Warnings: implied Hero's Cuties (Felix/Calhoun), mild gore

The party didn't look like it belonged in a ballroom, but then again, Princess—no, wait—President Vanellope never was one for following the standard.

She had hired the best DJ setup available from the Dance Dance Revolution X2 cabinet. A bespectacled gent with half his head shaved manned the setup, turning knobs and pressing buttons to control the lights without so much as looking up from his computer screen.

On either side of the ballroom, round tables with plush stools were set up for the guests to take a rest, and long buffet tables overflowed with sugary treats and drinks, both alcoholic and regular. Wynchel and Duncan, the two donut policemen of Sugar Rush, cast wary eyes over all hands that neared the punch bowls, ensuring none of the younguns snuck any booze into their cups.

"This sure is a huge party!" Fix-it Felix shouted over the music to a bubblegum woman on the opposite side of the refreshment table. She had a can of pineapple juice in one hand and a bottle of Sprite in the other, pouring little sloshes of each into a heart-shaped bowl.

"Yeah," she shouted back, dabbing at her sweating forehead with the back of her wrist. "I can barely keep up with making these drinks, I'm telling ya."

"I can imagine," Felix said. "With all these people here…"

And there were a lot of people there. Counting the candy citizens of Sugar Rush, which admittedly took up the majority of the partygoers, there must've been over a thousand characters present. Felix was surprised the air conditioning units were holding up. He'd like to take a look at their blueprints, he thought.

The bubblegum woman reached under the tablecloth and put the juice can and Sprite away. She gave her mixture a stir, then reached back under the tablecloth for something else.

"Oh, shoot," she muttered.

Felix, who had been people-watching while he was waiting for her to finish mixing her drink concoction together, turned his attention back to her. "What's the matter?" he asked her.

She raised up an empty bottle of Absolut for Felix to see. "Outta vodka," she announced. She sighed deeply. "Guess I'll be going back down to the wine cellar." Again, she wiped the sweat away from her forehead.

"I can do it for you," Felix offered. It was obvious, he thought, that she was tired, and he wasn't doing anything important. Just waiting for another grown-up drink, is all. His date for the evening had gotten caught up in her own game, something he didn't quite understand about a perimeter breach, so he was solo that night. "Truly, I don't mind to."

The bubblegum woman was quick to take him up on his offer. "Okay," she said, nodding enthusiastically, "that'd be great if you'd do that for me. Just don't tell President Vanellope I asked you to, okay? I might get in trouble."

Felix flapped a dismissive hand at her. "She won't mind if I do. No worries."

"You know where the wine cellar is?" she asked him. He shook his head. She gave him directions, which were pretty simple: out the ballroom doorway, to the left, all the way to the end of the hall.

"Got it," he said.

"And if we don't have any more Absolut, just get whatever kind is left," she yelled to him.

"Can do." He gave her a curt nod and departed the table, beginning to weave through the sea of people dancing and mingling in the ballroom.

The hallway was so much brighter than the ballroom that Felix had to squint while his eyes adjusted to the light. He hadn't realized it was that loud in there, either. The quiet was kind of refreshing.

There were a few other characters out in the hall, taking a breather, it seemed, but for the most part he was alone. He went to the right, as the bubblegum woman had instructed, and walked all the way to the end, where a heavy iron door greeted him.

Felix tried the handle, but it wouldn't budge. He could tell it wasn't locked…it was just jammed, somehow. He put his ear to the keyhole, listening to the mechanics within as he jimmied the handle again.

"Hmm," he muttered to himself. "I don't know what's the matter with it, but…" He grabbed his golden hammer from his tool belt. "I can fix it."

He gave the door handle a gentle tap with the head of his hammer, then tried opening it again. Whatever had been wrong with it was fixed now—then again, he knew it would be. He slid his hammer back into his tool belt and walked inside.

Even though it was dark inside, he knew he was at the head of a staircase, and he didn't want to try and navigate them without a light. He pawed blindly at the walls until he found the switch. Click. Electric lights fashioned to look like wax candles popped to life. As he descended the stairs, he noticed that the handrail was dusty, whereas the rest of the castle had been scrubbed to immaculate cleanliness. Well, Felix thought, this room wasn't really that important, and probably didn't get cleaned as often.

But as his feet left the last step, he knew something was wrong. He wasn't in a wine cellar at all. He must've misheard the bubblegum woman's directions, or maybe she'd told them to him incorrectly. Either way, he was in…

"The dungeon," he muttered under his breath. He'd been there before, and not too long ago, either. But there was definitely something different about it. As soon as he'd left the stairs and entered the main chamber of the place, an overwhelming metallic smell hit his nostrils. He decided he wouldn't question it. It was none of his business. He turned on his heel to leave, but he paused when he heard something.

He couldn't quite make out the sound, but it wasn't a pleasant one; it was a combination of ragged breathing, sobbing, and stifled moaning. Felix's arms and neck broke out in goosebumps when he realized he was not alone in the dungeon.

His Good Guy nature was nagging at him to investigate. Someone was obviously in distress, by the sound of it, and what kind of person would he be to just leave? Then again, this was the dungeon, and whoever was locked up was there for a reason. But it just didn't sit right with him. It'd be one thing to hear someone, but for them to sound like they were in so much pain…

In a way, he knew he should leave President Vanellope and her prisoner to their own devices, but he knew he'd never live it down if he didn't look into things.

All of the cell doors were ajar, save for the one on the right-hand side, at the very end. As he stepped closer, the metallic smell grew stronger. Felix felt his heart hammering in his chest. No, he thought, that wasn't normal.

He couldn't see anything inside the only closed cell door. There was a small window cut out of the door, but it was up too high. There was a ring of keys hooked to a nail, he saw, on the far wall, but he wasn't about to simply unlock the door. That would probably not be wise, since he wasn't sure who—or what—was on the other side.

So he did the only thing he could really think of to do.

"Hello?" he called. "Um…you okay in there?"

There was a guttural gurgling noise, followed by what sounded like the spitting of phlegm.

"Look," the voice said softly. "If ya here to"—more gurgling, spitting—"if ya here to torture me, those little brats already got it"—a haggard breath—"got it covered."

Felix's breath hitched.

That voice.

"Turbo?" he said, eyes wide.

It sounded like the person inside was trying to laugh, despite the pain they were in. A coughing fit and a mumbled moan followed.

"Yeah," was all the figure inside said.

Now Felix was confused. This was almost too much to comprehend. There was Turbo—as in, back in the 80s, when the arcade was still new, there was Turbo. Then Turbo…went Turbo, and killed himself in the process, except he somehow lived, actually. And he took over this game Felix was standing in, Sugar Rush, except it wasn't him-him, it was King Candy-him. Then King Candy…the Cybug incident was a mess in and of itself, but…King Candybug, as everyone had termed the strange purple creature King Candy had morphed into when a Cybug swallowed him up, died when he flew into the Diet Cola Hot Spring eruption. Felix had seen it himself. Now King Candy was…where? Turbo was in that cell. Felix would know that voice anywhere.

But all of that didn't matter, at the moment, because—

"Did you say something about torture?" Felix said.

Again, Turbo sounded like he was trying to make some kind of laughing sound, but to Felix, it sounded an awful lot like blowing bubbles into a drink with a straw.

"Hey, you—sound familiar. Have—have we met?"

"A few times," Felix replied. "I'm Fix-it Felix, Jr., from the game Fix-it Felix, Jr."

"Oh, yeah," Turbo said. "I remem—I remembah you, we used t—used to drink together sometime."

"You sound like you're in a lot of pain."

"'A lot' would—wouldn't even—touch it," Turbo said. It was becoming harder for him to talk, Felix could tell. "If you c—if you could see me right—right now, you'd—puke."

Felix grimaced. Turbo or not, he hated to hear anybody sound like that. Then again…apparently Turbo was a pretty manipulative guy, to put it lightly.

Well, Felix thought, he'd just have to see it for himself. He jumped up and caught the ledge of the small window cut into the cell's door. He pulled himself up and took a split second to take a readying breath before he peeked inside.

But it didn't do him any good. It was way too dark in there to see anything. The light from the main dungeon chamber only illuminated the first two feet of the cell, and that didn't help him. Now that his face was in the window, however, the metallic smell was a million times stronger, enough to make him want to gag.

"Are you…bleeding?" he asked through the window.

Turbo tried to laugh again, but it was clear that the effort pained him. "Yeah. Among other things. It's too—too dark to see, huh? I'd move closer t—to the light, but those little—fuckers got me chained to the wall." In response, he waggled one of his chains feebly, by the sound of things.

Felix dropped himself down from the window ledge. He tried to collect his thoughts.

So, Turbo was definitely bleeding, there was no doubt about that, and more than likely chained to the wall. Was that call enough for emergency? He could understand locking Turbo in the dungeon, and maybe even chaining him up to the wall, but…why was he bleeding?

And he sounded like he was in an immeasurable amount of anguish—whether or not that was a ruse was yet to be seen, though, he reminded himself. He was kicking himself for not bringing a flashlight. All good handymen always carried a flashlight wherever they went, but he'd swapped his regular tool belt for his snazzy suede one, since he was dressing up for the party, and all he had was his golden hammer.

He wanted to open up the cell door with that key on the wall so badly, being the Good Guy that he was, but he knew he shouldn't. His intentions weren't to free Turbo, merely to check on him and see what was going on, but he doubted he could fend Turbo off if this was all a trick, and Turbo tried to fight him to get free. Plus, it wasn't exactly his place to be snooping around, but…if someone really was in that much despair…Turbo or not…

Then an idea hit him. What he really needed was someone who would give him a second opinion on this matter. A fellow Good Guy who'd share his sympathies, maybe. Someone who'd easily be able to hold their own against Turbo, if the need arose.

Someone…taller.

"Just get—it over with, wouldja? You're—killin me with sus—suspense." Turbo coughed gruffly, spit something heavy onto the floor. Felix winced.

"I'm not here to…torture you," Felix reassured him. "In fact, I'm not supposed to be here at all." He briefly recounted the story of the party, of the bubblegum girl, how he was actually supposed to be in the wine cellar and not the dungeon. "But now that I'm here and I've discovered your troubles, I'm thinking I want to help you, if it's as bad as it's sounding in there."

Felix waited for a response, but he heard nothing. He went on. "I'll be back, hopefully before the end of this party, so I don't look suspicious coming back at so late an hour. I need to bring some…reinforcements, I s'pose you could say."

Still no response. Either he didn't have anything to say to that, or, Felix thought, he could've passed out.

"If you can still hear me," Felix called a little louder, "I'll be back shortly, I really will."

As he sped out of the dungeon and made a beeline for the exit tram that would take him back to Game Central Station, he couldn't believe he was doing this. Turbo didn't really deserve his compassion, he knew, but no one should be in that amount of pain. As he rode the tram, he tried to get his thoughts together, tried to think of something good to say to the gal he was heading over to meet. The more he thought about it, the less convinced he was that she'd share his point of view. For all he knew, torture was normal in her game, he thought with a grimace. But…he knew there was a lot of good inside her, for sure, so maybe she'd help him out.

Before the tram even came to a complete stop, he hopped out of it and sped off to the Hero's Duty entrance. His date for the evening had said she was too busy to come to the Sugar Rush party, but maybe she could make time for this. Oh, he hoped she could.

Author's Note: If anyone's been keeping up with my other story, "The Visitor," please know it's on hiatus for now. The past few chapters were far too forced, and the out-of-characterness I was writing (Turbo especially) was sucking my soul dry. So I've started a new fic! I've got lots of ideas for this one so hopefully it'll be better and appeal to a wider audience, even.