A/N: This is my first Zimfic, and I'm finding it rather had to find something that hasn't been written a thousand times before. So, in the end I'm sure it will turn out to be the same old Zim tries to take over, Dib stops him but doesn't expose him, they are both going crazy fic that everyone writes. There will probably not be slash or ZADR, so at least that separates it from half of the fics out there ;) And its not because I don't like slash or ZADR – I just don't think its part of this particular story.

Anywho, none of the characters in this story are mine except the ones in the town Dib moves to, who are all NPCs anyways and don't really matter. And so with that out of the way (because I'm sure you thought I owned Zim right? I wish) we shall begin.


"My Sanity for a House"

The long silver knife barely found resistance as it pierced the green flesh, exposing equally green runny insides that dripped slowly onto the cool metal table. Two thin cuts parallel to each other, one on the bottom to connect them, and two diagonally across the top making the easy-to-peel-back shape of a pike – or maybe a very thin, short house. The fluorescent lights above left no tiny organ within unexposed as the knife molested the green body and left it hideously deformed.

A misjudged cut and green juice squirted up onto the glasses of the boy haphazardly doing the autopsy. He swore gently under his breath - a word he had heard his father use once when the original super toast had gone under and his father's good name with it. Of course, the great Professor Membrane had bounced back with an even better version of super toast that swept the nation like a plague.

Taking his glasses off to wipe them on his white shirt, Dib was suddenly stuck between his unprotected eyes by something warm and grainy, but soft. Arranging his spectacles on his ears so they weren't crooked, the boy looked down at the muffin that had bounced off his forehead and into the plate of green beans he had been laboriously dissecting.

"Behold!" the irritatingly loud voice called from across the busy lunchroom, causing kids to stop in mid-bite to see what was going on this time, and to hope that it would be a food-fight of giant proportions. "Dib has succumbed to my Muffin of Doom!"

Brown eyes rolled under glass as Dib looked up, un-amused, at his mortal enemy, arch nemesis and causer of all sorts of dastardly doomed deeds.

Silently, he went back to his green beans.

"Ahha!" that annoying voice again, closer this time as the green fiend jumped from lunch table to lunch table, edging even closer with each maniacal laugh. "Do you see how the Dim-monkey cowers before the Irken Elite! Cower Dib-monkey! Cower!" As the black boots landed in Dib's view the green beans went flying - scattering across the table and floor, two hitting his kid sister in the forehead. He could feel the heat rising with her anger as a broken green bean splattered its disgusting matter all over her Gameslave screen.

"Zim, if you don't stop annoying me NOW," her voice rose in pitch and volume as she spoke, "I will make you regret this day for the rest of your hideously pathetic life!"

Zim stopped short, pausing half-leaned over Dib to look at the earth girl and decide whether or not she might make good on the threat. Deciding the Irken Elite didn't have time for such silly children, he turned his freakish purple contacts back to the bigheaded boy before him. "Bow to me dirt-worm! Bow to Zim!" Somehow, his voice always ended up an octave lower when he said his own name.

"Go away Zim, I'm not in the mood today." Dib closed his eyes as if the apparition before him would disappear so easily. Rubbing his eyelids under his glasses with his left hand, his right slammed the knife down into the remaining green beans.

Ever the intelligent observer, the alien squinted one eye at the boy below him in the cafeteria bench and tried to decipher what this new behavior could mean. Dib didn't want to fight back? He wasn't going to try to throw his glass of punch or rip out the alien's contacts to expose his red pupiless eyes? The Dib-monkey must be sick.

"You should see the skool nurse. This is probably something serious that needs to be immediately treated by a filthy health professional. When you are feeling better we will resume our struggle for the future of the planet." Stepping backwards off the table, Zim seated himself opposite his opponent, darting an eye towards Gaz to make sure she was fully re-immersed in her game and not plotting a way to kill him with a green bean and a spork. He himself knew of several ways to do so himself and none were a thrilling way to go down in Invader history.

Finally re-opening his eyes, Dib released his death grip on the knife and tried to explain as slowly and rationally to his green enemy why he didn't care for their little game of destroy/save the world at the moment. "I am not sick, Zim," he started out with clenched teeth, "I am not coming back to 'struggle for the future of the planet' as you so deftly put it. We are moving to another state. Game over. You win."

"Moving?" One purple contact squinted while a black-gloved hand scratched at the toupee the alien wore as a 'disguise'. Then his eyes lit up behind their white and purple screens and a toothy smile spread across the green face. "You have given up? You are moving to another planet with the shame of a defeat by Zim!" Once again his own name was said an octave lower - it grated on Dib's nerves.

Gaz looked up from her game, teeth set in a grimace, dark purple eyes squinting darkly at the incompetent fool across the table. "We are moving to a different state Zim, not a different planet. And if you interrupt my game one more time with your antics and stupid questions I will personally see to your speedy demise before that date."

A bead of sweat broke out on the Invader's forehead as he looked at her out of the corner of his eyes. "Yes, well, anyhow... ehem," a gloved hand covered his mouth as he cleared his throat. "When will this... shameful retreat be taking place?"

"Next week," had barely made it out of Dib's mouth when Gaz reached across the table, grabbed Zim's thin little neck and shook him so hard his teeth clashed together and his head snapped back. "Ow," he managed to breath before he complacently left their table; head cocked backwards starring at the ceiling.

"Thanks sis," Dib managed a weak smile as he watched the green form walk off towards the 'filthy health professionals' office.

"Whatever." Gaz was already lost in level 14 of her newest game: Pig Zombies from the Vaults of Vort.


Sitting with his back against a fire hydrant that smelled faintly of chocolate bubblegum and turkey, and his short legs wrapped up under his arms, Dib starred at the only thing on earth that proved his sanity. The house was short and thin, much like its owner, with a fake window near the top and a "mens" bathroom sign on the door. All four fake garden gnomes out front had their lifeless eyes trained on his glasses, but he had not stepped foot within the white picket fence so they sat meaninglessly in the dead grass.

The "I 3 Earth" flag stood straight out in the breathless air – just another testament to the boy's sanity.

"What are you doing Dib-worm?" The normally high-pitched voice was softer with the alien's struggle for comprehension at his enemy's new behavior.

"I'm looking."

"Looking for what?" There was a note of paranoia in the green boy's question. The human had never bothered just looking at the house before – what was he trying to find it in? A weakness to exploit? A souvenir to take with him?

Dib sighed and pushed the glasses back up on his nose. "Nevermind. You wouldn't understand."

A black boot blocked the view as Zim stood over Dib, leaning over him as he had earlier that week in the cafeteria. "Wouldn't understand? Filthy human! I understand all! I am Zim!"

At least he hadn't said his own name an octave lower this time.

"Dib, what are you doing? We have to finish packing!" Gaz's deceptively light voice traveled across the circular street to the figure still sitting, unmoving, on the ground.

"I'm looking!"

"Looking for what?"

Under his glasses, Dib closed his eyes as one lid twitched. "Nevermind, I'm coming."

He pushed himself up from the cement, looking past the green head in front of him to the empty window of the house. Behind its fake glass were all the resources of the Irken Elite. Everything needed for an Invader, however doomed his mission may be, to collect information to be used against the human race in the struggle for galactic domination. Drills that could pinpoint the happiness center of your brain and test your response to various stimuli, tiny micro-ships that could enter the body and destroy you from the inside out, a computer system with the information to take over the Massive and lead it to a fiery doom within a dying sun – all these things and more hid behind the white picket fence and "I 3 Earth" flag.

Brown eyes traveled down the building as the front door opened and a green dog stepped onto the small cement porch, tongue hanging out and a vacant expression on its face. "TAQUITOS!" it barked at the street before slamming the door on the human boy's gaze.

Turning his back on dog and owner, Dib walked across the street where his purple-haired sister was waiting. He could feel the electric red gaze following his back and heard the singsong voice follow him down the street.

"Goodbye dirt-monkey! Have fun trying to save the filthy planet from another state!"