When Gaz awoke, she first noticed that she was laying almost on top of Zim. As she laid there, quite comfortable, listening to the soft sound of the Irken sleeping, memories of the previous night came back. Dib and her father sleeping on the floor, Dib in a sleeping bad and Membrane on an air mattress. Herself and Zim sleeping on the couch together- she blushed at the thought- and GIR eventually deciding to sleep in front of the fire to keep it going. Amazingly, the little bot had done a good job- the fire was still going, and the house hadn't burned down. A faint light from outside dimly lit the house, and Gaz could see fairly well, despite the fact that the power was still out. She tapped a button on her watch, checking the time. Nine in the morning... great. And everyone was still asleep. "Lazy bums," she murmured, moving so that she was on her side.

Just then, she heard a pained groan from under the coffee table. "Agh... my head," Dib muttered, rolling over and sitting up. "Note to self- don't sleep near the table."

Gaz snorted with contempt, smirking at her brother. "Why don't you sleep in your own bed, then?" she retorted nastily.

"Oh yes, very funny, Gaz," he replied sarcastically. "I should go sleep in my bed when it's as cold up there as it is outside."

She smirked again. "Works fine for me." Sitting up on the edge of the couch, Gaz looked around. "Where the hell did I put my GameSlave?" she muttered, standing and striding over to where she'd tossed her backpack the previous day. Gaz kneeled down and began searching through, before pulling out her GS Lite. Returning to the couch, Gaz sat down and began playing, viciously killing demon piggies.

Dib rolled his eyes at the sound of piggies being killed, one after the other, while he grabbed his glasses off the coffee table and put them on. While she played, he decided to find something for breakfast. Grabbing the flashlight that Zim had left on the table, Dib flicked it on and headed into the kitchen. Before falling asleep, he and his father had come up with a food plan, to conserve what they had, and it was currently lying on the middle of the kitchen table.

He walked over and glanced at it, scowling. Only one bowl of cereal and a glass of milk per person each morning. He was going to STARVE at this rate- he was used to having several bowls of cereal when he wasn't at risk for missing the bus. If he was- well, he always had that emergency stash in his locker...

The teen dug through the cupboard, pulled out a bowl and spoon, and set them down on the counter. He looked around for a box of cereal and quickly poured it into a bowl- for fear that Gaz would pop up and take the cereal, as she did so often (and had been doing ever since she could pour her own cereal). He also poured himself a glass of milk from the fridge- having the house so cold, they could probably leave everything out of the fridge without anything spoiling- and returned to the main room. Sitting down on top of his sleeping bad, Dib started eating.

It didn't take long for both Zim and the Professor to wake up, and as soon as Dib noticed that the former had awoken, he immediately sneered, "I thought you said that Irkens don't need sleep."

The green-skinned male shrugged, slowly sitting up. "I didn't say that we can't sleep, Dib-worm."

The teen blinked, and sullenly returned to reading his paranormal magazine, while Zim smirked.

"Victory for Zim," he proclaimed- somewhat quietly.

Gaz glared at him, glancing up from her GS Lite for only a moment as she continued playing. "If you cretins make me lose this boss battle, there will be hell to pay," she threatened.

Dib hardly paid any attention, while Professor Membrane rolled over and yawned. Even sleeping, Membrane wore his lab coat and goggles, which Dib had previously pointed out was weird, before the Professor added that they were all sleeping in their clothes.

"Children, don't fight," he said as he sat up. "Not on the day before Christmas."

Dib glanced over at his father anxiously. "If we don't get power back, we'll be icicles before Christmas even gets here," he remarked.

"Son, that won't happen," Membrane responded. "Even if I can't do much to help the world at the moment, we'll have a fine Christmas."

"Yeah right," Dib muttered sullenly before returning to his magazine.

While Membrane went to eat breakfast in the kitchen, Gaz continued to murder the vampire piggies, Zim alternated between insulting Dib and yelling at GIR, and Dib skimmed through the pages of his magazine, occasionally muttering something inaudible.

GIR, since the others had all woken up, had stopped monitoring the fire and was now playing with a taco.

"Exactly how many of those does he have in that head of his?" Gaz asked, without looking up from her GameSlave.

Zim raised a nonexistant eyebrow and glanced at the green dog. "GIR, where did you get the taco?"

The dog looked up. "I gotsa lots of tacos!" he squealed, grinning. "Do yooooou have any tacquitos?"

"No, GIR. No tacquitos."

"Awwww... but I didn't bring any tacquitos."

Gaz, still playing her game, snarled, "If you have food, hand it over."

Zim glared at GIR, who sighed and unhappily pulled a large bag with the Krazy Taco emblem out of his head. The robot dog held it out, and pleaded, "Can I still have mah taco?"

The green-skinned male narrowed his eyes. "The bag, GIR. Give me the bag."

"Yes, my lord!" The green dog saluted and walked over, handing Zim the bag before returning to his taco.

The day dragged on ina similar manner, all five of them trying different ploys to relieve the boredom. Membrane attempted a board game- after Zim cheated and won, they all agreed on no more board games. Dib suggested card games- Gaz won them all without even once looking away from her GS Lite. GIR wanted to watch the Scary Monkey Show- and ended up watching the "blank channel" for several hours. Gaz offered no ideas, busy playing her video game, while Zim challenged Dib to various staring and breath-holding contests- which Zim won each time.

But they all managed to live through the day. By the time that the light from outside rapidly started to lessen, Gaz's watch read 4:30 pm and they were all out of ideas. Gaz had played her GameSlave all day (obviously) with the occasional switching-of-batteries, GIR watched the blank channel and played with various objects (one of which was Dib's hair, to Gaz and Zim's great amusement), Dib read a variety of magazines and occasionally turned on his laptop, trying to access the Internet (though with no success), Zim mostly sat around and insulted Dib, and Membrane scribbled down ideas to improve the human race.

With the house quickly darkening, many of their previous ideas to relieve the boredom were rendered obsolete, and the battery for Dib's laptop was running low. "Y'know, Dad, what if the pipes freeze?"

Membrane looked up from his notebook. "What's this about frozen pipes?"

Dib scowled. "The power's out. What if the pipes freeze?"

"Do we even stillhave running water?" Gaz muttered.

The Professor chuckled. "Son, if you're so worried about the pipes being cold, you can do something about it. You're old enough to do that sort of thing."

The dark-haired teen rolled his eyes and grumbled as he stood up and stumbled into the kitchen, tripping over the slight ridge in the floor.

Later that night, around the time when Gaz's watch hit 10, Membrane put his notebook aside and declared, "Time for bed, children- and friend."

Zim glanced up from watching Gaz play and smirked. "Zim needs no bed," he responded haughtily, before the amber-eyed girl beside him shoved him off the couch.

"How many times must I remind you to stop referring to yourself in the third person?" she snapped, as he grumbled and got off the floor.

"Human rules don't apply to Zim," he muttered.

Dib sniggered from his seat near the fireplace, where he was trying to wrap some last-minute gifts. "While you're masquerading as one, they do," he said in response, smirking at the disguised alien.

Membrane sighed. "Thereare no aliens, son. Just because your friend comes from a foreign culture..."

"Dad! First of all, he's not my friend! Second, no human I've ever heard of has green skin, and if there was one, they'd be famous."

He shook his head. "Son, aliens do not exist. Give up the paranormal and try REAL SCIENCE! Just give it a chance."

Dib rolled his eyes and replied, "I tried it- I got bored. I'm going to stick with what I like." With that, the teen stood and walked over to the unlit tree in the corner, and unceremoniously dropped a pile of clumsily-wrapped gifts beneath its branches. As he headed back, he muttered, "Christmas really isn't a true holiday without the lights."

A/N:: Prepare to be amazed! XD I actually UPDATED for the first time in months :P I lost this fic sometime during December, and only just found it a few days ago. I'm working on the rest of this as fast as I can, since the holidays are over XD Be watching for another update soon.

And an apology to the Final Battle people who are awaiting an update- I've had a major creative slump lately and I know that I promised to update during the x-mas break, but I never got around to it, being busy with everything else. I WILL FORCE MYSELF TO WRITE THE NEXT CHAPTER IF I HAVE TO!

I'll update eventually- however long it takes, though, isn't up to me to decide :\