a lot of time to think. Whatever other dimensions are out there are dangerous. Just imagine if Oogie Boogie happened to work with a real evil genius instead of some crackpot. No, I'm not putting the town in danger again. The portal will be destroyed, end of story."
"Yes, sir," Jack said, defeated. "I think I'll be going home now," he finished, walking out of the room with Zero following.
"Yes, go ahead, you've gone through quite a lot," Doctor Finkelstein said, oblivious to the brooding tone Jack had in his voice before he left.
"Doctor, I think you'll be wanting these too," Sally said, passing him the two Rift Makers.
"Good thinking, Sally. Though, the next time anything bad should happen, I would like to think you wouldn't run off into the unknown and risk getting captured yourself. Don't frown at me, young lady, I'm saying this for your own good."
"Yes, Doctor," Sally said, sighing and walking out of the room, trying to ignore the sounds of Igor and Doctor Finkelstein destroying the portal.
Meanwhile…
"Come now, Son, have a slice of pizza," Professor Membrane said to Dib as he sat across from his son and daughter in the Bloaty's pizza booth.
"Yeah, Dad hardly gets off from work and you're sitting here taking space with your head," Gaz said before biting into her slice.
"I'm not hungry," Dib sighed.
"Just ignore him, Dad," Gaz said once she swallowed her bite of pizza.
"Son, please, don't let this whole experience discourage you from following real science. It really is fascinating, you know," Professor Membrane said.
"It's not that," Dib said as he took a slice of pizza.
"Oh, good. Finally, your phase of paranormal nonsense is-" the professor started before Dib interrupted.
"Not over, Dad," Dib said.
"What a pity," Professor Membrane said, tsk-tsking over the fate of his son.
"It isn't nonsense. Look at what came through the traveler. A talking skeleton and dead kids? A woman made of dead body parts and a brainless man? You can't call that normal science."
"I suppose not," Professor Membrane said, causing Gaz to look upon him skeptically. "Then again… perhaps the paranormal exists in their dimension."
"Finally, you see things-" Dib started before he was interrupted this time.
"But, if the paranormal exists in their dimension, then it doesn't exist here. Simple as that," Professor Membrane said.
"I give up," Dib groaned as he banged his head against the table, causing Gaz to chuckle at him darkly.
"So, we can do this again in November, Dad?" Gaz asked.
"Yes, I think I can free up some time then," the professor said.
"Good," Gaz said, smirking at a crestfallen Dib.
Things didn't get much better when Dib got home. First of all, he had to manually find each and every one of the ghost traps Gaz had set in his room. For such a small space, those were a lot of traps. Did Gaz offer to help? No. But she did laugh every time Dib got injured. Once that was done, Dib climbed his way up to the roof of his house and looked at the stars.
They were always beautiful to Dib, beautiful and mysterious. He always knew something lay beyond them, living proof of that turned out to be his mortal enemy. Now, there was something else he wished he could look at: dimensions. One couldn't find dimensions in the sky or the sea or any other Earthly place Dib could think of. The one way he could look for other dimensions was gone.
Dib sighed as he took something out of his inside jacket pocket. It was the picture Jack had taken of himself by accident. How funny to see someone who spent his afterlife scaring people look so shocked. Dib couldn't help but chuckle at it, and feel a little sad. He finally found some people who didn't call him crazy or laughed at his mission to save the Earth, and now he could never see them again. No, he had to stop thinking this way. Dib put the photograph back in his coat pocket and stood up on the roof.
"When I'm done capturing Zim, I'm going to do some dimensional research of my own," he said as he started to pace around. "Then I can see Halloween Town for myself, and any other worlds without having to worry about Zim. Until then, I'm just going to-" he said before pacing right off of the roof and landing in a garbage can near the back door of the house.
"You're talking to yourself and hanging out in the garbage?" Gaz asked as she poked her head out of the window. "If you stop showering and leave the house for good, you can be an official hobo."
"The Earth will thank me for this one day, Gaz," Dib said, causing Gaz to throw an empty juice box at his head.
"Sorry, I was aiming for the rest of the trash," Gaz said smugly before disappearing from Dib's sight.
The boy had infinite patience with his sister. Rather than getting up and pelting her back with garbage, Dib lay back and looked at the stars once more. You know, they didn't really look so bad from where he was at the moment.
Meanwhile…
"Another plan ruined by that Bone Head!" Oogie Boogie yelled as Lock, Shock, and Barrel sewed up his left arm.
"You'll get him one day, Oogie," Shock said.
"He's bound to screw up sooner or later. When he does, I'll be waiting for him," Oogie Boogie said as the final stitch was made. "Finally. Now you three go out and find me some replacement bugs."
"Oogie Boogie, sir, we're kinda tired," Barrel said.
"NOW!" Oogie Boogie yelled.
"Let's go, guys," Lock said to Shock and Barrel, leading them out into the Pumpkin Patch.
"I hope those tall guys aren't mad at us," Barrel said to Lock and Shock.
"They can't do anything to us now. It's Oogie we have to worry about," Shock said.
"I guess so," Barrel said before he and Shock bumped into Lock. "What?"
"It's Jack," Lock said, pointing ahead to the spiral hill.
"We'd better bug hunt somewhere else," Shock said, the boys agreeing with her as they ran off to a different section of the Pumpkin Patch.
Jack never saw the trio nearly approach him. He was busy looking at the stars himself. As he sat on top of the hill, he wondered just how many places and people he would never see. Then there was Dib. Without some kind of outer intervention, there was no way Jack would ever hear if Dib succeeded or not in his mission to save his world. In the time he had spent in that odd dimension, the eccentric large-headed boy had grown on the Pumpkin King. So had his world.
All of a sudden, everything around him seemed so boring. Same old pumpkins, same old hill, same old full moon among the same old stars. Every day was the same here. You wake up, scare some people, sleep, repeat. Why had Jack never seen it before? There had to be more to this afterlife, right? Was Halloween all there was?
"Jack?" asked a shy voice coming from the bottom of the hill.
"Sally," Jack said, looking to the back of him.
"I didn't mean to disturb you, I'll be going now," she said as she started to leave.
"No, wait," Jack said, getting up. "It would be rude of me not to walk you home."
"Thank you," she said when he reached her. "Jack, are you alright?"
"Not really," Jack said. "I kind of liked the idea of going to other dimensions, and now that's gone."
"After all that happened?" Sally asked, surprised.
"Yes, odd, right?" Jack asked, Sally nodding in response. "When I was there, all I wanted to do was come home, and now that I am home, I want to go back. And not only there, but any other place, as many places as I can find to visit."
"You don't like the place you're in now?"
"It's not that, Sally. I love Halloween, don't get me wrong. It's just… I don't know."
"Jack, go home and get some rest, I'll make something for you and-"
"No, Sally. Don't go sneaking around at night on my account, you need your rest too."
"I don't like seeing you like this Jack," Sally said, stopping in her tracks and looking straight into his eye sockets.
Sally had a stare that could pierce through anyone's soul if given the chance. Whether she realized it or not, Jack didn't know. All he knew at the moment was that something was happening, something he was quite unsure of. Sally seemed close to tears. Jack must have scared her again without realizing. He had to get that under control if he was going to keep his best friend.
"It's nothing, really. Don't cry, Sally," Jack said before slowly wrapping his arms around her, embracing the rag doll. "It will all be better tomorrow, you'll see."
"Jack," Sally said before the skeleton shushed her gently.
"Don't worry. I don't want to scare you, I'm sorry if I do. You're my best friend."
"Just don't run away alone looking for some grand adventure. Don't leave me, Jack."
"Of course not. You'll come along with me. We'll find more nightclubs and dance until dawn. Or until we go deaf, whatever comes first," Jack said, smiling when he heard Sally giggle. "Better?"
"Yes," Sally said, unwrapping herself from Jack's grasp and taking his left hand in her right.
"Now, let's get you home before curfew. Something tells me the Doctor isn't in one of his patient moods tonight," Jack said to Sally as they continued walking to the laboratory.
All the while, Zero had watched them. He whimpered a bit and sighed. His master could be such a fool sometimes. If Zero could speak English, he would tell Jack exactly how he was being a fool. Alas, Zero was a dog, and had to settle in the hopes that maybe some barks and body language would get his points across. For the moment, he was quite tired and when Jack found him on his way home, Zero floated alongside him, glad he was back and a bit curious to see just what Jack would have on his mind now that his inter-dimensional adventure had come to an end.
Meanwhile…
How could this happen? Red and Purple stood slack-jawed at their main transmission screen. There was Zim, ranting and raving over his horrible time with a burlap bug man of sorts. The three children they gave his job to were missing in action. Zim seemed to be their Irken equivalent of human cockroaches. He was small, annoying, and hard to get rid of, almost impossible to kill. With a sigh in unison, the Tallest turned off their side of the conversation without so much as saying good-bye to Zim.
"My Tallest? Hello? My TALLEST!" Zim yelled, ignoring that GIR was drawing pictures all over some blueprints of his. "Eh, must have lost the connection," Zim said.
"Wanna see my pictures?" GIR asked Zim, shoving what appeared to be stick figures of Zim, Oogie Boogie, Doctor Finkelstein, and himself into Zim's face.
"No, GIR, I have some business to attend to," Zim said, focusing his attention on the hat lying on the floor close to GIR.
Zim picked it up and stared it at for a few moments. He then proceeded to shake the hat up and down to shake loose any physically bad things that could be hiding in there. No, it seemed to be clean. With a deep breath, Zim put the hat on his head. Nothing happened initially. Zim grew impatient and tried to take the hat off. Only, it didn't come off. It stayed stuck to his head.
"Heh? What the-" Zim said before shrinking back in fear.
The notes of an unknown song began to play. When they did, monsters seemed to appear from every nook and cranny of that room. Zim did the best thing he could think of, he ran out of that room screaming. Unfortunately, there were more monsters there. No matter where Zim went, all he saw were monsters. There was nothing he could do to escape them, they ran the Base now.
"Get them away! GIR, help MEEEEEEEEE!" Zim screeched, rolling around on the floor, unaware of his mind's betrayal.
"I like that game!" GIR exclaimed as he too began to roll around on the floor and scream.
It was then that he abandoned his artwork. It consisted entirely of stick figures. A very tall one for Jack, one surrounded by hearts signifying the "crunchy lady", and three all stuck together for the undead trick-or-treaters. One with a larger than average head stood in for Dib. That one was being poked by a slightly shorter stick figure, Gaz, of course. On top of that ruined blueprint was the one GIR had drawn on earlier, with him, his master, the doctor, and Oogie. Together, they made quite a nice, if amateurish picture.
It would be one of the few records of the inter-dimensional adventure. Drawn by a dim robot, it was the simple story of what happened when science mixed with fate and two worlds went along for the wild ride. Neither of the worlds was normal before the experiment, and now, it was less likely that they would ever come close to normal again. Not that being abnormal is bad. On the contrary, it was what made them unique and worth visiting in the first place, if only for one brief time.
The End
Thank you all for reading my very first crossover! I never would have kept going without all of your wonderful support. Thanks! Oh, and for Jack/Sally fans, remember: this story took place before the movie. So if you feel like watching them take their relationship further, you can pop in "Nightmare" and enjoy. I totally recommend it. (Re-edit comment: In all honesty, I am very pleased with how this story turned out. It helped me bridge my old style with my new style, and bring back some good memories along the way. Thank you again for reading.)