Author Notes: I actually don't have a whole lot to say here. There's a lot going on, I'm sort of getting back into the swing of things with this fic. There's more relationships involved in part two-although the focus will stay on Turbo and the twins, there's going to be a lot of other interactions to take a look at. I owe thanks to Lava, yet again, for helping edit this and for also providing a lot of inspiration for one of the scenes that follows. I'm astonished at how many people are already following this story! I hope I won't let you down. Please enjoy. :)

Chapter Two – Mood Swings

Turbo stood in the doorway of the vault, leaning forward and craning his neck as Vanellope turned to look back at him. She was floating at the end of the tether in front of the face of King Candy's code, her brows low over her large brown eyes. "Okay, this thing is huge," she called, looking back at him with a glare. "I can't move it any closer! You've either gotta come in here, or figure out some way to see it from where you're at!"

Turbo grimaced, poking a foot into the anti-gravity uncomfortably. It had always been easy to navigate the space as King Candy, but the weightless sensation was a bit unnerving in this big and spindly body. He crept out and hovered into the empty space, his wings flickering to life with a buzz. Once he'd acclimated himself to the vault, he clawed his way toward her to get a better look at the code. Vanellope moved back with ease, watching as he got his bearings and righted himself in front of the code box. Taking a breath, he clicked into the box and gave his code an intent look. The contents made little sense to her.

"The cybug coding is all still there!" he hissed, red glitching rippling along his back. "Why didn't it erase when the code reset? -wait a minute, it's not all here...just bits and pieces, what is this?"

Vanellope watched curiously, wondering how he had ever learned to make sense of all this. His eyes scanned the code as he reached out, collecting a few pieces of code and drawing them near to his space. The pieces of broken code glimmered and glitched slightly, sending a chain reaction through his body as he touched them. "It's...fused to me."

Vanellope watched as the last of the glitch fizzled out through his tail, then looked back to his face. "What's that mean?"

He frowned. He checked the old connections between his ghost code and King Candy's unfinished one. They were nearly indistinguishable now, which was just as well. But now the cybug coding (what was left of it) had fit itself in amidst both of them. All three now seemed to be one tangled mess of coding. But the cybug code was not complete. It couldn't be. King Candy and Turbo were two complete personas, two fully functioning avatars, the cybug code thus far was only an image, a change in his appearance. He had yet to notice the cybug instincts kick in, although, he supposed in some ways the ability to adjust to the new body was part of the the instinct code, but...

"I have to run the roster again," he said sharply, turning for the exit. Vanellope looked after him, blinking. The cybug floated awkwardly to the door of the vault and clambered out, tugging off his tether.

Vanellope hurried after the cybug as he pushed through the curtain back into the throne room. The twins looked up anxiously from where they stood near the throne, waiting. "Hey, Turbo!" she shouted after him, "You do know you can't run the roster any time soon, right?"

Turbo snorted, glancing back at her. "I can and I will."

Vanellope raised her brows at him, almost laughing. "Okay, no," she said, spreading her hands. "The Sugar Rush racers aren't exactly going to be happy to see you as a cybug agai-"

Turbo raised his voice suddenly, the glitch tearing through his words: "Tell those brats I've got to do it!"

The twins blinked. Ted stepped toward the two of them, raising his hands defensively. "Hey, guys..."

Vanellope breathed out sharply. "You can't tell me what to do, Turbug! This isn't your game!"

Turbo's eyes flickered yellow as he stared at her wide-eyed, his face hot. "It should be, glitch!" There was a tight silence before he suddenly lunged forward at her, sweeping a clawed hand at the child.

Vanellope was quick to react and glitched away from him, out of reach, staring at the cybug, not exactly afraid, but terribly startled by his reaction. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"What I meant to do the first time I got trapped in this goddamn body!" He scrambled after her, swinging at her with his claws as she continued to glitch away from him. The twins rushed forward to stop him, but he ignored them entirely, his wings buzzing to life as he began to lift himself up from the floor.

"Turbo, stop!" Ted shouted, just managing to grab hold of one of his hind legs as the cybug started taking off. Turbo dropped back to his feet stiffly, reeling on Ted with a growl. He was about to strike the racer when he spotted Ned preparing to jump onto his back from the other side. Without missing a beat, he twisted himself around, whipping the racer with his tails and sending him sprawling. Ted's stomach knotted, but he tore his eyes from his brother, scrambling to Turbo's side and reaching for his wing. Immediately, Turbo twisted back around and Ted yelped as the cybug got hold of his shoulder in his claws. Panicked, he leaped as far as he could onto the cybug's back, grabbing hold of the notch of armor at the bug's wing. Turbo perked as he was touched, shuddering with a quick glitch that momentarily revealed his own, grey startled face. "T-ted-!" he yelped as his limbs suddenly collapsed under him, sending the cybug and the racer to the floor with a loud whumph.

Ted let out a breath, collapsing against the cybug's side, his hand still rubbing at the spot under Turbo's armor. Turbo meanwhile scraped very weakly at the floor with his claws, obviously distraught although he was significantly subdued. He huffed out breaths wearily, his chin on the floor, his face warm and flushed. Vanellope had frozen a few feet away from them, her eyes wide and confused. She looked slowly from Turbo to Ted, blinking. "W-what just happened?"

Ted breathed out shakily, looking over at Vanellope. Then suddenly giving a start, he pushed himself up to look past the cybug at his brother. "Ned, are you okay?!"

Ned was just pushing himself up from the floor, wincing a little, but he gave Ted a nod as he wrapped one arm around his stomach, flinching. Ted let out a shaky sigh of relief, his whole expression softening. He looked toward Vanellope wearily.

She was still staring, keeping her distance. "W-what did you do to him?"

Ted sighed, his heart still pounding. He leaned on Turbo gently. "I'll explain once we get him to sleep, huh...?"

Vanellope nodded uncertainty, watching as Ned pushed himself to his feet and approached the other two. He lingered a moment by Turbo's head, then moved to his side, dropping down to his knees and reaching up to touch his brother's hand. Ted gave Turbo's wing a few last rubs before he stumbled to his feet, letting his brother take over as he moved round to Turbo's head and knelt down carefully. Turbo looked up at him helplessly as Ted lay a hand on his forehead. "Sorry, big guy..."

Turbo whined softly, still breathing a bit heavily, his heart and his head still trying to catch up with the rest of his body. The sudden shift in his mood, his adrenaline being chopped off at its peak, had left him shaken and rather uncertain, but he was slowly giving over to the relaxation impulse stirred by Ned's touch. Ted brushed his hand on Turbo's forehead gently. The glitch rippled through him and Turbo closed his eyes, shivering a little. Ned leaned over and hugged him around his side.

Ted continued to brush Turbo's forehead as the cybug continued to relax, finally falling silent, his breath calm and even. After a while, he opened his eyes sleepily, glancing up at Ted again, his face still warm and red. "Don't tell her...about the...about this..." He glanced toward Ned with his eyes and back at Ted rather pleadingly.

"We gotta tell her, Turbo," Ted murmured. "She'd figure it out on her own even if we don't." Turbo closed his eyes again, seeming to whimper a little. Ted smiled softly as the other racer tipped his head and pushed it against his knee gently. "Just go to sleep, bud, you'll be fine..."

It wasn't long before Turbo drifted off, his head just against Ted's lap, Ned leaning across his back.

Turbo lay, once again on the floor, in the room he'd been sharing with the twins. The busted bed was much too small for him anyway. He was bitter and angry and frustrated and embarrassed, but Ned had given him quite a massage before he and Ted went back out with the glitch, so he found that in spite of all this, he felt relatively calm. At least, he wasn't raging about destroying things, which is what he suspected he'd be doing if not for Ned's touch.

He sighed raggedly. Everything had been going so well. He'd finally been making headway. And now he was back where he had started. Or at least very close. He lifted his claws to his face and pressed his hard armored palms against his eyes.

And the glitch knew about his...'sweet spot.' Good gamers, what a nightmare...

A part of him felt perhaps he ought to be more concerned with his...'outburst,' but he wasn't. Barely conscious as he was carried by a station of the glitch's guards back to his room, he'd heard quite a lot of talk about cybug coding and 'kill instincts,' but he knew better. All that anger and vengeance he directed at...Vanellope had been his own. His, Turbo's. Maybe the cybug code made those emotions bubble closer to the surface, but it wasn't any cybug coding that made him go after Vanellope, or even knock Ned away from him...It was good, old-fashioned Turbo rage. The same kind of rage that had driven him to...well.

It was his rage, in any case. Whether that was better or worse than cybug rage, he wasn't sure. It was hard to place what exactly had been going on in his head when the cybug coding had got the better of him on Diet Cola Mountain.

There was a knock at the door and he tipped his head forward, dropping his forehead against the floor. "Whoever the hell is out there better go away," he said without much enthusiasm.

A small, equally unenthused voice replied, "It's me, sir."

"Sour Bill?" Turbo lifted his head and glanced toward the door. "Ah...come in."

The guard opened the door and Sour Bill shuffled in slowly, looking at Turbo with a faint tinge of anxiety. Turbo eyed him with mild suspicion as the candy's expression faded back into his normal melancholy state. "Frankly, I'm surprised she didn't have you bound again..."

Turbo snorted. "Is that all you've got to say to me?" he asked bitterly, turning away. "My, you don't get much respect once you abdicate the throne, do you?" He grimaced faintly, his face glitching a little as he beat down the frustration of not being able to glitch entirely over to King Candy as he had done for Sour Bill these past few days. He glanced at the candy from the corner of his eye and frowned toothily. "Get over here, come on."

Sour Bill quickened his clattering steps and moved closer to the cybug. Once he was within arm's reach, Turbo reached out and clasped him in one hand, pulling him in close and wrapping both arms around him. Sour Bill glanced up at him, distraught. "Sir?"

"Damn those twins, going out there without me like any other day," he muttered, his tail swishing. "Just leaving me here, locked up like a criminal-"

"You are a criminal, sir."

"-with nothing to do all day but stare out this damn window. I'm sick of this!" He raised his shoulders, then relaxed them again slowly, huffing out a breath between his fangs. In spite of his mounting frustration, he found he was still feeling the affects of the pressure point, and he didn't seem to able to get near as worked up as normally. Still, the intense feeling of restlessness that seemed to always plague him in this body was wreaking havoc in his head. Turbo closed his eyes tightly, resting his chin atop his old assistant, focusing as best he could on the glitch in his own body.

Sour Bill glanced up at him awkwardly, shifting his arms and legs a little in the cybug's grasp. "Sir?"

"Thowah Bill," he said slowly, King Candy's words quavering as though spoken with great effort, "if I can just learn to control this little glitch problem I-" Turbo shuddered with a glitch and opened his eyes, blinking yellow before they returned to King Candy's brown. "I can't do it," he growled, his voice back to its usual state. "I can't glitch out of this form! It takes all the energy I've got just to get part of it!"

Sour Bill sighed a little and gazed down at the floor again. He blinked when he felt Turbo shift his chin and brush his face against him lightly. "S-sir?" he stammered.

Turbo clicked his tongue a few times on the inside of his fangs, grimacing. Then he dropped his chin back to Sour Bill's head. "Just how sour are you, Sour Bill?"

Sour Bill blinked ahead of himself, uncertain how he was expected to answer this query. "I...don't know, sir."

Turbo hummed a little, an unfamiliar tune that suited the king's personality more than Turbo's own. "Stay with me," he said, "until the twins come back, alright?"

Sour Bill hesitated. He was supposed to meet with some of the servants to discuss Turbo's presence in the palace. But Vanellope hadn't exactly ordered him to attend, it was merely expected of him...

"Of course, sir," he droned, "if you insist."

"I do."

When the twins returned that afternoon, they found King Turbug fast asleep on his side, with Sour Bill half in his mouth, struggling a bit to get free. He looked at them with wider-than-usual eyes, bidding them for help as soon as they entered. With a little effort, they managed to pry the sour ball out from between Turbo's fangs, though he was still quite sticky and damp.

"Sorry," Ted murmured, setting the little sour ball down on the floor. He waved his arms a bit and looked up at them forlornly.

"Thank you," he droned, glancing at Turbo, who seemed to be waking up with a wide toothy yawn. Having fulfilled his duty, Sour Bill shuffled for the door and left. The twins looked back at Turbo.

"Looks like you had an exciting day," Ted commented.

Turbo stretched out his bug legs beside him and his arms above his head, licking his fangs distastefully. "Why is my mouth so sour...?"

"You were chewing on Sour Bill," Ned said, hunkering down in front of him.

Turbo blinked at him, his tongue between his fangs. He sucked it in quietly, grimacing. Ned was gazing at him sincerely, his large eyes curious and quite a bit worried. Turbo swallowed and glanced away, awkward. "Are you...alright, Ned?"

Ned nodded quietly, leaning forward. "You didn't hit me that hard...Are you okay?"

Turbo grimaced faintly. He was miserable and angry and frustrated. But they already knew that much. He glanced up at Ted. "How is your should-?" He perked as he noticed the pie plate held between the other racer's hands. He lifted his neck quickly to get a look at it.

Ted smirked. "Felix sent this at the end of arcade hours..."

Turbo hesitated, looking from the pie to Ted, then he quickly reached out with his claws and snatched it up, settling himself back down on the floor. He leaned down to give the pie a good sniff before picking at it with his claws and lifting a messy 'slice' to his mouth.

Ned dropped from his crouch to a sit, turning to lean up against Turbo's side. Turbo shifted, repositioning his legs to give Ned room. "It's not as fun racing when we know you're stuck in here again," Ned mused. Turbo settled his legs down, one of them resting across Ned's lap. Ned lay his arms on it lightly.

"Yeah," Ted said, touching Turbo's side with the toe of his shoe. "And there's no one screaming at us whenever we cross the finish line." Turbo glanced up at him with his eyes, a clawful of pie stuffed into his mouth. He flicked his tail in annoyance to swat Ted in the back of the knee. The racer stumbled a little and shot him a glance, then lowered himself to sit next to his brother, forcing Turbo to shift his legs around again. "You have any ideas of how to fix this cybug thing?"

"No," Turbo said, licking his claws and gazing down at the pie he'd rather well mutilated by digging into it with his hand. He sighed. "I'm not really sure there is a way to fix it. Running the roster race again should change me back temporarily, but...I'm..."

"You attacked Vanellope," Ned said, glancing at him.

Turbo sighed again lightly, scooping a little more pie out of the plate. "Yeah, and I'm not certain that lapse in self-control bodes well for getting to run the roster any time soon." Turbo grimaced. If he was perfectly honest, he wasn't completely certain what had happened in the throne room earlier. Just like he wasn't entirely certain what had happened the day he left his game, or the day of the race when he went after Vanellope on the track and first glitched to his old form. Except now, he supposed, he was even more dangerous than before. Still, he couldn't actually kill Vanellope, so...He chewed the pie thoughtfully. In spite of the mild shame of eating it, he was deeply grateful for it.

Ted slid down a bit against Turbo's side, glancing at the ceiling. "So...no ideas for a real solution to this problem?"

Turbo grit his teeth lightly. "...none."

Ted stretched his legs out, pursing his lips. "Any possibility it's just another avatar in your code? I mean, you did glitch to it the same way you do King Candy and Turbo."

Turbo considered this, glancing himself over. The lighter pink color that had instilled itself in his arms after eating his bonds in the palace had disappeared since the reset. The cherry rings were there on his fingers, but it was impossible for him to say if they had just reappeared or been there all along. The cybug form did seem to have certain retentive default qualities, though.

Turbo frowned thoughtfully. "But if that's the case, why can't I change back?"

"You're the one who knows code," Ted said, crossing his ankles.

The cybug hummed, licking the pie from his claws and gazing toward the window thoughtfully.

The twins sat with Turbo a little while before Vanellope stopped by the room and asked them to come with her and meet with some of the other racers. She said nothing to Turbo, simply gave him a rather cold, grim look, and then left. Feeling a bit guilty, the twins left Turbo to his own devices again. Sulking and moody, he spent the better part of that afternoon lying by the window with his head on the floor, gazing out at the Sugar Rush landscape that had become his permanent home. It was rather late in the day when a group of anxious-looking candy citizens (servants of the castle) came into the room, trying to ignore the cybug as they removed the broken pieces of the bed and reassembled a significantly larger, better constructed one. Turbo watched them rather suspiciously from the far side of the room, where he lay curled up on one side.

"Do you expect that to support me?" he sneered.

Most of the citizens rather uncomfortably ignored him, but one glanced his way nervously. "W-we're just...doing what the president ordered."

Turbo locked eyes with the little candy, holding his gaze a while before the man suddenly turned away and went back to working. Turbo smirked faintly. Ah, so, he could still instill fear in these people...that was reassuring, at least. He stretched out his legs and hoisted himself up, lurking over to the citizens who were just finishing assembling the bed. They all reacted with a sort of quick-footed panic as he came near, scrambling out of his way and glancing at him anxiously. Turbo craned his neck low to peer at them, grinning. "Glitch's orders, hm? Sent you in here all alone with me, did she?"

The candies looked at him a moment, then quickly returned to their work, trying their best to ignore him, shooting him fearful sidelong glances. He smiled coolly and lay himself back down just beside them, watching with bemusement as the little people shuffled about in their work.

Funny how she trusted him...very funny.