Warnings: None! Well, I guess one. An OC of mine is really prevalent in this chapter, so if you don't like non-canon characters, don't read it. ):

His new digs weren't too shabby, all things considered. For one, there was an actual bed—a bunk bed!—not some stupid cot-thing mounted to the wall. He was glad to see pillows, too. And since this place was a jail instead of a dungeon, the entire wall facing the outside was barred, and he was able to see out. Much better than the dark, gloomy place he used to be housed in.

Also, there were no chains to bind him with on the wall, he noted. Another big plus.

Turbo clambered onto the top bunk and stretched his limbs, looking like a beached starfish. He almost couldn't believe he wasn't being poked or prodded or burnt or sliced or stabbed or maimed at the moment. It felt surreal. But he wasn't complaining, that was for sure.

He thought for sure that the lady that helped smuggle him out of the hell-hole would be bombarding him with questions, or at least Fix-it Felix would wanna chew the fat for a while about what just transpired. But they dumped him out and left, rather hurriedly, he might add. He actually had something useful to tell them, but if they were wanting to run off like that, that was fine with him. Their loss.

He sighed in relief, half-grinning as he allowed himself to relax for the first time in weeks. Needless to say that in Sugar Rush, he was either writhing in pain and fading in and out of consciousness or keyed up about when the next wave of torture was coming his way. It was kinda nice, being able to lounge around for a little bit.

Of course, he'd have to think of a way to escape—but for now, he might just take a snooze.

Turbo faintly heard footsteps, and his heart began to thunder in his chest out of habit. But he reminded himself that he wasn't in Sugar Rush anymore, and whoever was coming was probably just passing through.

But the footsteps came to a stop just outside his cell. He didn't bother to turn his head and see who it was. Either they were just there to gawk at the new prisoner, or they'd pipe up and tell him what they wanted.

"Sarge said we had somebody new in here," came a voice—a throaty, almost androgynous voice that either belonged to a little boy or a woman.

Turbo turned his head. The figure standing outside his cell was a little plain-looking, sure, but female. Her body armor had a rounded chestplate for her boobs, instead of the square ones the guys around here wore. Counting the lady who carted him in, he'd now seen a total of three women here.

"Aint I the only one here?" Turbo said.

"Nah, we have two more, at the very end there," the woman said, pointing down the hall. "We call that cell 'the drunk tank.' People are in and out of that one." She shrugged. "We've never had an actual inmate, I don't think."

Turbo turned the rest of his body to face the woman. "Are you the warden?"

She laughed. "No, I just came to be nosy. Everybody was talking about how we had somebody from a different game down here, and I just wanted to, uh…" She scratched at her jawline, where an angry red rash festered. "See what you were all about, I guess."

Turbo opened his palm to the woman, as if to say, ta-da. He wasn't much to look at, frankly. He wasn't gonna lie to himself.

"So, what isthis game, anyway?" he asked her. "Shoot-em-up?"

"I guess," she said. "I mean, we call it a first-person shooter, but yeah."

"Do you shoot people?"

She laughed again. "No, no. I mean, I can, if I need to, but I hardly ever use this." She patted the laser pistol holstered at her hip. "I'm the mechanic. I fix a little bit of everything, I guess, but I mainly do vehicles."

Turbo straightened himself into a sitting position. The woman suddenly became much more interesting. Mainly because he could talk more about himself now.

"I'm from a racing game, y'know," he said proudly. "Originally, and I took one over for fifteen years."

"What kind of racing game?" the woman asked, intrigued. But suddenly, her face fell. "Wait, back up. You're not talking about Sugar Rush, are you?"

"I am," Turbo said with a smirk.

"So you're the game-jumping guy?" she said incredulously, brows furrowed.

"Yup," Turbo grinned. He was pleased as punch at his infamy.

The woman scratched at her rash. "Kay, so…you like, killed two games full of people."

Turbo nodded. He wasn't exactly proud of that part of the whole deal, but he'd done it nonetheless.

"Well, it's not like I slit their throats or anything," he said, trying his best to sound nonchalant. "But you could put it that way, yeah."

"Dead is dead," she shrugged. "Anyway, what's done is done, I guess. You're gonna be in there for a long, long time, you know that, right?"

"Yeah, yeah," Turbo said. "Don't remind me." This woman didn't seem too shocked at his actions, Turbo thought. She's probably seen her fair share of carnage in this game.

He looked up at the woman. "What's ya name, anyway?"

"Adams."

"No, no." He rolled his eyes. "Your first name."

Again, her hand found its way to her rash. "Nah, I just go by my last name. Just call me Adams."

"Embarrassing first name, I guess?"

"Kinda," she muttered. Scratch, scratch.

"Ya really shouldn't scratch that, y'know."

She dropped her hand to her side. "Yeah, I know."

That seemed to embarrass her. Her cheeks tinged a blotchy pink.

"So what's your name?" she mumbled to him.

"You know all that stuff about me, but ya don't know my name?" Turbo said. He was a little disappointed in that, actually.

"I guess I don't," Adams admitted.

"Well, I'm Turbo," he said with zeal. "The greatest racer evah."

Adams grinned at that, like she was humoring a child.

Turbo crossed his arms. "What's that face supposedta mean, huh?"

Her cheeks turned a darker pink. "Nothing, I was just…" She moved her hand up to scratch her face again, but she caught herself. She slapped her hand back down to her side.

"Anyway," Adams said, "welcome to Holding Cell A-3, I guess. They put you in the third cell so you're right in front of the security guard's desk, I think." She jabbed her thumb over her shoulder. Sure enough, there was a security setup there, complete with monitors and buttons and a sleek office desk and a swivel chair and Turbo didn't know whatall else. He wouldn't be getting into any mischief unnoticed, that much was clear.

"Well, lemme tell ya," Turbo said, "this place is way better than the Sugar Rush dungeon by a long shot."

"Yeah, Sarge won't get into details, but apparently there's something weird going on in that game," Adams said.

"'Weird' doesn't really touch it, but you could say that," he said. "Glad to be outta there, let's just put it that way. I think I owe your boss a favor, but I'm not really the 'owe a favor' type." He shrugged.

"Didn't figure you were," Adams said. "Anyway, uh…guess I'll be seeing you?" Her intonation phrased the sentence like a question, but she didn't wait for an answer. She did an awkward little wave and departed.

"She's kinda weird," Turbo said under his breath, when she was out of earshot. But a part of him had to admit that he was glad to have a conversation with somebody.

He thought he might conjure up a way to escape now, but really, he'd just have to play it out for a few days and see how things went. Who knew, maybe somebody came in to swap out bed linens or something and he could escape then. If he was being honest with himself, though, he couldn't fathom any way to escape all this metal he was surrounded by. He'd just have to wait.

Maybe now would be a good time, then, to take a little nap.

{*}

General Hologram was, as his name suggested, a hologram. Oddly enough, he didn't have a physical embodiment in Hero's Duty, but that hardly mattered. He could manifest himself within any mechanical device that had a screen, so appearing in most places was no problem.

In fact, he was quite fond of using the First-Person Player Module to get around the game, and he was free to do just that once the arcade was closed. He ran his code through the unit's motherboard and drove it to Calhoun's barracks.

He commanded the robotic hand to knock at the door. Expecting him, Calhoun opened the door in a matter of seconds.

She saluted him. "Greetings, General Hologram. I have lots of news to report."

"Oh, at ease, Tamora," he told her. "We're alone here, we can skip the formalities."

Calhoun dropped her hand back down to her side and allowed her shoulders to relax into a more comfortable position. She sidestepped the doorway, letting General Hologram's unit roll inside.

"I understand we've got ourselves a new prisoner," he said. He turned his monitor to look at Calhoun. "Well, I can't very well sit down, but you certainly can. Take a seat while we talk."

Calhoun sat in an armchair, while General Hologram rolled himself in front of her.

"Indeed we do have a new prisoner," she said. "I apologize, sir, but I had to get him out of the situation he was in. I couldn't leave him there."

"I understand," General Hologram said, his head on the screen nodding. "And I don't blame you. I don't see any way he could cause any real trouble here, so long as we keep a close eye on him. Barnes won't be happy that he has to constantly watch over our new prisoner, but he'll get over it." He chuckled.

"But the reason I really wanted to talk to you," Calhoun said, "is because I'm awfully suspicious of Sugar Rush. For those children to…to do the things they did…don't you think that's a little odd, sir?"

"Well," Hologram said, "it could be that they wanted revenge for all Turbo put them through, all he's done to the arcade. Do you think that's plausible?"

Calhoun crooked a finger on her chin in thought. "I suppose," she said. "But they're just so…well, they're just kids. I just can't see them doing what they've done."

"And what exactly have they done?" Hologram asked.

Calhoun told him of the horrors they had inflicted on Turbo, in very gruesome detail. General Hologram nodded as she explained the extent of the torture. It was terrible, yes, but not unheard of in his line of work.

"I see," Hologram said. "It does sound like there's some foul play at work there. Since Turbo rewrote so much of the game's code, and that girl—Vanellope, I believe you said her name was—reverted said code, I'm sure something could've been corrupted. Easily."

Calhoun nodded. "I've also considered that there might be a virus."

"Who knows, Turbo might've programmed a dormant virus into the game's code," Hologram said. "Though, if that's a case, his planning must've gone awry. I doubt he'd program those children to torture him intentionally."

"Right," Calhoun said. "Either way, there's something amiss over there, and I'm in favor of finding out what."

"I think we ought to investigate," General Hologram agreed, nodding. "We wouldn't want that game to be unplugged. Or worse, we don't need the virus they might be infected with spreading over here."

"They're good kids," Calhoun said candidly. "I really don't want anything to happen to them."

"I know," Hologram said. "If we can help, we should try to do so. Can you make a plan of action for me, Sarge?"

Calhoun smiled at the nickname. "I'll have it ready by tomorrow, General."

"No real rush," Hologram said. "I would suggest talking to your prisoner first. See what he knows. It might help you."

Calhoun didn't look too enthused about having to talk to Turbo, but she nodded. "I'll interrogate him."

General Hologram said his goodbyes, and Calhoun sent him off with a salute. As he rolled down the barracks corridor, he thought he might like to talk to this Turbo character himself, see what he was all about. But that could wait. He didn't want to overwhelm the prisoner, and Calhoun was sure to do a mental number on him with her sharp interrogation skills. He wanted to keep this character as compliant as he possibly could, though he doubted he'd have much luck with that.

But those kids in Sugar Rush were puzzling him. At first he figured Turbo was at fault for this, but now he wasn't so sure. It could very well be a virus. But if it was a virus, where did it come from? Corrupted code seemed the logical answer. But if that was the case, he wasn't sure how they were going to fix it.

They might have to have a helping hand from their prisoner to do that.

Well, he thought, maybe Tamora could get him some more information about the matter. He rolled the First-Person Player Module back to the game's entrance where it belonged, sending his code to the main motherboard at the top of the 99-story Cybug Tower. He allowed himself to switch to sleep mode, but the thoughts of the ravenous children across the hall still plagued his thoughts.

Author's Note: I nearly wrote General Hologram as he was originally intended to be, as General Lockload-but, ehh. I just decided to keep him how he is now. Both are good characters. And at first I had it written that Turbo was really frightened and freaked out at his new surroundings, as an after-effect of being tortured in Sugar Rush, but I decided not to write him that way. After he was free of immediate danger, I figure he'd recover quickly-outwardly, at least. He's not really the type of guy to display weakness, if you're asking me. Hmm, I dunno.