Well it's about darn tootin time for another update my lovelies. Today's experiment is one of direction and tension. How do you guys react to having the story shift to a brand new character, and, how well does it work to increase tension in this chapter?

Personally I'm worried on how this chapter turned out, mainly because I didn't think the ending worked as well as I wanted it too. Maybe a little forced? Mm. Anyway, the theme is now set, and we can start working towards the next climax of the story.

Anyway, read, enjoy, REVIEW!

The room was bathed in the glow of a computer screen. Three actually. And if one listened, one could hear the soft hum of fans cooling motherboards. Dib's computer set up was a geek's dream, top of the line, almost military-level hardware with full surround sound, fan and liquid cooling systems, several experimental graphic cards, processors and a one petabyte hard drive.

The boy was sat, hunched in front of his screens. His long cowlick hair curved down towards the back of his head, his shoulders covered in his favourite sea blue blanket which almost utterly covered the rest of his skinny, lanky form. He pushed his round glasses up for a moment as he rubbed his amber eyes before looking back to the screen, the stream of words reflected back on his glasses.

Since he'd been stricken down with the cold he'd spent most of his time either asleep or at his computer... which was mostly what he did at home anyway. He raised his bowl of noodles up slowly, taking a pair of chopsticks and quickly gathering some noodles up before chewing on them silently, all the while his eyes never leaving his screen.

He was reading, as he always seemed to be reading, the translated encyclopaedia from Tak's ship, the damn thing still sitting mostly useless in his garage. He'd been trying to repair it for years now, but some things were just a little too difficult to fix, even for a fifteen year old with a one hundred and seventy IQ.

That and he wasn't willing to deal with Serbian terrorists to get the plutonium needed to power the ships flux capacitor.

Luckily the boy had managed to pull the ship's memory's out before it'd shut down, although he'd had to translate everything himself. A full year of constant work, night after night, before he'd finished and now he just sat and read through every article, as everything in there wasn't just about the irken empire.

Lists of aliens from other planets, other empires, history's and theories and science beyond his imagination. The annoying thing was that it was all very, very biased.

"Thus the glorious Irken empire, personally led by the brave and very handsome Tallests Red and Purple defeated the horrible slaughtering rat people of Blorch." Dib read out loud and rolled his eyes at this. So many articles ended this way. Did every Tallest do this or was it just Red and Purple? And what kind of names were Red and Purple anyway? Irkens were so weird.

He sneezed suddenly and wiped his nose on his blanket. Ugh, stupid cold. He had felt so run down and even now he had a slight headache, although that could have been from looking at three screens all day.

Dib had finally covered the last of the 'recent' irken military conquests. Recent being that this encyclopaedia was now a good three years old... minimum. He had no idea how often Tak had kept it up to date. He was still working out how to calculate the difference between irken and human time keeping, the irken's worked on a whole different numerical system after all.

Right now however he felt like taking a break, getting some aspirin and maybe watching Aliens. He remembered telling Zim that it was a documentary and having him hide in his house paranoid that 'the Riply-beast' was hunting him down. Man, that was a fun week. The boy slowly uncurled from his seat, showing his long, blue and green pyjama pants and the flash of a black t-shirt with a Z? sign on it before his arms wrapped the blanket around him.

Like some great cloaked figure the tall teenage boy glided silently through his house. The lights were all turned off, plunging it into darkness, why? Well no one was home so what was the point of turning lights on?

Besides, Dib could see in the dark just fine and he was a master of sneaking around by now. His feet tapped only lightly on the tile floor as he entered the kitchen, rummaging through the medicine cabinet for anything that could quell his headache.

He sneezed again, the sound almost echoing throughout the house as he muttered, "Goddamn cold."

Suddenly, almost without warning, the door to the house shot open with a bang. It was so sudden that Dib practically jumped out of his skin, yet, almost instinctively the boy threw himself up against the nearest wall, peering over just slightly at the intruder.

Or rather, intruders.

"Gaz stink, why did you bring me to your smelly home?" The voice cut to the core of Dib, making him want to leap out and smash the irken's face in with his foot. Sure, it'd been a very long time since he'd been fighting Zim, years in fact, but did that mean he hated him any less?

No. There was no slight peace, no sense of respect for him, no 'they sat together at lunch time' or anything like that. Dib hated Zim. He would always hate Zim and Zim would always hate Dib. There was still that sick little part of him that dreamt for the day when he got to slice Zim's belly open and dig around his insides.

Yeah, he knew he needed therapy... he'd get some right after he finished Zim's autopsy.

He was about to walk out and lay the smackdown on the annoying green alien before he heard Gaz's reply. "Because we need to talk."

They needed to talk? About what?

"Why here?" Zim seemed to comment quickly, his tone low, "With the Dib-stink upstairs."

"He'll be asleep by now, he's sick, remember?" Gaz seemed to have a strange tone with Zim, it seemed her voice wasn't commanding it was more... informal. Odd. Gaz always addressed others as inferiors.

"Fine, but Zim still demands to know what you're up too." Dib clenched his fist, what the hell could this annoying little douchebag want with his sister?

"Why aren't we friends?" The question utterly struck Dib blank, and even though he didn't see it, it did the same to Zim.

"... what?" The alien's voice seemed so devoid of the usual zest and energy it usually held that Dib almost thought it was a new person entirely.

"Why aren't we friends?" The young man was so sure he could hear a crack within Gaz's voice. "We've been hanging out every night of this week, we play games and go out together. Why aren't we friends?"

Dib almost had a heart attack. They'd been hanging out? And going on, dare he say it, dates? No way, this couldn't be happening, his sister couldn't be betraying him like this.

"Because you are a human and I am an irken, we are enemies." Zim's answer seemed forced and cold.

"Don't give me that crap," Gaz snapped back, again, the unusual amount of emotion in her voice shocking Dib to his core. Just what had happened when he'd gone? It seemed the world had collapsed outside his bedroom and gone utterly insane. "Why won't you say you're my friend! What? Are you scared to allow someone into your selfish little world? Or maybe you just think I'm not good enough to be friends with you."

Zim seemed to pause, and in a voice that Dib didn't know he could summon, the alien replied, "... does the Gaz-beast consider Zim her friend?"

Gaz now went quiet, Dib could hear her moving on the couch, she was probably looking away and trying to avoid the question as she sometimes did when faced with big things in life. However, like the Gaz he knew, it didn't take long for her to answer. "... yes."

Dib almost leapt out there and then. He didn't care how sick he was, hell, he would sneeze all over Zim if it made him get the hell out of his house as soon as possible. He was NOT going to let his little sister be corrupted and turned against him by that psychotic little alien. But his logic and sensibility held on, that and he knew in his weakened state he would not be able to fight off both Zim and Gaz who would certainly be infuriated that her brother had been spying on her.

"I see." Zim seemed to go quiet for a moment, as if for once his brain was being put to use. He seemed to sigh, which was the first time Dib had ever heard the irken sigh. "Gaz-beast, I cannot be your friend because... I cannot be your friend.."

The teenager felt like laughing. Zim was truly the saddest person on the planet if he didn't know how to be someone's friend. And hell, he wasn't FROM this planet and he was the saddest person, how hilarious was that!

"What? Weren't you friends with Keef?" Gaz quickly replied in an angry tone. "You can be friends with Keef but not me?"

"That was for show and besides, I am not accustomed to having such... company." Zim commented in a sharp tone. "Irkens do not make friends with aliens."

HA, he could say that again. Even from the very edited irken encyclopaedia Dib could tell how deep the hatred of other alien races were for the irken race. Not only that, but irken society itself was so... isolating. The efforts of the individual were placed above all things, except their height of course. It was truly in Zim's nature to be alone and look only after himself.

"Why can't you?" The young girl's question seemed so simple. "You've been here so long, Zim, why can't you just allow this one change?"

There seemed to be a second where Zim paused, as if something was at the tip of his worm like tongue before he stiffly replied, "I do not need to change! I am fine as I am!"

"You're a terrible liar, Zim," Gaz spat out, her voice sounding like a mixture of anger and desperation. "Tell me the truth you ass."

"That is the truth!" The irken's voice was high pitched and Dib knew from experience it really only did that when he was lying and getting desperate to hide something. "Now stop asking Zim stupid questions!"

There was a long pause before before Gaz slowly began to speak. "You know you can't do this forever. You can't just keep pretending you're still this great evil invader from space."

"Shut it human!" Zim seemed far too defensive for his own good, "Zim will one day kill you all! Just because I haven't got around to it yet doesn't mean it won't happen!"

"I think you should go." She seemed to be moving stiffly, "Please. Leave."

"I'm going." The irken replied in a vicious tone, "You confuse me, Gaz beast."

There was another moment of silence as Dib listened to his hated enemy walk towards the door. Then Gaz said something that almost made him cheer. "We shouldn't see each other anymore."

"Why?" The irken commented simply.

"Because... no." Gaz's voice seemed so stiff, so... forced. It was as if inside she was ready to burst and yet that great concrete wall which she'd built around her own feelings was forcing her to guard every word from her mouth. "I don't want to teach you anymore. Go home."

The irken must have faltered at the door. "Gaz-beast, I don't under-"

"GO HOME!" Gaz's roar made Dib jump, however, it must have gone unnoticed by the girl and the alien in the other room.

Dib heard no more words after that. Zim seemed to be silent, than he heard the door open and slam. Hard. Gaz made a strange sort of noise, like something was caught in her throat before she mumbled something, what it was the young teen wasn't sure, but he caught the word 'dammit' very clearly.

She then turned and stormed up the stairs and a few moments later her own door slammed. Dib finally let himself breathe in the kitchen, sinking to the floor and letting the blanket curl up around him. He wasn't mad at Gaz, she had turned him down. If anything he was very proud of her. No, no no, this was Zim's fault. That... weird little freak had fallen for his sister and had probably tried to put his horrible alien hands on her somehow.

Dib slowly frowned within the dark of the kitchen. He didn't care if he wasn't feeling one hundred percent, he was going to make Zim pay... and pay big.

SO. This chapter is all over with, what do you guys think? Lots of DRAMALLAMAS going on here. I'm going to spend a little more time building on this idea of Zim 'changing' in the next couple of chapters, as well as Dib's horrible revenge and Gaz's feelings at losing Zim over this argument.

It's gonna be a fun time.

REFERENCES. The whole Syrian terrorists and plutonium and FLUX CAPACITOR is of course from the amazing film, BACK TO THE FUTURE!

Z? is a reference to JV's comic book, Johnny the Homicidal Maniac.

Laying the smackdown is a reference to WWE's The Rock.

As always, tell me what you thought, didn't like, liked etc etc. Feedback is important kids! And don't forget to tell me more of what you want and don't want!

TILL? NEXT TIME!