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Miscommunication was a real problem. Zim felt like Captain Freaking Obvious for having such, well, obvious thoughts. But it couldn't be helped.

Ugh. 'Captain Obvious.' What a stupid, human concept.

That was really beside the point right now though. He should be concerned with breaking away from these chains that kept him suspended to the wall. He tugged at the manacle holding his wrist, but it was attached firmly. He had expected nothing less.

Questions flooded his brain. When had the Membranes installed a basement beneath the labs? How had Gaz managed to get him down here? Why was he down here?

And where the hell had Gaz gotten chains like these in the first place?

Zim smirked, impressed that she had managed to do all of this without him having the slightest idea and no struggle. He had become exceedingly accurate at reading her moves, but she had deceived him this time around, no doubt about it. He was…proud of her.

No! Bad thoughts! He was being held prisoner. The last thing he should be doing was giving praise to the enemy. He should be furious. Especially considering the fact that he had done nothing to deserve this type of treatment.

Okay, maybe the way he had worded that note had been a little harsh...and callous and unfeeling considering the circumstances.

Fine. He deserved it.

But he had to get free. He didn't want to endure the same humiliating treatment she had bestowed upon her brother. He had to think. Be smart about this. Well, smarter than usual at least.

He examined the chains that held his wrists to either side of his body. He had about six inches of slack between the wall and the manacles. Not much, but it might be worth something.

His ankles were encased in fetters, eight inches of chain attaching them to the wall. Hm. He frowned before a genius idea erupted in his head. His PAK! Surely he could use that to escape these maddening confines.

"Don't you dare," Gaz warned in a neutral tone as she descended the stairs. The robotic arm withdrew from sight.

"What do you think you're doing? Isn't this illegal or something? Alien abuse? Doesn't your government have rules against that?" Zim demanded as a rare bout of panic worked its way through his system. Her rage made her features exotic. It wasn't hard to recall why he so enjoyed getting her riled up.

Gaz shrugged. The movement caused the fabric of her button-down work shirt to slip off of her shoulder, exposing pale flesh. "Only human aliens probably."

"Why am I here?" he dared to ask, eyes transfixed on her bared skin.

"I thought that was obvious. You've raised questions that I need answered. Seeing as how we're both too stubborn to sit down and talk things out, this seemed the best alternative." She picked at a loose thread that hung from her cutoffs and sat before him, curling one leg so that the arch of her foot balanced on the edge of the chair. She leaned forward and rested her chin on her knee.

"This doesn't strike you as a little too drastic?" Zim's eyes followed the curve of her leg and he frowned in confusion. When had her legs become so shapely? Perhaps they had always been that way and he had never noticed, seeing how she always wore wide leg jeans. He shook his head. Now was not the time for him to be dwelling on such things. Damn these stupid…what were they? Oh, right. Damn these stupid hormones!

"Nice to know that you realize I'm a girl," she stated blandly and he wondered if he had spoken aloud. "You can stop staring now," she added and he knew that he had not.

Zim cleared his throat and gave her his oh-too-familiar mocking glare. "What is it that you want, dirt-child?"

"Who the hell do you think you are?"

"I am me. The all mighty Zim! You know that."

"Who the hell do you think you are to decide whether you shall keep me 'prisoner' or not? Do you think you own me or something?" she clarified as she straightened and tapped her fingers against her thigh.

"Is that not how this dating process is supposed to commence? The male assumes ownership of the female in most cases. Therefore it would be my decision if I want to keep you or not."

"And now we come to my second point." Gaz narrowed her eyes at the alien and he resisted the urge to look away. "Did you believe us to be dating, or was this just another routine business contract for you to fulfill?" Her tone dripped venom at the phrase 'business contract.'

Zim's eyes widened in dawning comprehension. "You tricky female Earthanoid," he muttered. "You females are all the same with your mind games and clever deceit."

"Mind games? You think I'm playing mind games?" Gaz trembled with precariously leashed fury. "You're the one that started this whole thing!"

"And you're the one that agreed to it," the alien shot back. "You knew the rules just as well as I did when we started out."

"Rules are one thing. When did you stop seeing me as an ally?" Her voice deadpanned. "When did I become nothing more than a business contract to you?"

"I thought that was how you wished for me to view this whole matter." Zim eyed her warily as she came to stand before him. "You gave off all the vibes, all the signs. You began to avoid me. You went out of your way to be sure that we wouldn't be seen together. How else was I to interpret such behavior except that of someone desperately trying to escape?"

She tensed, pausing just out of his reach. "I'll give you credit for the fact that you knew I wanted to escape. But you fail miserably when it comes to understanding what I was trying to run away from." She closed her eyes briefly to regain some sense of composure. "How would you feel if I called you a contract? Or thought of you as a mission?"

"Not…good."

"Not good, huh? Well congratulations. Now you know how I felt when I read that stupid note of yours. Do you know how cheap you made me feel wording it like that? I have never felt so used by someone that I trusted before." She couldn't help herself. She landed a right hook to that oddly beautiful face she had come to admire.

He growled an Irken curse as he sought to rub his aching jaw, the length of chain just barely making that impossible, but uttered no reprimand for her actions. Instead he sighed tiredly. "It was not my intention to make you feel like that. I was hoping to put your mind at ease."

"Put my mind at ease," she echoed. "I don't understand. Explain."

"I thought that you were anxious to get this little farce over and done with so that we would not be forced to pretend any longer. I thought you had become uncomfortable with it and maybe even thought that it was evolving into something different from the original plan. I…was worried…that I had done something to make you unhappy."

"So you wrote me a letter to reassure me that you still saw it as a big game of pretend." Gaz shook her head and allowed a smirk to emerge. "You really are an idiot, aren't you?"

Before he could issue a proper rebuttal she kissed him. He allowed his eyes to shut as he gave in to her actions. It was not the first time they had done this, but mother of Irk were the sensations just as strong and overpowering as if it were. He reached out a hand to grasp her closer, but she kept her body a fair distance away. She knew how far he could move with his restraints and used the fact to her advantage. She couldn't have herself losing control when things were going in her favor for once. No matter how badly she wanted him to touch her it would not be allowed. She left butterfly kisses on the flesh bruising from her assualt before returning to his mouth once more.

I hope he appreciates just what it is I'm putting myself through. All to teach him a lesson, she thought.

He groaned in frustration; he would have been the happiest Irken on Earth to be able to just touch her bared shoulder or the expanse of thigh revealed by her cutoffs. But no such luck. Stupid feelings! Why did they have to be so pleasurable yet so painful all at once?

She really was an exquisite punisher.

Gaz pulled away and licked her swollen lips. She smiled at the alien as he attempted to free himself. "I'm not an idiot," he growled, the only response he could muster to her previous inquiry.

"If you weren't then you would have realized that I do not fear the possibility of you trying to claim me as your own," she replied and turned away to go back upstairs.

"Wait!" She paused at the bottom step and twisted her neck to look at him over her shoulder. "Aren't you going to let me go now?"

Gaz smiled like the Cheshire cat. "Consider your plea a case of miscommunication." With that she was gone.

Zim's salvation came in the form of Dib nearly six hours later. He unlocked the manacles and fetters that bound the extraterrestrial to the wall. "I don't want to know. I don't want to know. I don't want to know," Dib chanted as his friend rubbed his wrists gingerly.

"It isn't what you might think. Your sister has a decidedly cruel executioner side to her. I don't know where she gets the ideas for some of her punishments," Zim complained.

"Punishment?" Dib's eyes widened. "What did you do to her to make her chain you up like that?"

"It was a problem of miscommunication," he spat. He was coming to hate that word with an intensity he didn't know he possessed. "Where did this room even come from?"

"Oh, dad used to use this as one of his labs, but after the living dead incident he moved everything upstairs. I guess I can't blame him. Normally we keep it closed off and hidden from view."

Now it was Zim's turn to recite his rescuer's newest mantra.

"Why didn't you use your PAK to get out of here after she left?" Dib's voice startled him out of his thoughts, which were mainly focused around a certain female with the mouth of a goddess.

"Um…that is…damn." He was incapable of coming up with a good excuse. He refused to admit that he had quite forgotten his original method of escape. How dare she render him an uncomprehending fool? And from just one kiss? Infuriating.

Dib shuddered as he led the alien upstairs, catching the sinful grin on Zim's lips.

There was no possible way she would walk away from this unscathed.

Gaz Membrane would receive what was coming to her in due time.