2

"2D? 2D? It's over... you can wake up now." The voice seemed familiar, but lower than he remembered. "Trii?" he mumbled, opening his eyes slightly. He was in a different cell, bigger, with a few more people in it.

"Yeah, it's me," Trii said, smiling as much as the Tanian mouth would allow. "You fainted. They put all of us in the same big cell. You're lucky... Tanians are usually hairless, but yours is still there." She pointed a clawed finger at a mirrored section of the cell wall. 2D swallowed, stood up shakily, and stomped over to the wall.

Trii was right; 2D still had his blue hair. He blinked, trying to get used to seeing himself in this strange new body. The only other familiarities were his eyes, which were still black, and his clothes, which were strangely still intact. He had dark greenish-brown scales all over his body, and his skin was super-tough, most likely to keep his claws from cutting him. He was still tall and skinny, but his face was oddly short, his giant teeth jutting out from his mouth. He had no nose, just reptile-like nostrils. He half-expected to find a dinosaur tail; luckily there was none.

"What d'you think?" Trii said. "Powerful, huh? This could be the best thing those greys ever did to anyone. We can get rid of them and be heroes!" She laughed.

"I guess we could... but we'll have to worry about security and everything," 2D said, in his new unfamiliar voice. They were talking in the language of the planet Tanan, which they automatically knew due to the language chips implanted in their minds. 2D looked up at Trii, who he figured would have a plan for everything.

Trii, of course, did. She called the others in the cell over to where they stood.

"As you guys probably know, we've been messed up. Somehow, the idiots running this whole thing decided to make us Tanians, which was a huge error on their part. We're now one of the most violent races in the universe, and we can use this to our advantage."

Nods and grunts of agreement came from the group as they listened to her. "For now, we're gonna pretend to go along with their stupid scheme... but when they least expect it, we attack. The idiots won't know what hit 'em. I'll tell you guys when the time grows near." The others grunted approval, and walked away.

2D looked at her. "Great job," he said, grinning, slapping her on the back in a very Tanian gesture. He wasn't sure why he thought to do that, it just seemed right. "That wasn't much information." He laughed.

"Hey, we'll be back to our home planets in no time," Trii said. She looked at 2D, and grabbed him, much to his surprise. She embraced him in a hug that would probably have killed a human, and kissed him. At least it looked like kissing. It was a little awkward; she wasn't completely used to being Tanian yet.

2D smiled at her. "Was there a reason for that?" he asked. "Or just nerves?" Trii laughed. "You're so funny looking with your hair, and your teeth... and you're really cool. I like you," she said, the words sounding rather violent in the trademark Tanian snarl. 2D was a little taken aback; he hadn't known her for very long. But she hadn't even heard of him before, making it seem more realistic. She wasn't a crazy fangirl. He laughed and hugged her back.

The others in the cell watched, disappointed. Trii was the only female of the group, and to Tanian eyes she was very good looking, not to mention she was a genius with a plan to get them out. Now she was taken, it seemed, by the weirdo ex-human guy. Oh well.

"Hey, Trii?" 2D said, looking at the wall, wondering who else was in the other cells. "Yeah?" she said. "Does your 'get us out of here' plan involve getting us back to normal? I mean... It might not be good for the band with me looking and sounding like this..."

Trii shrugged. "I don't know yet. We might not even be able to turn back." She turned and looked at 2D. "So what's your band, anyway? I'd like to hear you guys sometime. On Draga we've got these great disguise devices that'll make us look human. Maybe I could give you one?"

2D grinned, all his giant teeth showing. He looked very strange with the front two missing. "That'd be great. I'm in Gorillaz. Does your disguise thing change voices? My voice is completely different now than it used to be... I don't think I could sing good now." He laughed.

Trii started to say something, but an alien guard came into the cell. Trii glared as she waited for it to do something.

The grey looked rather angry, pushing a large box full of the organs of various species. They were the organs the various captives had coughed out while they transformed, and now they were going to be food for the most carnivorous of the experimental groups. He left the box on the ground, yelled that it was dinnertime, then ran.

2D and Trii walked over to the box and peered into it. "Discarded organs," Trii said. "How fitting. Hey, I think this is yours." She tossed a pair of human lungs to 2D, who looked at them strangely. "I'm gonna be sick," he mumbled.

"Don't be. Tanians eat this crap. They eat anything, really, but this is the good stuff." She looked over at the three others, who had been hanging back. "Hey, come on! It's dinnertime!" she said. Apparently the others had somehow chosen 2D and Trii as leaders, and were waiting for them to finish.

2D picked up his lungs and sniffed. He put them back in the box. "I think I'll eat something that wasn't already in my body," he said. "Suit yourself," Trii said, and ate the lungs, ripping and tearing with her giant teeth. She picked out some unidentifiable alien organ and gave it to 2D. "Just don't think about it," she said cheerfully.

2D wasn't thinking about it anyway. Some sort of alien instinct kicked in, and without any delay, he ate it sloppily. The others came over to the box and started to eat. They weren't called the most violent race in the universe for nothing.

Soon the box was empty. "If we've got meals like that, maybe there's no need to break out," said Yabreq, one of the other three, a kid from some very far-off planet. Trii glared at him. "That's what they want you to think, idiot!" she said. "They're trying to keep us complacent. If we think we're okay, it will be easy for them to do all these experiments!"

2D was leaning up against the wall when some guards walked by. He caught a small part of their conversation. "...Tanians, the experiment is tonight." "Yeah, that's right, tonight..."

"Trii!" he yelled. She looked up. "What? What's wrong?" she said, walking over, sitting down, and biting 2D on his neck. "No time for flirting, Trii..." 2D said, although he did smile. "I just heard them; they're experimenting on us tonight!"

Trii let out a good string of Tanian swear words. "Men, gather!" she commanded, and everyone came over. She grinned. "Cool, I'm commander. Okay, our escape plan has moved up." She talked loud enough for the others to hear, but not loud enough for the greys to be able to listen in. "We're escaping tonight. There's gonna be a lot of violence, and a lot of blood..."

The other grunted in amusement. After hours of being in their new bodies, they were completely used to it, and they were all displaying the characteristics of a born Tanian. Violence was a favorite pastime of Tanians.

2D smiled. If everything went right, he'd be home soon, maybe even with Trii. And he had complete faith in Trii. She was so confident about her escape plan. They still had a few hours before the experimentation was to begin, so they had some time to chill out.

So they spent the time they had left watching TV. The television was set into the wall, and got a lot of strange alien channels. 2D and Trii finally settled on a very violent documentary on Tanians to get the best idea of how best to fight the greys. Trii and 2D sat together, sometimes kissing and biting. The other three guys were jealous, but they didn't say anything.

After a while, the documentary was over, and they were watching some odd game show that they couldn't quite figure out the reason for. Someone won a five-legged goat. 2D found the remote and flipped through the channels. He went past a music video station.

"2D, that's you!" Trii said, sitting up and accidentally elbowing 2D in the face. Sure enough, Dirty Harry was playing on the station. 2D grinned. "Well, it was me... I don't look like that anymore."

"You're still awesome," Trii said, giving him another bone-crushing hug. He laughed.

"We hate to interrupt this little party, but you need to come with us. All of you." One of the greys was standing in the cell, ready to take them for experiments.

Everyone nodded, and walked single file to where the alien was. He turned off the force field of part of the cell and was about to take them out when Trii lunged at him, biting, tearing his throat out. The grey gurgled and fell, and they ran.

2D ran over to a switch on the wall and pulled it; the cells disappeared, freeing everyone. Many said words of thanks as they scattered, some attacking greys, others causing random chaos.

"This way!" Trii yelled, seeing a sign with a picture of a spaceship on it and an arrow. They found a bunch of smaller spaceships inside. "Escape pods," she said, smiling. "Let's get out of here. THERE'S ESCAPE PODS THIS WAY!" she yelled. She and 2D got into one and it fired off.

"Can you drive this thing?" 2D asked. "No problem," Trii said. "These things have autopilot. We'll swing by Draga first and get the disguise things. Then we'll go to earth. I hope everyone made it out. The other guys said they'd take care of the greys..." She pushed a few buttons and the word DRAGA appeared on a screen.

2D sat back in a seat that was obviously meant for something a little smaller than he was. Trii smiled. "Okay man, of course you've never been in one of these. I have no idea how it works, but this is going to be really fast and disorienting." She pushed another button, kissed 2D, and sat back.

Within a few minutes they were on Draga, a planet humans had never even heard of. The atmosphere had very little air, but that didn't matter to 2D; he no longer had lungs. His Tanian body seemed very adaptable to any condition.

Trii led 2D to a strange round building. "I live here," Trii said. "I'll get the disguises and be right out." 2D sat down on the bizarre purple grass and waited for her.

She came out a few minutes later and they went back into the pod. Trii set it for earth. It took longer to get there, at least fifteen minutes, but 2D didn't mind. They touched down right at Kong.

"Do you want to put on the disguise now, or later?" Trii asked. 2D smiled. "I'll put it on first, then show them when I'm inside. How's this work?"

Trii showed him how to adjust it, and soon he looked and even sounded like his old self. She put hers on and looked like a more human version of what she used to look like. She still had the purple hair.

2D opened the door, and Noodle, Murdoc, and Russel were waiting for him inside. Noodle smiled. "2D! We were so worried! Where did you go?" 2D smiled. "Space," he said. He introduced them to Trii and they told their story.

"That's the biggest load of crap I've ever heard!" Murdoc said. 2D turned off the disguise and his menacing reptilian form appeared in the lobby. Murdoc stared. "Dullard?!" he said in disbelief.

"Yeah, it's me," 2D said. "I'm an alien thing now. So is Trii. We didn't have any time to try and get changed back."

Russel grinned. "Well, we're glad you're back home anyway," he said.

2D smiled, and turned the disguise back on. "I can use this to look and sound normal when we need to do a song or something," he said. "You can't really tell I'm alien."

Noodle got up and poked him. "You're scaly," she said.

2D and Trii laughed, turning the disguises off. "I'm more comfortable now like this... is that okay?" 2D asked.

"Yes, 2D, it's okay!" Noodle said. "You look like a big lizard."

"You should turn into that for a second or something when we play a show," Russel said. "It'd be funny."

"Why do you still have hair?" Murdoc asked.

2D grinned, glad to be accepted back into his band in his present condition, and glad to have Trii. He hoped the others had escaped, but for now he just wanted to get adjusted to living with his new body. "We still have those body parts in the fridge?" he asked.

"Yeah... you eat body parts?" Murdoc said.

2D and Trii grinned. "Sure do," Trii said. "We'll be back."

Noodle, Russel, and Murdoc watched them go. "What the hell just happened?" Murdoc said.

THE END!