This is it. The time has come. The demons have chased me down and now forced my heavyweight hip hop hand. I need to get there. The expanse, the calm of the eternal briny deep. The Ocean. . The ..Ocean... So this is it... Throw myself into the sea.

X Russel Hobbs...

~Chapter Four: A Change In Plans~

He had discarded the note onto the floor of the tiny flat and was now walking in a zombie-like fashion to the door.

Russel Hobbs would not lie: at first, it was going to be suicide. He was done and he was scared and all he wanted to do was throw himself into the ocean. The demons…. they whispered to him at night. Bad things. They would knock on the inside of his head, scratch at the walls of his brain, trying to get out. The noises could be heard all day: the knocking, the scratching, the laughing, the whispering…

So he was done with it. He had lost everything that mattered to him. He even had to sell his last drum set to pay the rent. Well, not anymore. There'd be drum sets in heaven.

He wondered if he'd see Noodle there, too.

That's mostly what the demons would whisper about. Things about his little baby girl. Terrible things. It made his skin crawl just thinking about.

What was the point anymore, then? He lost Noodle. 2D and Murdoc were dead to him. Those shitbags left him and they left Noodle and they deserved to be punished. And the demons, why put up with them if Russel didn't have to? They couldn't follow him to heaven.

But then, a few days before this moment, he realized something that made him stop and think. Something was stopping him from jumping into the ocean and drowning at this very second. And it was the realization that he wanted to punish his former band mates. Punish them for leaving him and Noodle behind. He had already heard the new album; he had left his flat for a rare moment of fresh air to go down to the library and listen to it on the computer. He could only get through three tracks before he got sick to his stomach and returned to the cursed flat.

They deserved punishment.

So he decided how he was going to die: he was going to die swimming to Plastic Beach. He would try with all his might to get there to punish those selfish bastards, and if he died on the way, at least he died trying.

Thus would be the way.

It was May 4th. And Russel Hobbs was heading to the door.

The Ocean…

Soon it would consume him.

An old radio was blaring in the background. Under usual circumstances Russel wouldn't hear it, over the screaming and whispering and knock knock knocking, but everything was surprisingly quiet as Russel walked to the door. And when he subconsciously listened to a piece of what a newswoman was saying, he froze, suddenly on high alert. She had said something about Plastic Beach. But this was a news station, not a music station, so what was this all about? Russel dared stop for a moment to listen.

"The reports came in at about 9 o'clock, approximately two hours ago," the woman was saying. "No one knows quite how it happened, but the fans of the band were the first to recognize it when the video surveillance cameras being streamed to the band's websites suddenly went offline, and our specialists have confirmed that huge waves of energy have been coming from the approximate coordinates of the now-famous Plastic Beach!"

"So what does this mean for the future of Gorillaz, Heidi?" an anchorman asked.

"No one is quite certain yet, Steve, but it's now official, folks: Plastic Beach has been blown up, and the whereabouts of the Gorillaz is unknown!"

"What a tragedy, Heidi. Now, here's the weather."

Russel, once again feeling like a zombie from one of 2D's old movies, trudged back over to the radio and switched it off. He had heard enough.

Plastic Beach… blown up.

A long stream of thoughts worked there way through Russel's head, but they all pointed to one inevitable fact:

They had been punished already.

So… Russel didn't need to jump into the sea after all.

He perceived this odd piece of new information in the following way:

2D and Murdoc were dead.

He felt a little sad, and he certainly didn't feel happy, but he felt somewhat… relieved.

Like a huge weight had been removed from his shoulders.

He didn't walk back to the door. The demons whispered, but he didn't hear them.

He could put up with all this shit for just a little longer.

Only because he now knew his baby girl's death had been somewhat avenged.

He was wrong on so many levels, but he was making the right decision as he sunk down into his armchair. The door stayed close.

A/N: It's Russel! Hooray! Sorry for the short chapter, but it fits into everything else quite nicely, so it was necessary. I also apologize for the depressing tone, but things will get better for Russ soon(ish)! We won't be seeing him for a few more chapters, which means it's back to 2D and Murdoc!

If you don't recognize it, the italicized stuff at the top is an actual letter written by Russel, posted on the Gorillaz site.

Also, a quick note for those of you who aren't just joining us now: in the last chapter, for some reason, I claimed the current date (in the story, not in real life) was May 15th. This is incorrect, and I have changed it to the correct date, March 5th, the day after this chapter occurs. Sorry about that.

Reviews? Please?

Thanks for reading!

~blue-eyed-cow