I have seen you in the morning
In the evening light you hold me
Closer than the air around me
You surround me always
(Everywhere I Go – Five Iron Frenzy)

Dib stared out the bus window, letting the street lines become a blur. He’d stopped counting them a while back, and could no longer remember where he was or where he was going. It didn’t really matter; he’d ultimately end up where ever Zim led him.

/Damn him./ He glared through the rain at umbrella-wielding pedestrians. /I wish I could find some sort of clue that would lead me to him. It’s almost as though something’s been diverting me whenever I get too close./ His “vacation” in Mongolia hadn’t helped the situation—it had only given the alien a chance to get further away from him. He couldn’t really call the trip a vacation anyway; the word vacation implied relaxation and some amount of leisure time. Between the cold and his worries about Zim, he’d gotten neither.

/Can’t honestly call them worries,/ he reminded himself. /There isn’t any reason to worry anymore. Operation Impending whatever it was is over, and Zim’s people don’t even consider him one of them anymore./ What he felt had gone beyond worry. It was obsession now. Zim wouldn’t, and probably couldn’t, do any harm to the people of Earth. But Dib still followed him.

He sighed, tracing stick figures in the fog he’d created on the window glass. It didn’t surprise him that he automatically gave one of them antennae.

It had been eleven years since Zim had come to earth, and nine of those he’d spent running from Dib. /Not that I could do much chasing when I was in skool. That didn’t really start until a few years ago./ And Zim wasn’t even actively running; he just stayed where he was until he had no choice but to move. Dib had the feeling that the alien was just taunting him; playing some sort of game that neither of them would ever win.

But Dib couldn’t shake the feeling that he was much closer now than he ever had been before. /Of course, I’ve thought that more times than I can count. And I’m always wrong./

It would be nice if he was right, though. Eleven years was a long time.

/Nine years. I haven’t seen him in nine years./ He couldn’t help but wonder what that time had been like for Zim. At their last encounter, the alien had been bitter and unsuspecting. Somehow, he hadn’t thought Dib would try to make good on his threats to “get” him. The banishment had hurt him.

/Of course it did. He gave everything he had to his people—put everything into taking over the earth./ Dib still wasn’t sure how the Irken social system worked, but it had something to do with height. /Zim always was sensitive about it. I think he was quite relieved when he realized that he was taller than some of the kids at skool./

He jolted forward as the bust stopped, and stood when he heard the doors opening. /Probably about time I found my way to where ever it was I left my car. Stupid, rundown parking garages. It’s probably already been stolen./

He stood on the street corner for a moment, watching people walk past, debating whether or not Zim might be in this city. /It seems a bit run down for his tastes. I would think he’d go somewhere quieter./ But, Dib had to admit, there was something unsettlingly quiet about Rankle City, as though the people were all holding their breath, waiting for the buildings to crumble around them.

After a time, he began to walk. It didn’t matter where he went—suddenly, it didn’t seem like such an important thing to find his car and move on. It was almost as though the despondency of the city was seeping into him, in some sort of large-scale reverse osmosis. /Except without the water./

It took him an unprecedented amount of time to discover that it was getting darker, and most people had disappeared from the streets. He also didn’t see the man walking behind him, or the knife he was holding, gleaming in the broken streetlights.

He felt it, though, when it pressed up against his back, settling into the groove between two of his ribs. Even through the trench coat, he could feel it, and goose bumps spread across his skin like fire.

“Got any money?”

/He certainly isn’t one for pleasantries./ Dib forced himself to stay calm, not letting his hand tremble as he reached for the wallet in his back pocket. It wasn’t an easy thing. Sure, he’d been faced with giant hamsters, hypnotic pimples, planet-sized ships, and even regular old laser guns, but those had all been such obvious threats that they paled in comparison to this. There was something almost primeval about knives that made them seem more deadly than anything else he’d come up against.

He drew the cheep piece of synthetic fiber from his jeans and held it up. It was snatched out of his fingers almost immediately.

“Car keys?”

Those soon joined the wallet in the thief’s pocket. /Not like I’ve got anything valuable in there anyway—just some heavy-duty winter clothes that he won’t be able to use this far south./

“That it?”

“Yeah. That’s it.” Even though he had kept his hand from shaking, his voice was beyond his control, and the words came out thin and low pitched. He hoped that, since he’d cooperated, he’d be let go without any trouble.

He was proved wrong. He heard the sound of ripping fabric first, but the pain of the blade entering the skin beneath his ribs on his right side followed all too quickly. Gasping, he dropped to his knees, not registering the sound of running footsteps retreating behind him. He waited for a second attack for what seemed an eternity before struggling upright.

He clutched at his side, swallowing heavily at the feeling of thick liquid draining from the wound. /Stay calm,/ his mind screamed. /Rational thought will help you—throwing up won’t! Now, find some help./ He nodded to himself, and stumbled a few feet.

Rational thought, however, didn’t hold out long against shock and pain, and he fell to his knees again, retching loudly. As he finished, the sound of footsteps drifted to his ears, and he looked up to see a pair of heavy, combat-type boots stopping only a few feet from him. Whoever the feet belonged to, he didn’t know; he couldn’t make himself look up that far. He managed to crawl the distance between himself and what he hoped would be his savior before collapsing completely.