Be Careful Making Wishes in the Dark--Ch. 4

Dib wasn't sure how much time had passed when he finally pulled away from the cool alien tech littering Zim's base and looked for a way back to the surface. The base was huge and crammed with tons and tons of stuff, most of which Dib didn't even have a name for. He wished he could use a camera or even a notepad and pencil in his current state—but, of course, he couldn't, so he'd just have to remember every detail as well as he could.

And now he really had to go find Bill. Exploring an alien base was neat and everything, but every second he wasn't keeping track of his body was another second it might be dropped down another flight of stairs, or forced to eat more spicy foods…

He found an elevator and emerged back in the house level up through the toilet in the kitchen. (So that's what it was used for. Well, good.) The TV was still on and the little robot was still watching it, lying upside down off the edge of the couch with his head resting on the floor. He was squeezing a squeaky little moose doll that he must have found while Dib was down in the base.

"That was amazing!" Dib said, unable to resist flying over to him. "And Zim'll never know I was even here! Hehe… unless I tell him all about it. I might tell him just to see the look on his face. Um, later. When I actually can tell him stuff."

Without warning, GIR tumbled onto the floor, jumped up, and crowed, "MARY! Mary's on the TV!" Then he flopped back down on the couch and stuck the moose toy's head in his mouth, biting down hard and making the toy emit a loud squeal.

Dib glanced at the TV behind him and saw that it was still just playing the news. "Who's Mary—?"

His heart stopped for a moment. The news report was showing footage of a wrecked car, and an ambulance, which wasn't unusual in the city—but being pulled out of the car was a limp form, a boy wearing a black coat, displaying no signs of life, and he was being set down on a—a stretcher…?

"What—that's me!" Horror-stricken, Dib rushed forward and tried to press his hands to the screen, only to have them pass right through the glass. "Bill actually wrecked the car?"

"Allegedly, the young boy in the driver's seat actually was driving the vehicle and hit a telephone pole at high speeds," the reporter announced.

"Did Bill kill my body?!" Dib's eyes were wide and he felt a kind of hollow, empty dread overtake him. "Am I dead?"

He was fixated on the footage, which was blurry and pixelated and looked like it was taken with a cell phone. Suddenly the figure on the stretcher started tossing and turning and Dib felt like he could breathe again. He was still alive.

On the screen his body—Bill—sat up and jumped off the stretcher only to fall a few times and get sick, which made Dib cringe and back away. When the paramedics carrying the demon to an ambulance tried to force him back onto the stretcher he lit a handful of matches and set the entire thing ablaze. The footage stopped there; whoever had taken the video must have run away at the sight of the fire. The reporter came back on and promptly turned the program over to the weather guy.

Dib clenched his fists, staring in disbelief at the TV. "Bill nearly killed me! That horrible little—triangle!" He whipped around, darting back to GIR. "All right, where's Zim? I mean it this time! Can you hear me?"

GIR ignored him. Dib reached down, yanked the moose out of the robot's claws, and held it up out of reach. "How about now? Huh? Huh? Can you hear me now?"

The robot shrieked, falling backwards and scrambling away. "TALKIN' MOOSE! IT'S A TALKIN' MOOSE!" He hopped to the ground in a fit of mad giggles and rolled around on the carpet.

"Um…" Dib lowered the moose. A thought occurred to him. "Wait, did you just hear me? How—?" He looked at the moose he was holding, and realized something equally as astonishing—that he was holding it. Through some bizarre twist of fate he'd managed to pick it up and it seemed he was able to speak through it. "Hey! I can talk again!" He squeezed the moose and it squeaked. "Maybe I can touch inanimate objects that represent something that has a face? And use them to talk even though the mouth isn't moving? For some reason? It doesn't matter! I could go warn people about Bill now! Or get Gaz's help! Or something! I'm just going to have to take this, sorry." He pointed to the moose even though he knew GIR couldn't see him. "I'll give it back when this is all over."

"NoooooOOO! MY MOOSE!" GIR screamed. Bright blue flames erupted out of the bottoms of his feet and he blasted upward, took hold of the doll, and dropped back down, yanking Dib down with him. "It's my talkin' moose! I'm gonna sell him for bacon!"

"Hey!" Dib yelped and tried to wrestle the doll away from GIR. "Gah—Stop! I need this more than you do! Leave it alone, c'mon! Quit it! Would you leave it alone?"

He finally managed to shove GIR away and clutched the doll to his chest. "Can't you just go back to watching TV or something? Just forget I even took the doll! All you were doing with it was biting its head, anyway."

The little robot looked blank for a moment, then beamed, yelled "OKEE!" and jumped back onto the couch.

Dib backed away. "That's a relief," he muttered to himself.

An alarm buzzer sounded, startling him. "Intruder detected!" the voice of the base computer said. "Prepare to be destroyed!"

A robotic claw dropped out of the ceiling and shot towards Dib.

"NYAHHH!" Dib flung himself out of the way, dropping the doll, and the claw paused before snapping loosely at the spot where he had just been. Dib dove for the doll and scooped it up off the floor.

"Uh…" The claw snapped at him again, passing right through Dib's forearm. "Okay, I give up. I don't really want to deal with demon mooses." The claw retracted back into the ceiling.

Dib frowned. "Okay, first of all, it's just 'moose.' And second of all it's not a demon moose, it's just me, only I'm sort of like a ghost right now." Struck with an idea, he moved forward, still clutching the doll. "Anyhow, Zim's weird evil computer thing… Where is Zim? Where did he go?"

"I don't talk to ghosts," the computer said.

"Oh, come on, I'm not a real ghost!" Dib said exasperatedly. "Where did Zim go?"

"Last night he was yelling about intruders taking GIR and ran out somewhere. I dunno."

"Last night?" Dib stared at the ceiling in confusion for a moment. What had happened to Zim last night to make him think GIR had been kidnapped? Obviously nothing whatsoever had happened to the robot, and the computer apparently didn't have any idea what had convinced Zim that someone had taken him, either. So Zim was just having one of his weird delusions again, but why…

Dib almost dropped the doll. Bill.

He had sent the demon into Zim's mind to implant a memory. Had Bill implanted the wrong one?! Instead of Zim's leaders telling him not to wear his disguise, Zim seemed to have a fake memory of people breaking in and taking GIR. "Did he say who did it?"

"Nah. It was probably something to do with that Dib kid."

Dib opened his mouth to make an irritated retort but gave up. "Okay, well, thanks, I guess." Figuring he'd get no further information here, he turned and flew out the open front door with the moose still clenched in his hand.

"I can't believe I can actually talk to people again!" he said when he'd drifted some distance away. "I should go try it out on someone who won't be freaked out by a floating moose toy, though. Like Gaz. But Gaz might not listen to me. Maybe I should keep looking for Zim, or… Hey, I know! Dad!" He smiled hopefully, then furrowed his brow. "…And I'm talking out loud to myself again."

Zim was coming to realize that he had chosen a poor spot from which to scrutinize the nondescript door in the wall of the building a few feet away. The view was great. The smell was disgusting.

He peered around the old dumpster, eyes narrowed and nails digging into the peeling green paint through his gloves. Under his wig his antennae were slicked flat to his scalp and he made an effort to breathe only through his mouth. Stench clung to the filth receptacle and surrounded it like a cloud. Zim let go of the dumpster and crept toward the door, examining it up and down. There was a hand scanner on the wall next to it. He should have expected something like that. This was Dib's secret society, after all. The Dib was paranoid and liked to lock everything up with locks and keep other people out.

Zim hesitated for a moment, then reached out and pressed his palm to the hand scanner. Nothing happened. Maybe it was because of his gloves.

Suddenly the door swung open to reveal the building's dark interior and Zim found himself face-to-face with an all-too-familiar human boy wearing huge round glasses and a black jacket. Blood was smeared under his nose and a wide grin stretched across his face.

"Dib!" Zim spat, drawing backwards. His PAK legs expanded out behind him and dug into the concrete ground.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't the bug-eyed alien freak!" Dib leaned one arm against the door, planting his other hand on his hip. "Zimmy! Zimbelina! I thought I might find you out here! Coming in?" He gestured into the building.

Zim didn't make a move forward. "What did you do with my robot?" he growled, clenching his fists.

"Who, me? Nothing at all!" Dib tipped his head to the side. "Also, just sayin', you really might want to come in! These people don't particularly like spies and whatever snooping around in their garbage!"

Still glaring, Zim slipped through the doorway and circled around Dib, rising up a bit on his PAK legs as they clinked against the floor. Dib stepped away from the door and let it swing closed. It locked with a click.

"So!" The human clapped his hands together. "What brings you here? Just the robot?"

"Yes, Dibworm," Zim said. "Where. Is. GIR?"

Dib stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocked back and forth on his heels, smiling. "Hm… well, I might know where he is, but what makes you think I'd tell you?"

"You will tell me!" Zim rushed forward, lashing out with two PAK legs to block the Dib human from walking away. "You'll tell me now!"

Dib regarded him, grinning widely. Zim couldn't recall Dib ever smiling like that before. He shifted backwards a little.

"Yeah, I don't think so!" Dib laughed. "What would be the fun in that? But hey, maybe I can help you look! Provided you did something for me later, of course."

"I don't want your filthy Dib help!" Zim touched his feet back to the ground, his biomechanical legs snapping back into his PAK. "I'll find GIR myself."

"Oh, will you!" Dib said. "Well, good luck getting five feet in this place without this!" Before Zim could make any move to stop him, Dib reached out and snatched his wig off his head.

"Hey!" Zim cried. He lunged to take it back but Dib pushed him back with one hand, holding the other away and twirling the wig on one finger. Dib then jumped backwards and brandished his arms around the hallway.

"Welcome to the headquarters of the Swollen Eyeball Network, Greenie!" he said, and leaned forward. "Whaddaya think they'll do when they see an alien walking around in the halls, hmmmm? Does the word 'vivisection' ring any bells? That'd be a sight to see! I bet it wouldn't be nearly so fun to live through, though! Haha!"

He pushed the wig into Zim's chest. Zim grabbed it back, fumbled with it, and shoved it back on top of his head. He spun around and ran to the door, heaving at it and leaning all his weight on it, but it didn't budge.

"Oh, forgot to mention!" Dib paced toward him. "You need my handprint to leave through any of these doors!" He indicated another hand scanner on the wall by the door. "Looks like you're stuck here, pal! Sorry!"

"It's locked from the inside as well?" Zim stepped away from the door, clutching his hands under his chin and rubbing them together. "This was a trick to lure me in here and do experimenting on me!" He rounded on Dib. "I knew it was a trick! You'll never get me into your filthy dissecting room, Dib-filth."

"Haha, yep, that was a little bit of a trick!" Dib smiled. "You catch on quick, kid! But I'm not planning on doing any experiments! So are you gonna reconsider my offer? I'll help you find this robot of yours and keep you from getting caught, and you'll do something for me later!"

Zim gnawed at his lip, glaring at the human. "There isn't another way out of here, is there. Fine," he said in a low voice. "I'll do you a filthy favor. If, and only if, you assist me in finding GIR."

"It's a deal!" Dib stuck out his hand.

Zim narrowed his eyes and snatched the human's wrist, turning his hand over to search for tacks or other hidden weapons and finding none. He gingerly shook Dib's hand and let go as quickly as possible.

"Okay then, it's time we got a move on!" Dib said cheerfully. "They could be disassembling that robot any minute now!"

Zim sucked his lower lip into his mouth. They would not dissect GIR. NEVER.

The human started off down the hallway. Zim had no real choice but to follow.

"So anyway, since we're working together I might as well tell you my plans here!" Dib said. He looked over his shoulder at Zim and grinned that unnerving new grin of his. "I'm gonna delete or burn every piece of information they've got here and bring the whole place to the ground! HAHAHA!"

"Eh?" Zim stopped in his tracks. "Why would you do that?"

"Oh, well, you might say I'm not really myself today!" Dib gave a playful smirk. "You can help me destroy this place if you want!"

Zim narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "I'm only here for GIR!"

"Okay, suit yourself!" Dib continued on. "Don't say I didn't warn you when you're captured and strapped to an autopsy table, though! And just think—if you helped me, that would never happen! Oh well!"

He made a compelling argument.

He took to watching the alien out of the corner of his eye, catching every nervous little movement as the creature followed along behind him while trying to look like he was here entirely by his own choice. It was really pretty funny.

Despite the alien's earlier protests, he nearly mirrored Bill's every move and didn't seem too keen on going off on his own. Bill reached a door at the end of the hall and pressed his hand to a scanner to open it, peeking inside. The room beyond was covered wall to wall in flickering computer monitors.

"Something tells me you're pretty good at smashing things!" Bill said to the bug-eyed alien, pushing the door open wider. "You want to do the honors?"

Zim looked hesitant but he stormed past Bill, expanded those funky metal spider legs out of his electronic backpack and arced them around his body, then shot concentrated beams of energy at the computers until they either melted down with molten plastic dripping onto the ground or blew up and burst into flame.

"That's not quite 'smashing,' but great job anyway!" Bill said. "This isn't a room where they keep paper documents, so we'll have to go somewhere else for those. Then we'll have to take the elevators down to get to other rooms! Hold on a minute, though."

He walked past Zim and made for a little metal box bolted to the wall, which he pried open with little difficulty. There was a small red button inside. He pressed that with his thumb and closed the box again. "And now to the next room!"

They went through five more rooms in much the same way, blasting the computers and pressing the button in each room, jumping from hall to hall until Bill led Zim to the hallway lined with elevators. He hit the down button on the one nearest them, then clasped his hands behind his back while the jittery alien stood next to him, glancing around every so often like he was expecting to be ambushed. Bill smiled and side-eyed him. "Hey, don't worry, I sent out an alert about paranormal tampering in the lobby! Seems someone put the receptionist down there in a near death-like sleep, so that'll keep everyone occupied for a few hours!" He pushed the button again. "By the way these are basically the slowest elevators in existence so we might be waiting here a while!"

Zim ground his teeth. "Don't they have stairs?"

"Oh! Probably!" Bill swept his gaze back and forth until he spotted a door labeled as a stairwell. "Well that answers that question!" He darted over to the stairwell and pushed his way inside. "Come on! We've got a little bit of a time limit on this!"

The alien followed after him through the door into the cold stairwell, chasing after Bill as he hopped down the stairs two at a time. "Time limit?"

"Yeah, I've been activating this building's self-destruct system. Once all the buttons are pressed the entire place'll blow up in a matter of minutes!"

"Since when does Dib want to destroy all the paranormal-y secrets he spends so much time researching?" Zim demanded. "What are you doing?"

"Look, Greenie, if you haven't figured out that something's up by now, you're never going to. So just give it a rest!" Bill stopped on the next landing they came to and pulled open a door. "Here's our next stop! That was marginally faster than taking the elevator!"

"Also, I thought we were going to look for GIR!" Zim said, pursuing him out into the new hallway. "You said you knew where he was!"

"Nope! I said I might know! There's a subtle but important difference! And hey, we're checking pretty much every room so we're bound to come across him eventually, doncha think?" Bill popped his head into the next room they came to and grinned. "And here's where the paper documents are kept! Whoa-hoh, look at all those filing cabinets! We'll have a time in here! I might have to get more matches! Actually, I think I might know where I can find a lighter!" He backed out of the room again and faced Zim, tossing him the box of matches in his pocket. "Here, get the fire started! I'll be back in a minute."

Zim threw the box on the ground and scattered matches across the floor. "No more burning things! I'm going to go find my robot!"

Bill tsked. "Oh, come on, you're a little pyromaniac and you know it. Anyway, I'm sure they still have a few guards around! You're pretty much toast if you start wandering around without me!"

"There hasn't been anyone around! At all!" Zim shouted. "If you want to break stuff then do it by yourself! I don't care! Bye!" He turned on his heel and stalked off, shoulders hunched.

"G'bye, then!" Bill called. "Have fun wandering around aimlessly until someone finds out you're here! Haha." He left the door and headed down the hallway. "I'm gonna go find that lighter!"

No sooner had he reached the end of the hall and turned a corner than the odd little hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, prickling, and he paused. "Hold on, someone's here. I can feel—"

Someone was indeed there because just as he spun around, a dark figure grabbed him by the shoulders and yanked him backwards. They pulled a black cloth over his face and tied it behind his head to block his eyes, knocking the glasses he was wearing askew. "Whoa! Hey! What gives?"

Whoever had blindfolded him grabbed his hands and bound them together behind his back. Then the person took a firm grip on his upper arms and dragged him off, the heels of his boots scraping against the ground.

Bill was pushed roughly into what felt like a hard wooden chair. The blindfold was torn off, leaving his glasses crooked and causing a few strands of messy black hair to waft in his face and tickle his nose. A giant face loomed down into his; he leaned backwards automatically, and someone shined a bright light directly into his right eye. He winced and squeezed that eye closed while using the other to take a quick look around. Then the blinding light was focused on the left eye for a moment, too, before it was moved away and he was able to see more clearly. He was sitting at a table in a dark room somewhere with a single bare lightbulb dangling from the ceiling right above him. There were other people around the table, but all he could make out were their silhouettes.

He huffed, going cross-eyed and wrinkling his nose in an effort to sit the glasses straight again. "All right, all right, you got me!" he said to his captors. "You can untie my hands now!"

"I don't think so," one of the people around the table said in a gruff voice. "You're not going anywhere."

Bill squinted at him. "Haha! I like your style! But seriously, I'm as much of a fan of mystery and suspense as anyone else, but next time give a guy some warning before you tie him up and shine a light in his eye!" He straightened up and looked around again, both eyes open this time. "So what are we here for, anyway?"

The person standing closest to Bill, and the one who'd shined a pen light into his eyes a moment ago, was an oldish man who had bushy eyebrows, a goatee, and a bald spot on top of his head.

"It's just like I thought," the man said, clicking off the light and nodding. "A classic case of possession." He turned to the other people around the table. "Agent Mothman's been compromised."

They all gasped.

Bill looked up. "Oh! You're referring to me, right? What would possibly make you think I was possessed?" He grinned, displaying every tooth in his mouth. "Seems a little extreme, doesn't it? I mean, in order to be possessed I'd have to have done something really stupid, like summon a demon with a pamphlet I got at the mall! But who'd do something like that?"

The old man leaned closer to him. He smelled like cleaning supplies and old coffee. "Who are you? What is your name?"

Bill looked him up and down. "My name? Hm, probably Dib! Haha! But you already knew that, didn't you? What about my last name? Do you know that? Bet you'll never guess it! Here, I'll give you a hint: it doesn't start with an M!"

"This isn't working," one of the agents said.

"If you won't tell us your name, tell us what you're doing at this organization," the old man continued, glaring down at him.

"Oh, that's easy. I'm a member!" Bill replied. "Unless I got kicked out! Did I miss the memo about that? That's pretty unfortunate, not gonna lie!"

The old man slammed his hands down on the table. "Where is the real Agent Mothman?"

"Sitting right in front of you!" Bill stared at him intently. "Wow, your eyes must be even worse than mine, and that's saying something! So is there anything else you wanted or are we done here?"

One of the agents in the shadows moved forward. "We know something strange is going on. The receptionist in the lobby is in such a deep sleep that no one can wake her up and the phone cord is broken."

"Uh huh. By any chance, have any of you been to the rooms upstairs lately?" Bill asked. The room rang with a chorus of confused murmuring. Obviously they hadn't.

"And another thing, you've been behaving really oddly!" another agent added.

Bill gave a light scoff. "So what exactly is odd behavior for me?" he asked. The people around the table were silent.

"Agent Darkbootie, it's obviously a demon," one of the other agents appealed to the old man. "Isn't there a way of removing it from the body?"

Bill's mouth twisted, and then he burst out laughing. "AHAHAHA! Agent Darkbootie? That's what you call yourself? Well, I already knew that, but it's different hearing it out loud! How do you expect anyone to take you seriously with a name like that? Even I can't take you seriously, and I'm a floating one-eyed triangle with a bow tie!" He scooted backwards in the chair and hopped down. "Anyway, give yourselves a pat on the back! You were right! But, unfortunately, little scythe-head isn't anywhere around here. What do you suppose'll happen if you kick me out and this meat sack body is left without a pilot for hours and hours until you manage to find him? What happens to a car left running without a pilot? Or a driver?" He laughed. "It crashes and burns! I know from experience!"

The Swollen Eyeball agents all jumped to their feet and surrounded Bill in a semicircle. None of them had a single weapon, though, except maybe one who was just holding a big container of salt. Bill nodded to it. "Do you carry that around wherever you go?"

"Leave that body or we'll be forced to take drastic measures!" the one called Agent Darkbootie said.

"Please, how am I supposed to believe you losers have ever actually even dealt with a real demon before?"

"I've dealt with creatures far more powerful than you," Darkbootie said, advancing forward.

Bill smiled. "You don't even know who I am."

At that moment a hole was blasted through the wall behind him, sending everyone scrambling backwards as rubble flew across the room and light from outside spilled into the room. Zim stood framed in the newly-made doorway, breathing heavily and glaring at the entire group.

"Hey, there you are, right on time!" Bill said. "What, didja follow us to this room or something?"

"Silence!" the alien snapped. He turned to the room in general, lifting up on his spider legs. "I know you've got my robot! Now where is he?"

The mechanical spider legs were likely the only things keeping the agents at bay. Most of them were looking at them with wide, excited eyes and exclaiming about encountering a demon and a probable alien on the same day.

Bill hurried to the hole in the wall. "Well, anyway, I've got to go! I'm pretty busy, if you haven't noticed! You can handle them, right, Buggy?"

Zim was moving forward, fury dancing in his fake gray-blue eyes.

Bill nodded. "Yep, thought so! See all of you later, then! Well, probably not. Bye!"

He happily exited the room and left the agents alone with Zim.

Miles and miles away, young Dipper Pines sat curled up in a chair, twirling the phone cord in his fingers while he pressed the receiver to his ear.

"This is Dipper Pines from Oregon!" he said into the phone in one breath. "I'm trying to warn you that—"

He was met by a sudden dial tone and lowered the phone. "Hung up," he said.

Kneeling next to him on top of a t-rex skull sitting by the chair was his twin sister, Mabel Pines. She leaned toward him with her hands pressing down on the chair's armrest. "How many has that been?"

Dipper sighed and set the receiver down. "I dunno. I lost count at thirty-seven."

"Blaaarrggh, we could keep this up all day and no one'll ever believe us!" Mabel sat up, pulling at her hair. "Are you sure that was Bill on the phone?"

"Positive, Mabel! He infiltrated that Swollen Eyeball society to destroy the information there before I could get it, and he's going to wreck the whole place!" Dipper flipped open a hardbound book sitting on his lap and flicked through the pages. "Maybe there's something in the journal that could help in dealing with demon threats that are pretty much on the other side of the country, but I haven't been able to find anything yet. Like the only thing we can do right now is keep calling people in Michigan and hope that one of them knows what to do."

His sister rested her chin on her knees. "This is dumb."

"Would you rather just sit here knowing Bill's running around in some kid's body?" Dipper punched in the next phone number. He'd managed to find quite an extensive list of possible numbers, considering.

The phone rang for some time before someone finally picked it up on the other side.

"What," came the response. It sounded like a little girl.

"Hi." Dipper hoped he didn't sound too worn out. "I'm Dipper Pines from Oregon and—"

"And I'm here too! Mabel!" Mabel cut in.

"Mabel!" Dipper shot her a frown, then returned his attention to the phone. "This is like the fiftieth number I've tried. I need to warn someone about a demon running loose in your area!"

"Great. Bye," the girl said.

"Wait, wait!" Dipper said, frantically trying to catch her before she hung up like everyone else he'd tried. "Does someone named Professor Membrane live there? Can I talk to him?"

The girl paused. "Dad makes sure all of our phones are unlisted. How did you get this number?"

"That's our secret!" Mabel said.

So apparently the girl was the daughter of Professor Membrane, who seemed like an influential person that should definitely be told about the current situation. Dipper continued on. "Could you please just go tell Professor Membrane or someone that a demon possessed a kid's body and is running loose? He's going after an organization called the Swollen Eyeball Network and if someone doesn't stop him then multiple people could be injured or worse, and all the information they have about him will be destroyed!"

There was a long moment of silence. Dipper slid the twisted phone cord off his fingers and drummed them on one of the yellowed pages of the open journal, biting the inside of his cheek.

Finally the girl spoke up again. "And how would this person have gotten possessed by a demon?"

Did she actually believe him?! He sat up straighter, which got Mabel's attention, and she started asking what was going on. Dipper talked over her as he tried to explain. "Um, okay, apparently some boy summoned Bill, and then Bill took over his body because he's manipulative and tricky and promises cool stuff that he doesn't follow through on. You can't trust him! Also, what's your name?"

"It's Gaz," the girl growled. "I have to go." There was a click.

"Come on, seriously?" Dipper pulled the phone away from his ear. "She hung up!"

"Who did? Your new girlfriend?" The twins' great uncle, Stanford Pines, passed by the two of them, carrying a Pitt Cola in his hand.

"What? No, someone I was trying to—oh, nevermind." Dipper sighed again. "I guess this has all been just a huge waste of time. Sorry I woke you up for this, Mabel."

"Hey, if Bill's up to something again, someone's got to do something about it!" Mabel rocked back and forth on the skull and gave him a light punch in the shoulder. "Come on, bro, we'll think of something!"

"Yeah, I hope so." Dipper picked up the phone again and dialed another number.

It seemed like all they could do for the moment was make entirely unhelpful phone calls.

"Hey! Can you open the doors? It's important!" Dib rose up in front of the armed guard standing by the door to his dad's lab. "I have to see Professor Membrane."

The guard took one look at the toy Dib was holding and screeched. "AAH! Demon moose! Demon moose!"

"It's not a demon moose!" Dib shouted. "It's just a regular moose! It's not even a moose, it's just a toy that I'm using to talk with! Could you please open the door so I can take it inside and talk to my dad?"

The guard backed away, pressing against the door with his knees knocking together and his hands covering his face. He peeked through his fingers and let his electric spear slide out of his grip and clatter to the ground. "Have you come to steal my soul?" he whispered.

Dib scowled. "I won't steal your soul if you open the door."

"Yessir! Right away sir!" The guard scrambled to his feet and unlocked the door, opening it wide. "There you go! Have fun!"

"Great. Thanks." Dib flew through the open door, clenching the toy more tightly in his fist. "By the way, you're a really terrible guard."

"I know…" the guard said morosely, scuffing his toe on the ground.

Dib flew through corridor after corridor lined with doors leading to different labs. He glanced through the window of each one but didn't see Professor Membrane anywhere. Where was he?

"Dad?" Dib called, forgetting for a moment that his voice would be coming out of a stuffed moose toy. He passed a few scientists who were too preoccupied to bother with a floating moose—a man with tousled blond hair and glasses and a woman with dark hair in a ponytail who gave Dib a scathing glance before moving off—and finally found the right room at the very end of one of the halls, where his dad was giving a lecture to a small group of grade-skool students.

"Dad! Hey! Dad!" Dib called, drawing up next to the window in the door. He banged the moose toy on the glass. "Dad!"

One of the kids spotted the floating toy and screamed.

"Excellent, Tommy, that is the proper reaction to a local nuclear meltdown!" Membrane said to him. "Now, what is the next step?"

"Call you!" a girl sitting in the front row said.

Professor Membrane chuckled. "Excellent, little girl! Call me and I'll pencil you in for my next available slot, which should be within three months, give or take a few weeks. Well, kids, that's all the time we have. I have another group coming in at noon so you need to leave as quickly as possible!"

The kids stood up and filed toward the door, chattering amongst themselves. Dib backed up when they opened it, then flew forward and slipped through with the moose in hand. He darted in front of Professor Membrane, who was tidying up a table full of merchandise from his science show. "Dad!"

He didn't look up. "I'm sorry little boy, I don't sign autographs between groups! You'll have to wait for your next opportunity to come to one of my lectures!"

"No, Dad, it's me! Dib! Your son!" Dib said. "I was pulled out of my body by a demon and I need someone to help me get it back!"

Professor Membrane finally looked up and caught sight of the moose toy. "Now is not the time to practice your ventriloquism skills, son! I thought you were going to stay in your room after the shop-lifting business earlier!"

"Well, that was before a demon stole my body…" Dib said. "Look, why don't you just call me? All you'll have to do is talk to Bill and you'll realize he's not me!" Or maybe he wouldn't. Gaz had talked to Bill in Dib's body directly, after all, and she hadn't noticed anything unusual.

Professor Membrane reached up and took the doll right out of Dib's hands. "Hm, no wires," he said, examining it. "You must have installed an anti-gravity device! Well done, son! Now, I have very important business to attend to and I need to prepare for my next lecture. Why don't you go spout your nonsense stories to your sister? I've instructed her to listen to what you say and help guide you toward the right path—the path of REAL SCIENCE!"

"Dad, for the last time, I'm not interested in 'real science,'" Dib said. "All I really like is the supernatural! …Except when it leads to me getting kicked out of my own body."

He was interrupted by a scientist running through the doorway, skidding to a stop in the middle of the room. "Professor! That kid of yours is on the news again! He stole a car and hit a telephone pole!"

"WHAT?" Professor Membrane dropped the moose toy on the table. "Son, I've told you time and time again about stealing! These fantasies of yours are turning you into a delinquent!"

"Dad, that wasn't me!" Dib protested, then realized that since he wasn't holding the toy anymore, Professor Membrane couldn't hear him. His dad got up and left the room. Dib snatched up the toy moose and followed, flying out the main door of the building when it opened and lifting into the sky until he was floating high above everything.

"I should've known Dad wouldn't listen to me!" he moaned. "What do I have to do to get someone to help me get my body back? Huh? Huh? Huh?"

The Swollen Eyeball Network might help. They might even know what organization it was that Bill was planning to use his body to destroy. It was certainly better than spending all day tracking down Zim, or trying to convince Gaz to help him.

"Okay, I'll try there next," he said to himself, turning and flying off in the direction of TSEN headquarters.

He tried not to think about the fact that if even they refused to help him, he was completely out of options and could be stuck like this indefinitely—or at least until Bill grew tired of his body and decided to give it back. But that might not even be a real possibility

If even the Swollen Eyeballs didn't want to help him, then he'd have to handle this on his own, just like usual. Only this time he was a spirit that could barely interact with the real world, facing a mind demon that was likely thousands of years old.

What chance did he possibly stand?

A/N: Dude that new episode last night was awesome, right? I was kind of hoping it would have Bill in it, but it was great all the same. Anyway, there should be one last chapter after this one, and then perhaps an epilogue. Yeeee