"Doctor Karbunkle?" Limburger's deep baritone wafted through the mad scientist's domain, startling Karbunkle and making him look away from his computer screens and windows.

"How is work coming along on the transmutation gene?"

"It's hit a snag," Karbunkle admitted. He motioned to the five-foot-long tube behind the glass in front of him, where two technicians were adjusting various tubes leading into the chamber. "There have been some unexplained chemical imbalances in the Darchron, but they're getting cleared up as we speak."

"Damn," Limburger muttered, watching the flowing blue fluid in the wide container. "Camembert's riding my fins about being on schedule. Speed it up- I don't care what you have to do, but we must make this deadline!" He slammed a gloved fist into his other gloved palm and exited, leaving a sweating, swear-mumbling Karbunkle.

0000

"Come on, bros!" Throttle shouted, rallying Modo and Vinnie to continue shooting at the Plutarkian-steel-clad tank.

"I'm runnin' outta ammo!" Vinnie yelped, ducking a laser bolt just in time. It sizzled a little tuft of fur on top of his head, and he squeaked unhappily. "Ow!"

"Modo, Vinnie, we need to split up and tackle this thing from separate angles!" Throttle shouted over the roar of engines and squeal of tires.

"I got the aft!" Vinnie shouted back, jumping over the barrel of the tank's cannon and blasting rockets at the tank's rear thrusters. It didn't do much.

"Darn," the white mouse muttered.

And then he choked as a tranquilizer dart hit him in the neck. His bros were too busy fighting the tank to notice the pained look on Vinnie's face, or his bike's worried beep.

Vinnie's chest heaved as his lung muscles started locking up. He managed to use his elbow to hit the red 'panic' button on his bike's mini-board, and then he started seeing stars in his vision and feeling agony in his chest.

"Bros," he wheezed out.

And the world went black.

0000

"Wakey-wakey, today's a new day!" a sickeningly cheerful voice said, jerking Vinnie out of his drug-induced sleep.

"Whaaa...?" he slurred, opening his eye to see Karbunkle grinning down at him evilly.

"Why, hello there. You don't look so good. Tranquilizer hangover?"

"Shut up," Vinnie mumbled, unable to think of a more suitable retort. Karbunkle sighed.

"I was expecting more spunk out of you. Oh, that's just as well. You can't struggle if you're too tired!" Karbunkle fit a ballgag over Vinnie's muzzle, the black plastic ball connected by a tube to a ventilator. "Now, that's to make sure you don't bite down on your tongue. Hold still." Karbunkle left, and after a few minutes the table under Vinnie shifted and then lowered into a tank of liquid.. something. Vinnie inhaled sharply, blinking against the invading fluid.

There were whirring and clanking noises all around him, and then a sudden, searing pain as something was inserted into his stomach. He grit his teeth, his fists clenching weakly, and his tail jerked violently.

And then the pain was replaced by unbearable agony, something beyond what he'd ever experienced even when his face had been burned. Needles drilled into his chest and he was flooded with searing fluid, white-hot and burning him up. He writhed as best he could, unable to scream because of the gag, and squeezed his eyes shut tightly.

He felt a change in his body, as he floated in his own personal hell- his fur stood on end in the fluid chemical, and the burning heat abruptly faded to a unpleasant warmth. He struggled furiously, the all-consuming pain in his stomach still there, and still growing, until there was something akin to a large explosion in his minds-eye and everything except his soul disappeared.

Dear God, he was aware now, aware of the unending void in front of him and the only person there was him- it was his worst fear come to life- !

And the void slowly faded, replaced by soreness, fear and hunger. And the sizzling heat was still there.

He moved, his eye opening first. There was no pain as liquid met pupils, which was odd considering what he'd just been through.

"His heart flat-lined for a minute there, but he should be fine."

Karbunkle?

Vinnie turned to look towards the source of the voice, a gleeful Karbunkle standing in front of a equally pleased looking Limburger.

"We can use his DNA for the rest of the supersoldiers. Put him in stasis for now."

Supersoldiers?

Not on my watch, the Martian thought. He growled through the gag, straining against his bonds until he snapped them. He jerked and twisted, slamming aside the numerous needles and knives, and burst out of the chemical, newly reinvigorated and pissed off.

He shouted at them, wordless, just expressing his anger and rage, and then bolted for the door, dodging laser blasts as he headed for the window.

Vinnie let out something between a scream and a laugh as he crashed through the window, breaking it and falling three stories into a concession stand. Ignoring the various screaming women and children, he skedaddled down the street and opened the first door he saw, entering into the back area of a wedding supply store.

"Thank you," he mumbled to whatever merciful deity might have been listening. He grabbed a pair of underwear that was marked 'defective' (one hole didn't make the whole package defective, he remarked to no one) and then scurried over to the doorway leading to the main part of the store.

"...So Judy said that Ron was dating Marsha and I was all 'no way' and she was all 'yes way' and then Mark came in and he had lipstick all over his collar so that how we figured out he was dating Joseph, because Joseph likes chapstick, dontcha see..." floated from the lunchroom.

"Oh, God," Vinnie mumbled. "Will it ever end?"

He crawled on all fours, quickly sneaking a bridegroom's outfit from the rack and heading back to the changing rooms, set the clothing down and turned to look in the mirror.

Vinnie nearly screamed his fool head off when he saw the reflection in the mirror.

He was no longer white, and his eyes was no longer red- he was now a very light color of beige, and his eyes were green.

And his face-

"Oh, wow," he mouthed, staring at the restored flesh of his face. He had no mask.

He reached up and touched the fur, feeling the soft, very real fluff on his fingertips. Vinnie felt a knot form in his throat, but quickly swallowed it down and continued studying his new body. His antennas were a deeper red, longer and more slender. His tail was about the same except for the shade of the velvet fur on it. He also had a mane- a curly one, of all things, dull streaky blonde and carefully trimmed. He was the same height, same weight, same basic build, but still radically different.

He wanted to talk, to see if his voice was different, but a cold draft snuck up his back and he remembered the clothing. Vinnie quickly donned it, a ache surfacing in his heart as he realized while dressing that his bros wouldn't recongize him now.

Jeez, he hoped this wasn't someone else's body.

As he finished dressing, he threw the tie aside and ruffled up the sleeves and collar, ripped out the price tag ($5600, he read, and was glad he was stealing it) and then realized- he had no shoes.

And, after a thorough, painstaking search, that this particular store only had one pair in his size and they already belonged to someone else.

Sorry, bub, hope you have a car, Vinnie thought to himself as he slipped on the poor sucker's sandals and headed outside through the back entrance.

"Look, there he is!"

Vinnie turned around to see the whole crowd that had been there before when he'd crashed into the stand- several squealing women with papers and several angry men with sticks.

Like Stoker had wisely taught him, he ran in the opposite direction, and the crowd knew better than to follow him.

0000

"Hi, are you looking for me?" Vinnie asked no one, chattering to himself in a mostly empty Wendy's.

It was creepy, really. Talking to yourself but not sounding at all what you normally do. Vinnie had been surprised by the soft, very meek voice that issued out of him- it didn't quite fit his looks, but according to the waiter, it was sexy.

He finished his smoothie and pondered for a moment the odd smell of the $30 that he'd found in the soles of his new sandals. When a particularly unpleasant cause came up in his mind, he stopped thinking about it.

Vinnie tossed the wrappers in the trash and headed outside, ducking into a alleyway and making his way through the backalleys to the Last Chance. A tuxedo-clad giant mouse was not a good thing to be in this city unless you had a gun.

He jumped when he heard the roar of familiar engines, and then held back a shout of glee and headed towards the noise.

"Bros!" he yelled, waving his arms at the two Biker Mice. "Bros! Throttle! Modo! It's me! .. uh, kinda!"

"What in hell?" Throttle mumbled, looking up from his Enquirer to see the beige curly-maned mouse waving at them. "Aw, crap-"

He bolted up from his seat and ran over to Vinnie, looking pissed off. "Are you insane?"

"Sort of, yeah!" Vinnie grinned and clapped Throttle on the shoulders. "Man, am I glad to see you! You wouldn't believe some of the stuff I've been through tod- Hey!" Vinnie let out a protest as Throttle pushed him away and up against the outside wall of a building.

"I don't know who the hell you are, but you'd better explain yourself," Throttle growled angrily. Vinnie winced.

"Yeah, yeah, sure, but not here, okay? The, uh, like Charley's place or something." He cowered visibly at the withering glare that Throttle gave him. "Okay, okay, it doesn't have to be her place! Wherever you wanna go! That's fine with me!"

"Come on, you fool, you're making a scene." The tan-furred leader gripped Vinnie's tuxedo and hauled him off towards the parked bikes.

0000

"So we're supposed to believe that you're Vinnie, in a different body?" Modo said incredulously.

"Well.. yeah." Vinnie shrugged. "Look, I don't know how Limburger did it either, but this is me in here! Your bro, your pal, the guy that went to strip clubs and threw money at the women with you! Don't you remember?" He searched his bros' faces for any sign of trust or friendliness and came up with nothing.

"Right. You could've coerced that outta him," Throttle said dismissively.

"I didn't coerce it! I am him!" Vinnie exclaimed, anger rising in his chest with desperation. Never a good mix with someone like him, and he knew it. "Don't you guys remember? We-we were at that club, and Throttle double-dared Modo to go inside, and I came along and said I was gonna be moral support but I was just there for the boobs! And women!" Vinnie took in a breath. "A-a-a-and Modo had to explain how he lost his whole allowance for the month in one afternoon! To his mother! And Stoker said he'd never been more proud of the three of us and..." He trailed off as he hit a snag in his memory.

"Man, you are not good at this," Throttle muttered.

And in the next moment, he had Vinnie backed up to a wall, elbow digging against the young mouse's throat and threatening to cut off his air supply. "Where's Vincent?" he roared.

"I am Vincent," Vinnie choked out. He stared up at his leader's face as stars swam in his vision and his heartbeat pounded in his head. The tan-furred face offered no mercy to him, and neither did Modo.

"G-guys.. it's me.. it's Vinnie.." His voice faded as he passed out. "Bros.."