I don’t own Invader Zim. After an idea in the review admizgr8 in A Father’s Scars, I wrote this. Prof. Membrane’s name is T.J. so you aren’t confused. Read A Father’s Scars to get the back story.

“Dad I’m leaving and never talking to you again!” T.J. Membrane yelled at his father. He was off to NYU for college. “I hate this place. I hate you!” These last words struck Reverend Timothy Jonah Membrane in the heart like an icicle. He couldn’t bear the thought that his firstborn son didn’t love him. Of course since T.J. was 7 they had fights over their beliefs. The young Professor Membrane couldn’t see the explanation behind creation and how all these things in the Bible happened like the parting of the Red Sea or how putting mud on someone’s eyes could heal them. It wasn’t scientific. Reverend Membrane however said that you didn’t need an explanation for everything; not everything was logical.

“Not everything makes sense Thaddeus. Look at our hair.” Reverend Membrane said motioning his pointy hair that was as tall as his son’s but pointed straight back while T.J’s was in an m shape.

“It’s T.J and it’s DNA! That’s why! Our hair is stiff and the Membrane family produces a grease that is like styling gel that freezes our hair this way! Why else would mom be the only normal one there?”

“There you go with your need for logic.” Reverend Membrane said. “ Things don’t always make sense! Like your attitude right now!” Professor Membrane’s father’s ears were growing redder and a vein was pulsing in his forehead. You knew when he was mad, but T.J. looked cool and composed. A smirk exactly like Dib’s came across his face while he stood in the Las Vegas heat in jeans a Led Zeppelin T-shirt and a white nose high open lab coat. “Too late Timothy Membrane. We just share DNA.” and he spat at his father’s feet, got in his black ’67 Mustang and drove off flipping off his father.

“Thaddeus...” Maryann Membrane, his mother cried. She shielded as many of the 4 younger Membrane children, Franklin, Martha, Joshua and Danielle as she could. Danielle just stood watching the street. Her favorite brother was gone, maybe forever. He would always take her for rides, pick her up from school and stand up for her when kids made fun of her for her hair which looked like Gaz’s only black. Now she’d have to stand up on her own two feet and judging by how he acted he would never talk to any of them again. “Mommy I’m gonna fail science! The kids’ll make fun of me! Who will drive me to the toy store now? Who will make sand angels with me now? No one! T.J. was nice!” Then the anger that rose up in Membrane women when they were hurt rose she closed her eyes because of it. “ He stopped the ice cream truck and bought me the biggest chocolate cone!” Tears ran down her cheek. “He told me about the cacti and pulled out the spines I had stuck on me!”

“Well Franklin could help you.” Maryann suggested.

“He’s not as good as T.J. He made stuff blow up.” Danielle stated.

“Don’t remind me. Well he can drive you in his Vista Curser.” Her mom suggested.

“T.J. had a cool car.” Danielle pouted.

“Look your brother was a bad seed! Satan got a hold! He didn’t believe us. He never got saved and renounced his baptism we had him go through at the age of 4!” Reverend Membrane said yelling at Danielle. If T.J was lost he wasn’t going to lose any of his other children. “My poor damned son. And I’m not about to say,” My poor damned son and daughter”! You should hang out with Franklin more. Or you could talk to Martha or play with Joshua at school.”

“Franklin’s a bore. Martha only talks about boy and how she likes a guy at school named Russ who beats on band geeks and plays with bottle rockets a grade ahead of her. And so you know Russ is like T.J in the fact he renounced his mom’s faith but all of them stopped going and his parents are cool about it!” Danielle said making a fist.

“How do you know that? I have to talk to Martha about her taste in boys.” Reverend Membrane said. Danielle rolled her eyes. She knew more than Martha thought she did. She talked on the phone for hours in her and Danielle’s room while Danielle tried to sleep.

“Martha is wearing make up and taking diet pills and not eating her lunch at 13!” Danielle pouted trying to get her brother’s room. “Can I move into T.J.’s old room?”

“Why?” Her father asked.

“He was my favorite brother, no favorite sibling!” She said stomping her foot.

“No I should get it! I’m second oldest!” Franklin pleaded. “You promised that I could!”

“I said 2 people would have their own room.” Timothy Membrane said.

“Have Martha share with Joshua or let Franklin ride out the 2 years he has left till he graduates!” Danielle whined. “Besides, you hated T.J! You wouldn’t be able to stand the hole in the floor or the roof! That and it smells like iodine and you hate that! You said so yourself!”

“Fine let Danielle have it. But it will remind you that Thaddeus will never talk to you again.” Franklin taunted. He hated how Danielle would hang out with his older brother, the scientist.

“Okay Danielle you can move into Thaddeus’s old room.” Maryann agreed. Danielle ran in and noticed the remains of her brother. This was all she had left, the experiment ruined room. On the nightstand was a pad of research notes and she noticed one thing, a picture of T.J and her on the Merry-Go-Round at Circus Circus. The picture looked like a 17 year old Dib and a happy 5 year old Gaz but it was all she had left. “T.J. I miss you already.” She sobbed.

Meanwhile after a few days drive he soon arrived at New York City. Once he got there the soon to be Professor Membrane got his dorm assignment and his new roommate, Simon Simmons. He took his stuff crate by crate to the room. At the end of one excursion he dropped a crate full of books on his galoshed foot.

“Goddamnit!” He yelled and winced as though to be smacked.

“Relax man.” Simmons said.

“Sorry Maryann of Timothy, my parents, smacked me for that.” He said.

“ Name’s Simon. Simon Simmons. Everyone calls me by my last name.” Simmons said.

“Thaddeus Membrane- don’t call me that it’s T.J.. I hate my first name. My friend calls me T.J.” T.J. said.

“Friend?” Simmons asked.

“My baby sister Danni actually Danielle.” He said showing Simmons a family portrait and he was flipping off the camera and Danielle was sticking her tongue out.

“She’s nice.” Simmons smiled.

“I miss her.” He said sitting on the bed putting his face in his knees. “ I vowed to my parents that I’d never talk to them again nor Franklin Martha or Joshua either. But Danni, I don’t want to ice her out too.”

“Don’t. Write to her once in a while.” Simmons said.

A few weeks later Franklin drove up to Saint Theresa’s School for Little Girls and frowned while the other girls smiled. She was sucking her knuckles and sometimes she’d see a memory of her brother’s black Mustang. Alas it was only Franklin’s Vista Curser.

“Get in.” He said in his school uniform. “What did you do?”

“Said the pillar of cloud and fire in the Moses story was a spaceship.” Danielle said.

“You’re just likeThaddeous! Get over it! He’s damned!” Franklin yelled.

“He’s T.J.! And he isn’t damned. Maybe you are!” and Franklin smacked her.

“Hold your tongue! You want to be scarred like him!” Franklin yelled.

“No.” Danielle pouted and Joshua ran over, the boys school was next door.

“Your sister’s nuts.” Franklin said to Joshua.

“She’s your sister too man!” Joshua said repulsed and Danielle cried until she got home where she ran into her room, T.J.’s old one and slammed the door. At this her mother came in.

“Danielle-.” She started. “Mom its Danni!” Danielle cried. “- anyway you got a letter from your no good brother.” Danielle tore it open and read it.

“Dear Danni,

I miss you already. Be good and by that I mean do what is right in your eyes.

Stand up for yourself. I made a new friend Simon Simmons but he likes to be called Simmons. School is fun and hard. I sent a picture of me in my dorm. I started to wear gloves because I hate my scars. Hold your tongue at the right times. Oh and ignore your brothers and sister. Write back if you can!

Love,

Your brother T.J.”

“T.J...” She sobbed tears on the letter and put it in the nightstand.