A companionable quiet hung over the gloomy building's two occupants. Now both much calmer and with full bellies, Zim and Dib had been content to simply lean back against the wall of a convenient nook Dib had found during a small expedition of his own, fairly clean (by the library's standards) and with a couple of chairs and a desk sitting around, tarnished with age and forgotten by time, along with the last people to make use of them. They'd dragged some cushions in, and Dib, having fussed for a brief time over the sores he'd received from the talons of his roommate, was still tired enough to do little else than procrastinate.

The teen turned his head a little to look at Zim, who was comfortable enough to have balled up against the wall quite close to him, making use of what appeared to be the remains of a bean bag. His antennae rested easily above his head, every now and then rising and falling a little as if checking all was still quiet. His head drooped into his folded arms, and a sliver of ruby showed under his lids, making it clear he was still awake and not open to any kind of assault, but in all other aspects he looked peaceful. The alien was evidently feeling better, or at least much more composed, perhaps even more so than when Dib had first found him on the day of the storm. Despite his no-touching attitude, he seemed relaxed enough to stay about a metre or two from the human. He didn't appear to want to get up and scream his head off, at least, and Dib's ears accepted this happily.

Perhaps it wasn't a bad time to ask a few answers of the Irken. They were both settled, having eaten, and although under his clothes Zim was wrapped up like a corpse, it was no reason for him to be unable to give Dib at least a short recount of the events after the fire. He was holding back information that surely Dib himself was allowed to know. And for what good?

He was about to say something along the lines of these thoughts when Zim's eyes snapped open, antennae pausing in their motion for long enough to stand quivering at half mast for several seconds, before the alien returned, within a moment, to the position he'd been in all along. Weird. It was almost like he was expecting the question.

Feeling a very slight, but vaguely peculiar throb emerge on the side of his head, as one would get from suddenly standing up or being subject to a quick change in temperature, Dib reached his hand up to it in annoyance but without much thought, still idly pondering the alien's action.

He didn't get a moment more to do so before Zim was no longer sitting beside him.

Blinking in astonishment, Dib took a double take and reassured himself that the supposedly handicapped alien hadn't dematerialised though some spectral outside force, but rather had hobbled very quickly in a short space of time. He was standing stiffly in the entrance to the desk-and-chair nook, on tenterhooks, as though he were listening intently to said spectral outside force. That, or a possum carking it somewhere in the roof. (Ugh! Surely Dib's sandwiches were good enough for him?) He remained in the position at length, until Dib began to feel that there was little good in staying silent and hoping for an explanation to be given of its own accord. Oh, and there was the throbbing headache again. Of course, it was likely just his body needing water, however Dib's mystery-seeking mind forced him to question.

He'd rarely seen Zim's antennae behave quite so… eerily. They looked like twigs in winter – slick, black twigs, quivering under the cold breath of impending frost. Or something poetic like that. He'd seen them do some pretty bizarre things, granted, but this didn't seem to fall under the usual category. And he certainly didn't feel tempted to touch them now. The Irken looked as though he might easily remove the fingers and possibly the frontal lobes of any unwary soul who tried. Searching out some means to do something about this, Dib moved quickly to the entrance to peer around the one-man musical-statue game, studying the alien's face, following his line of gaze (which was directed nowhere in particular and so wasn't much help), but as yet unable to find any prompt for further Dib-like action. It was obvious he was going to have to rouse the alien from the trance he'd fallen into and…

"Aargh!"

Dib threw up an arm to his head as a stronger pain hit it without warning, only to be hit from the front by Zim's antennae as they flicked backward; the owner startled by the cry. The Irken twisted around with a glare and a snarl, only to pull back at the sight of a nonthreatening, pesky human. He was clearly agitated. The human met his glare equally hotly, for although the sensation had subsided, it was still a source of irritation. Rather abruptly, he asked:

"What? Can you hear something?"

The Irken widened one eye at him, then replied, "Yes," before hobbling slowly and rather moodily back to his original position, feelers twitching and an uncomfortable hunch to his shoulders. His brow furrowed and he reached a hand up to touch it lightly, his tone becoming rough and impatient toward his interrogator. "Zim hears a lot of things, as you could probably imagine." He paused, thinking of a way to reaffirm this. "Because I have hearing… thingies." He gestured toward his antennae before looking conclusively at Dib.

In any other situation Dib might have teased the alien's attempt at sarcasm, but now he once again returned the glare, wondering why he suddenly deserved such a tone of voice – and a somewhat disturbingly Zim-like attitude. He also took stock of the hand placed over Zim's head.

"You have a headache as well, don't you?"

The Irken went to widen his eye, realised it had reached its limit and substituted with the other, quirking his head to the side, and searched for an escape route before figuring the question wasn't doing much harm – yet. "What if I do…?"

"Well, my head hurts too… though, if it has anything to do with whatever you've been listening to, I suspect it's much worse for you." In truth, Dib was simply probing. If he could find even a small opening in Zim's guard, some kind of loophole, he might yet get answers out of the Irken. Of course, that was provided the touchy alien didn't decide to end their unspoken truce on a rapid and ungraceful note should he prod the wrong way.

Zim gave him a very odd look. A look that suggested perhaps he was a rabbit in the headlights of a truck, but the headlights had just turned into a pair of stoats and offered him a bag of mushrooms.

"I… well… mind your own business, human!" He turned over, presenting his back to Dib.

Said human snorted. "You'll talk to me before long, anyway. I know from experience how hard a time you have keeping your mouth shut."

No response.

And while Dib watched the back of the Irken with what he thought was a fairly matched stubbornness, Zim still did not speak or turn around, but rather shuddered and put his arms down over his antennae.

Ugh. Well, so be it. He'd find something else to occupy him that wasn't his roommate's misery. In time, perhaps he'd come around – 'in time' seemed to have become a regular mantra for him. What a shame he hadn't thought to pack himself any pigeon-bile extraction homework tasks when he'd hurriedly thrown belongings into his dampened bag.

It occurred to Dib that he was sitting in a library. A very old one, at that. It was a fact old as history that most libraries tended to contain books. And while the hulking wooden shelves in this one brought back chilling childhood memories, and the hefty books living on them spoke in whispers of dimly-remembered scars and bruises, a bit of a risky book fix seemed like a promising way to alleviate boredom-induced worry - and headaches. Yes, better a headache from a falling book than from contagious alien angst.

"I'm going to check out the books here, Zim." Dib paused, feeling an awful, niggling sense of déjà vu when the only response was an indecipherable twitch from one twig-like appendage. Having by now picked up that a sense of optimism was necessary if one was to stay sane in this kind of environment, the boy gladly took it for a gesture of assent.

The soft skittering movements of many tiny beings punctuated the muffled, irregular rhythm of Dib's feet, each one causing him to pause uncertainly between each stonily-watching guardian of human speculation. Each time, he had to reassure himself that the creature surely didn't sport frightening metallic legs and a thieving lust for organs. If worse came to worst, such an apparition was lying dormant close by and would likely rise to defend his territory. Dib found his thoughts straying wryly to possums, and quickly shunted his attention over to the dusty books.

He wandered around for a little longer than previously anticipated, pulling a few tomes from the shelves (in some cases, having to yank them out forcefully and then watching the bookcase in terror to see if it would fall on his head) and flipping through them, though he found an awful lot in them that wasn't text and either smelt of animal waste or was black and had a copious number of legs. He passed on quickly, all too eager to leave these alone.

At some later point in time he actually came upon one of the creatures that had been gracing his ears with its scratching and scuffling, though this one had been resting behind a fiction book he'd just removed – when startled, it jumped, showing its teeth to him, and jumped a little too close to the intruder in a bid for escape. Dib recoiled, having had a few more unpleasant experiences with rats than some, and jolted the bookcase. It wobbled, but held its position. Unfortunately the book resting on the edge of a higher shelf didn't. It expressed its appreciation by dealing the disrespectful youth a good blow to the head.

"Ahh~! Goddamn-" Dib staggered and doubled over unsteadily, holding his now exquisitely sore cranium and glaring at the offending book through smarting eyes. The tome sat innocently at his feet, its cover open and pages face-down and skewed.

"It's your own fault, you know…" Dib muttered absently to it as he picked it up, doing a cursory job of straightening some of the pages. The book was mockingly silent, as books generally do not respond to scorn. The boy shook his head, straightening out a final page, which then succeeded in catching his eye. He read a few sentences, realising the story seemed vaguely familiar to him. Turning it over to study the title, he shrugged, figuring a good monster-based book would tide him over. He might start seeing unspeakable nightmares stalking the corridors later tonight, but it was still kind of cool to find a book that he remembered from his childhood. Tucking the sturdy weight under his arm, he made his way through the labyrinth of knowledge to show Zim his find.

A/N: Here's an update for all you patient readers. The plot, well... sorta picks up here, just very subtly. Tried not to rush into it too quickly, but feel free to give feedback and/or advice - I don't intend to drag it on long enough as to be boring.

I apologise for the still-slow updates. My muse is creeping back, albeit reluctantly, and as I've just had a fresh pile of essays dumped on me by school, a chunk of my writing energy will be directed toward that for a time. To the reviewer who asked if I was going to leave you with another six-month cliffhanger, I can only promise to try my hardest. Not to, I mean. ^^" I'm glad you're enjoying it, though.

Oh, and I truly do enjoy stupid chapter titles. XD