A/N: Guess what? Go on! Guess!

[By the way: DISCLAIMER: I do not own Invader Zim or JtHM (No matter how much I love referencing the latter). If I did the world would probably end.]

P.S. This has been reposted because Nae is a total blondie and forgot to edit for typos and things that should be in italics!

The lab was strangely empty and devoid of shrill hunger cries. It was well past the mutants' usual feeding time. They ought to have been raising hell and attempting to climb on top of one another to get out of their cage to go find some bloody meat. Finding their playpen empty I started to worry. I heard Dad humming to himself in the opposite corner of the lab. I panicked.

"Dad?" I was still staring down at the mutants' little enclosure, wondering where they were and imagining the worst.

"Son! I didn't hear you come down. How can I help you?"

He sounds like a Super Mart employee.

"Where are my mutants?"

"I'm dissecting them. They were doing remarkably well so I thought I'd take the opportunity to see how they worked."

What?

"What?" I stumbled across the lab (several carts and boxes insisted on blocking my path) to where he stood by a sink. One of the mutants was pinned down in a dissection tray. Its fluffy top was flayed open and its innards were on display. The tiny organs had a purplish cast to them.

"Would you like to watch?" Naturally he assumed my dropped jaw and eyes full of tears meant wonder and amazement, not shock, pain and horror.

I ripped the scalpel from his hand and flung it across the room. "You have no right to cut up my mutants," I growled.

"Now, Dib, be rational," he began in a familiar, condescending tone, " these are not your mutants. They aren't pets. They were genetically engineered animals and, seeing the success that they had, they needed to be dissected so that any internal defects can be weeded out in the next batch. It isn't as though they care what happens to them."

Trying very hard not to scream I pulled the mutant from its dissection tray and shoved it in Dad's face. The whole not-screaming thing was a total failure, but then again I never really had very high expectations of success.

"Tell that to Lieutenant Butt Scoots, Dad! Did you ever stop to think that these things might like being alive! They were healthy! I even think Colonel Mustard and Cuddles were gonna have babies! Babies, Dad! You're a baby killer! This is infanticide! For God's sake I even taught Squee to jump on fucking command! He was good at it!" I gripped the lapels of Dad's lab coat in one hand and shook him while gesturing wildly with the other, flinging bits of the Lieutenant's innards everywhere.

"They were not just your damn experiments, Dad! What's more, they were mine! Don't you dare say they weren't! That is bullshit!

"Who fed them, huh? Who made sure they didn't suffocate in the post-feeding fur pile, huh? Who was the one that made sure Sir Wiglebaum actually got to eat, huh? He would have starved if it weren't for me!" Sir W. was the runt of the pack. I held a special place in my heart for that one.

"I know for a fact that it wasn't you who did all that, Dad!" Panting, I released him, smoothing out his coat and accidentally smearing it with Lieutenant Butt Scoots's blood. The mutant's corpse was still clenched in my fist. It was a ball of much, guts and fur at this point.

"They were my responsibility," I spoke in an even tone, " You should have had the decency to at least tell me before you started dissecting them. What you did was rude and extremely inconsiderate of my feelings."

"I had… no idea that you felt so strongly." His voice was shaking.

Inside I grinned. This round goes to Team Dib. Well done, soldier.

"No shit. You killed my babies." I folded my arms across my stomach. My bullet wound was achy and my torso felt hollow. The mutants were my summer project and I'd liked having them around. My therapist had even said that taking care of them was good for me. Now they were dead and I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye. This sucked.

"They aren't all dead."

I perked up at those four words and shoved my face into Dad's, making him pull away at the personal-space invasion. "Where are the survivors?"

"There's one left in the empty aquarium and-"

I went to the aquarium, scooped the mutant up in my shirt and went back upstairs without another word. Tak was helping Gaz put away the groceries in the kitchen, albeit reluctantly. She held a pound of hamburger meat away from her body with one hand and was opening the fridge with the other.

"I'll take care of that for you, thanks."

By the time either of them had processed what had happened enough to demand my return I was locked safely in my room. I gently unrolled the mutant from the hem of my shirt. There was some light striping on its tan fur. This one was Devi. She didn't move for over a minute and I thought the stress of being moved so much in one day had killed her. At about the time when I was preparing to put her lifeless body in the trashcan she scuttled towards the package of meat, bumping into it repeatedly and making gritty noises.

I smiled and sniffed, rubbing my eyes.

Crybaby.

"You were worried, too."

I ripped the plastic off the top of the package then plucked Devi up by the fur and set her inside of it. (There was no way I was getting my hand anywhere near the bottom of her body. That was where her mouth was and, though none of the mutants had bitten me I wasn't about to trust that they never would). Thankfully the act didn't seem to hurt her and she went straight to eating. The slurping sounds that issued from the tiny ball of fluff were comforting. I was glad I'd saved one from Dad's ruthless pursuit of science.

When Devi was done eating squeaked again, trying to walk straight ahead. It was cute to watch her try to head butt her way out of the plastic box. I picked her up and set her on at the foot of the bed. She curled up into an armadillo-like ball and stopped moving. She was sleeping.

I tossed the meat package into the trashcan. There was no need to clean it out- the mutant had removed any and all traces of biological matter from it. I stripped down to my boxers and slid into my bed, careful not to kick my mutant. It had been a tiring day. If Gaz wanted to force-feed me she'd have to wake me up first which was a monumental task on a good day.

Curling up in my blankets I glanced down at the mutant. "Please don't gnaw my toes, face or any other body parts off while I'm sleeping, okay, Devi?" There was nothing in lieu of a reply but I felt better for having made the request.

You're crazy.

"Look who's talking."

xXx

"DIB!"

The force of a small tornado struck my bed and sent me flying up against me bedroom wall. The blankets were wrenched from my body. I let out sound mid-way between a terrified screech and a sleepy grunt in reply.

Gaz stood at my bedside with her hands on her hips and Devi perched on her shoulder. "Dib, wake up! There are Mormons downstairs. That bumbling idiot that insists he helped produce me must have let them in. They have been here for an hour! Its your turn to make them leave."

I rubbed my hands over my face. The sun was still up. I'd only been asleep for a couple of hours at the most. "Stay up here, Gaz."

"Why?"

"You risk being blinded."

With that final warning I stalked into the hallway and downstairs, shedding clothes as I went. I paused in the bathroom to grab my sister's favorite piece of art- an intricately carved dagger from Italy. In a flash of divine inspiration I snatched up her maroon lipstick and drew a star on my stomach with it. They must have heard me coming downstairs because one of the happy churchgoers stood and began to say something about it never being to late to convert.

"I really do not have time for this, lady." I greeted the woman and her husband butt naked and brandishing the knife. She quickly sat down beside her husband, staring at me with a mixture of shock and horror. (Though I prefer to think of it as admiration.)

"Clearly the gods have answered my prayers for a real human sacrifice because I'm awesome and they love me. Now come here!" I roared and lunged for the couple, stopping about six inches away form them. They ran screaming from the house, almost tearing the door off its hinges as they left.

"Damn it."

Gaz chucked a towel at me and I obediently wrapped it around my waist. "What?"

I sighed, "I really did want to sacrifice them to the gods."

"What gods?"

"The ones my meds are supposed to make go away."

True fear crossed my sister's face for the first time in either of our lives. God I wish I'd had a camera.

I laid a hand on her shoulder. "I'm kidding, sis. The voices didn't tell me that they were gods- they just kept me company. There is a difference in those types of delusions. My meds are working just fine."

"Good." There was a slight pause then, "You didn't eat. I hate you. Go eat before I rip out your esophagus and shove it up your scrawny ass."

Her icy glare made me flinch. I snatched up a box of flavored wheat crackers from the pantry and went back into hiding. Safe in my cave I curled up with Devi and read through the "H" section of my encyclopedia set. Around the entry for "hornet" I fell asleep.

xXx

"It has to be him. It can't be but it has to be."

Of course its him!

I closed my Anatomy and Physiology textbook. The class had been given a textbook-scavenger-hunt. The idea seemed to be familiarizing ourselves with its contents. It wasn't going so well for me or anybody else. There was lots of standing around and socializing. The latecomer from the first day stood near the window, staring down at what looked like a phone. It wasn't a phone. I knew it wasn't. I refused to believe that it was. I was also being horribly paranoid.

Then do it! What's the worst that could happen? I'll tell you- you look like you're crazy. That's nothing new. Hell, you're clinically diagnosed as crazy. Suck it up.

"I guess you're right."

The latecomer was suspicious. The fact that he was cute meant nothing. I had a theory about him but I was too scared of being wrong to say it out loud. (Although, if my theory were correct, his cuteness would be cataclysmic in regards to my sanity). There was only one thing to do.

I sidled over to where he stood with as much stealth as I could muster. His pale eyes were still glued to the cell phone's screen. He was texting someone. Oh crap that was freakishly normal. What if-

Do it!

I leaned my head down a few inches so it was right next to his. "I'm still taller."

In a split second my head was smashed down into the dusty windowsill. Zim's hand gripped the collar of my shirt tight around my throat. "Not any more, Dib."

My hands had taken on a life of their own and were trying desperately to pry his fingers off. Breathing down there was getting a little difficult. With a gloating smile he released me and I collapsed onto the floor. Zim took his seat and began reading through the textbook. Of course Human Anatomy and Physiology was a course he'd take.

You know, you'll never realize how much you like a little think like breathing until you can't do it for a while. It was moments like this that had made me so appreciative of my mortality back in greyd skool. I had such a knack for living back then and I'd gotten so much out of it. Perhaps that was why I'd tried to kill myself: I'd forgotten how damn much there was to life.

I picked myself up and dusted off my shirt. I took a moment to yell at Zim before returning to my desk. "I'm still taller than you, alien freak!"

Someone at the front of the room giggled. "You're crazy."

Nice going, Dib. Now we're gonna get called crazy again and probably get jumped after skool. You were doin' fine- what the hell happened?

"I don't know what came over me," I muttered.

A poorly aimed book sailed past my head. I rolled my eyes. People were such idiots.

A/N: Zim's Back! 3

Let us know what y'all think!

Love and Mutants,

Invader Nae & justmacy