Alright, HERE are the Gorillaz. This is pretty PG too. If you're wondering why all the chapters are song titles, it's just whatever Gorillaz song reminds me of the situation in the chapter. After all, this story was spawned when I listened to the Plastic Beach album for the first time.

"Must we do this at dawn?"

"Shut your mouth, twerp, and sing those lyrics."

"But I just barely woke up. I'm not even dressed yet."

Those mismatched eyes, the same ones he had grown to hate over the period of a decade, narrowed defensively. "Genious has no schedule."

If 2D had eyes, he would've rolled them. "More like stupidi'y," he muttered.

"WHAT DID YOU SAY?" Murdoc roared into 2D's headphones. Oops. He had muttered into the microphone.

"Nuffing," he answered cautiously. The last thing he wanted was a beating so early in the morning.

"That's what I thought. Now when I start the music, you sing those lyrics." 2D looked at the lyrics sheet. Just in time for breakfast? What kind of lyrics were these? "And don't muck about. Remember, Russel isn't here to save you this time around. You're going to have to do what I say if you don't want to get hurt."

2D scowled through the glass of the recording booth. "Well, maybe if you stopped trea'in' me like-"

Music started playing though his headphones. He sang as well as he could force himself to, trying not to notice those repulsive, evil, mismatched eyes staring him down through a green face. He was a hideous man, Murdoc. Broken nose, greasy black hair, one eye black and another red. He hadn't aged well in the few years they had spent apart. And women are actually attracted to him? But he cleared the thought from his mind and sang, "Superfast, superfast, I come in last, but just in time..."

He trailed off as something green and brown streaked by outside the studio window. In a split second, it had come and gone, but the initial shock and the lingering curiosity lasted much longer.

2D heard, or rather, felt, a thud.

"You hear that, Murdoc?" The music stopped.

"I don't hear you singing if that's what you mean."

"No, somefing outside. I fink it landed on the island."

Murdoc rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Just ignore it."

"No," 2D asserted, peeling the headphones from his ears. He dropped them unceremoniously on the floor and opened the door. Murdoc tried to block it but got there too late. 2D rushed to the window and searched the artificial ground below for the green and brown object. "Look," he exclaimed, pointing to a place near the dock.

Murdoc followed 2D's finger to the window. "Oh, yeah," he said. "Looks like some sort of fish. Just leave it there and it'll die soon enough. I'll go and shovel it back in the ocean later when it stops flopping about like that." It was true-It was convulsing ferociously.

"No! We need to do somefing!" Somehow he found the courage to face Murdoc and meet him straight in those unbelievably demonic mismatched eyes. "I-I won't record anyfing else until-until we save it."

Murdoc advanced on him. Despite being shorter than 2D, he was immeasurably more intimidating. 2D had to will himself not to shrink away. "Get. Back. In. There."

2D was trapped. On one hand, that fish's life was running out before his eye sockets. On the other, he couldn't do anything without Murdoc's help.

So he used the only leverage he had.

"If-if you save that fing's life, I'll do anything you say." 2D studied Murdoc. Not even the slightest softening of expression. "Promise."

Murdoc backed off at this point. 2D continued: "I'll record wha'ever you want me to, and I won't comp'ain or nuffing..."

He waited. He glanced outside at the fish, whose convulsions had calmed to half-hearted, suffocated flailing. He turned back to his only hope: the short, hideous green man with the horrible mismatched eyes. "Please?"

"Fine," Murdoc spat. "Take the horror to down to the lab. I'll be down there by the time you've got it."

2D broke into a sprint to the lift the minute the words had left his mouth. Frantically he pressed the ground floor button until it opened, pinging in complaint several times. It couldn't reach the lobby fast enough. Not even acknowledging Tatu, the midget doorman, he burst through the front door and hurried down the steps to the creature. But by the time he had gotten there, it had stopped moving.

Correction: she had stopped moving.

The creature had a female torso and a long, lime green tail. He approached her timidly. Her eyes were closed and a dark, tangled mass of curly hair partially obscured her tropically dark face. She was also ensnared in a large quantity of seaweed. All of her was shimmering with seawater and peppered with sand.

2D tugged at the seaweed but couldn't get any of it off. He stood there puzzling for a minute about what to do next. Was she even alive? How would you be able to tell? It then occurred to him to check her heartbeat. He leaned over and pressed a hand to her chest, careful to keep it between her breasts. He felt a struggling, quivering beat. Once again panicked, he scooped up the mermaid in his lightly muscular arms and carried it inside as quickly as he could without tripping over anything. He was clumsy and, after all, Plastic Beach was made up entirely out of trash.

Back in the lift, he pressed the button to the bottom floor: the Lab. The place Murdoc had made the cyborg. It was below sea level and might take a long-maybe too long-time to get down there.

2D studied the creature in his arms. He struggled not to drop it as it was so slippery and heavy. Carefully, he took one of his arms from under her and brushed the wet hair off the mermaid's face. 2D was stunned. She was beautiful. Somehow it made the load he carried lighter.

Settling against the wall of the lift, he continued to stare into her face and began absent-mindedly singing: "Oh joys are us, the sun has gone again to hold you..." Funny time to be thinking up song lyrics, he thought. But he kind of liked them. Suddenly he thought of maybe writing a lullaby for the mermaid.

Given that she survived.

And she would survive, right? Murdoc knew what he was doing, right? He'd built that Cyborg using Noodle's DNA, right? What-ifs buzzed in 2D's head as the lift doors opened, revealing a dim room full of Metal tables, once-white countertops, many scary-looking mechanical tools, jars full of unidentifiable substances, a giant surgery light, and Murdoc in a lab coat. Ha. Murdoc in a lab coat. 2D felt the small, fleeting urge to laugh, but it quickly faded when he realized that the mermaid's heartbeat was slowing.

Murdoc pointed to the closest metal table. "Put it here." 2D obeyed, careful not to bang her body against anything or break something Murdoc valued. He took one last look at the mermaid before Murdoc shooed him out saying, "Piss off."

2D reentered the lift, not sure whether to be relieved or concerned. There was nothing more he could do. It was literally out of his hands.