Save Me from My Dark Side

Chapter Five

It was bedtime once again in East Niceland...well, bedtime for those who didn't have jobs. The arcade was currently open so that's when "homeless" characters took the opportunity to sleep...kinda like what Turbo was trying to do. He was laying on his back in bed when he felt something drip on his head. He stirred when he felt it, blindly swept his hand across his face in his sleep and settled back down.

Drip. Drip.

Whatever it was, it was warm and it succeeded in slowly bringing the racer out of his slumber. The hell, he just wanted to sleep. Turbo ran his hand across his forehead again and drowsily creaked his eyes open. Then his eyes popped wide open as he stared directly above him, his body numb with fear.

A ghostly blue aura surrounded Teddy as he floated horizontally above where the racer was laying in bed. He had that same sharp-toothed grin as last time only now drops of blood was oozing out of his wrangled mouth and drip drip dripping on Turbo's face. It was nauseating and Turbo felt his stomach heave but he was too petrified to move.

"What's wrong, Tur-bozo?" Teddy asked snidely, the blood in his mouth giving his voice a garbled, warped effect. "You're not queasy, are you?"

When he spoke, the blood came out in a steady stream, its hot thickness smothering Turbo's face. He wanted to vomit yet he could not, probably because this was another dream. He hoped it was another dream. He shut his eyes so he wouldn't have to see Teddy anymore and tried to force himself awake.

"You can't get rid of me that easily," Teddy chortled maliciously as he continued to hover over the bed. "What's wrong with you? You used to be tougher than this."

"Go away!" Turbo told him, keeping his eyes shut. "Leave me alone!"

"I'm not going anywhere. Might as well get used to it."

Turbo rolled over towards Rosie so that when he opened his eyes he wouldn't have to look at Teddy. "Rosie! Rosie, he's back!" he was shouting, shaking her a bit roughly. "Teddy's back!"

"That's nice, dear," she mumbled in her sleep, snuggling more against her pillow. "Invite him to breakfast."

He gave her a quizzical expression before he felt a pair of cold hands grab him and shove him forcefully onto his back. Teddy had dropped from his aerial position and was sitting on Turbo's stomach, his cold dead fingers wrapped around his throat, a maniacal grin present on him the whole time. Turbo's heart banged hard and his whole body became chilled with terror.

"Stupid, you think after that little stunt you pulled earlier, she's going to want anything to do with you?" the dead racer sneered. "She was practically pissing her pants when you had your little tantrum. I'm surprised she's even still here."

"D-d-don't t-talk ab-b-b-out her," Turbo stuttered out.

"Ooooh, so b-b-b-brave, aren't w-w-w-we?" Teddy retorted mockingly, his fingers slowly tightening around his victim's throat. "You WERE always fond of the little whore. You know she's only sticking around because she feels sorry for you. You think she wants to be married to a pussy?"

Turbo tried to swallow but found it difficult to do under the circumstances. "I'm n-n-not a...not a..."

"Yes, you are," the apparition insisted cruelly. "You're so pathetic. The so-called great Turbo is nothing more than a big baby. It's embarrassing that I let myself get killed by such a pansy."

More blood splattered onto Turbo's face, the excess running down past his neck and onto the bedsheets. He could feel it soaking into him, like it was wanting to corrupt him somehow. He found it getting harder to breathe the longer he laid there and he felt paralyzed all over.

"You disappoint me, Turbo. You have the nerve to kill me after I give you the chance to have a new life and this is what you do with it? You're so damn lame. You always were. Nobody ever liked you, you know. You thought your stupid parties and status as Litwak's moneymaker bought you popularity? You thought pretending to be some kooky old fart with bad puns made you likeable when you took over that dumbass candy game? You thought that taking care of your little charade in that soldier game would make everyone welcome you with open arms?"

"S-s-s-stop it," Turbo whimpered out, trying not to listen to the hateful words but he knew they were all true.

"Stop it?" Teddy threw his head back and laughed. The blood that pooled in his mouth made it sound like he was gargling and Turbo felt himself want to retch again. "Funny, I remember saying the same thing to you when you bashed my face in."

The icy fingers squeezed their hardest, preventing air from entering Turbo's lungs completely and he tried to pry his dead co-racer's hands off of him to no avail. He felt himself slipping away, the only thing he could see was the fuzzy image of Teddy laughing that insane warped chortle of his with blood steadily pouring out of him.

"Ro...sie...hellllllp," he managed to squeak out.

"She doesn't care. No one cares. She'll be happy that you're gone. Then she won't have to worry about your stupid ass all the time and actually be able to have a LIFE. She thinks you're a pathetic wuss just like everyone else, she's just too nice to say it to your face."

Turbo's vision was turning black and his defensive grip on Teddy loosened as he felt himself fading.

Then suddenly something very cold was dumped on him and he snapped back to the land of the living. He tried to scream from shock but nothing would come out but exaggerated gulps of air as he regained his ability to breathe again. The lamp was on to vaguely lighten the room and Teddy was no longer sitting on his stomach. Rosie was, however, and her face read of both fear and concern.

"Champ, you had another bad dream," she told him as she went to dry his face off with a small cloth.

He looked baffled, first staring at her then twisting his head around as if trying to find someone. They were the only two in the room.

"You were talking in your sleep and I kept shaking you to wake up but you wouldn't," she explained hurriedly. "So I had to dump cold water on you."

So that's what woke him up...and her shaking must have coincided with Teddy strangling him somehow. Turbo calmed down relatively faster than he did after the first nightmare and relaxed considerably, thanking the Arcade Gods that he was still alive. He gazed up sleepily at Rosie's sweet little face and Ghost Teddy's words came slinking back to him.

The so-called great Turbo is nothing more than a big baby...You know she's only sticking around because she feels sorry for you...She thinks you're a pathetic wuss just like everyone else...

"You need some water or anything?" Rosie asked him, worried when he didn't say anything back to her. "I can give you a back rub if you want."

She was offering out of love but he didn't see it that way. No, she was asking because she felt sorry for him. He remembered the last time she had shown pity towards him and it had greatly pissed him off that he was in a position to be felt sorry for. This time wasn't any different, he thought. Rosie could see his mood change gradually just by watching his face turn from being relaxed to agitated.

"I'm fine," Turbo said through clenched teeth. "You don't have to baby me."

It pained her that he thought that's what she was doing. He could tell her feelings had been hurt judging by the frown she was wearing and the lack of sparkle in her eyes. Damn it, he couldn't do anything right. It didn't matter what he did, she was either going to feel sorry for him or get her feelings hurt. She deserved better than that. She deserved better than him. He wasn't the same guy she fell in love with all those years ago; he'd actually been somebody then. It wasn't her fault that he was nothing now, so he felt a twinge of guilt for snapping at her. Turbo sighed deeply and rubbed his eyes with one hand.

"Look, I'm sorry, I just want to go back to sleep, okay?" he told her, trying to sound nicer. "And yes, a glass of water would be nice, thank you."

He somehow succeeded at mustering up a fake enough smile to get her to do as he said without giving him wavering looks of skepticism. Teddy's remarks kept repeating themselves in his head, and it saddened him to think that it was possible that Rosie might just leave him because he was turning into the world's biggest loser. He loved her and didn't want her to go, but he didn't want her feeling damn sorry for him all the time either. What little ego he had left was getting bruised more and more.

All right then, quit acting like a puss and get over it. Just learn to ignore people.

He scoffed at his own thought. Yeah right. It's hard to ignore people punching you in the face or kicking you to the floor.

Homesickness swallowed him up, wishing he could go back to a time where things were happier. He didn't have to worry about any of this back then. Rosie came back with his glass of ice water and he sat up to swallow a few gulps before putting it on the little nightstand. She sat cross-legged to the side of him more towards the foot of the bed. She wanted to ask if he felt better but thought he'd just get mad if she did so she waited for him to say something first.

He wasn't going to say anything but then a thought crossed his mind. Of course! Rosie didn't have her Home Game anymore either. She'd understand more than anyone how it felt to not be able to do your life's purpose. He'd been so wrapped up in himself he never even considered asking her about it.

"Can I ask you something?"

She perked up slightly at the friendlier tone he used. "Sure, anything."

"Do you miss your old home?" Turbo asked her, now looking in her eyes with a bit of hope in them. "You know, your home game? You miss being there, don't you?"

Disappointment crept into him when she said, "No, not really."

He stared at her, not comprehending her answer.

"What do you mean, 'not really'? You don't miss cheering?" he inquired farther, talking more in his normal voice now. "You don't miss your job? The very reason you even exist? You don't want that back?"

Rosie felt guilty for being truthful. She knew that he missed racing, that was more than obvious, but she didn't want to lie to him about her own self.

"I don't have to be a ball game to cheer," she explained. She threw him a little grin when she added, "I liked cheering for you more. Besides, I think I spent more time at your place than I did at mine, so I never really thought of Slam Dunk! as 'Home'."

That didn't really answer his question. He was looking at her like she was speaking Q*bert-ese.

"Home's not a place, dear," she continued, her words slowing a little when she saw he wasn't getting it. "It's...where you feel like you belong. And I belonged with you, so...I guess you were my Home."

That made less sense to him than the rest of what she'd said. The hell was she talking about? A person can't be a home. Home was somewhere you went, not someone.

Rosie struggled mentally to figure out how to get him to see it her way, but she was at a loss at how to word it. When he'd "gone away" (she refused to use the phrase "going Turbo" for obvious reasons), she'd felt the same symptoms that one feels when they're homesick, only she supposed it was more lovesick, but it was a little deeper than that. She wished she was good with words like Turbo was; he would have known how to translate it better if the roles had been reversed.

"I guess I mean...I never really felt like I belonged there. I was never close to anyone. I sort of latched onto you after we met, so I didn't really have much chance to get attached to my own place. I honestly didn't care when we got unplugged, because it didn't matter to me. I was too busy missing you anyway."

That's not the answer he wanted to hear. He wanted to hear that someone else missed their game as much as he did his, then he realized that was selfish of him to want her to be in his situation. What kind of person was he, to wish that someone would join him in his mindset of uselessness?

Rosie toyed with her hands, getting more embarrassed the longer he didn't respond to her. "Sorry, that probably sounded dumb," she said under her breath, almost as though she were chiding herself instead of apologizing to him.

Turbo felt his insides cringe at her self-doubting tone, not sure how to respond since he didn't even understand what it was she was telling him. He let out a silent sigh and leaned over a bit to rub her knee.

"It's all right," he told her, not knowing what else to say.

But it wasn't all right. Nothing was.

"You want me to go where?"

Ralph stood awkwardly just outside of Turbo's front door, out of fear that he would break the little stairway they had, while the racer himself blocked the doorway entrance with his arms crossed and his eyes at half-mast. He wasn't even dressed yet, having decided that he wasn't stepping foot out of the house that day, and he looked pretty pissed off at the very suggestion that he go back out in public. Rosie peeked her head over Turbo's shoulder to give Ralph a "trust me" wink and said,

"I think you should go, honey."

He turned and looked at her in shock. "But that's a group for villains! I'm not a villain!" he protested, pressing both hands against his chest for emphasis.

Rosie gave him a nervous smile as she carefully reminded him, "Well...you said so yourself that everyone thinks of you that way."

He opened his mouth to argue with her, but then closed it when he realized she was right. He had said that everyone thought of him as a monster.

"I think it'll be good for you," she told him with a big supportive smile. "It might make you feel better about yourself and that you're not so bad, and then everyone else will see it too. Right, Ralph?"

The wrecker was caught off-guard at being dragged back into the conversation and he cleared his throat. "Oh, uh, yeah!" he exclaimed, wearing a flustered grin. "Yeah, I mean, I know how it feels to be...you know...not wanted and have everyone scared of you, and so does everyone else in the group. I know you're not officially a 'bad guy' but given the...circumstances..." He felt awkward bringing up Turbo's dirty laundry in front of him, "I think you qualify for at least an honorary spot."

Turbo threw him a withering look of doubt over his shoulder. Rosie reached a hand out to grab his chin to make him look back at her.

"Can you just give a try?" she asked him sweetly. "Ralph said it's a good confidence booster and I think you could use that."

Confidence. Yeah, he did need some of that. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. Couldn't be worse than anything else he'd been through.

"I promise you won't get thrown out, I'll make sure of it," Ralph added, thinking that might help ease any worries the racer had about trying to visit another game.

The racer glanced back and forth between the other two, both of them wearing similar expressions of support. It took him a minute, but he finally decided that if he had at least two people batting on his team, then maybe this wasn't such a bad idea. Besides, Rosie wouldn't agree to it if there was a chance of trouble brewing, right?

Rosie felt her heart warm when she saw the slightest hint of a twinkle in Turbo's eyes and an inkling of a smile on his face, having almost forgotten when the last time she saw him appear even the least bit happy.

"Okay, I'll give it a shot."

He wasn't expecting a hug but Rosie couldn't contain herself and squeezed him tight to her, glad he was allowing assistance with his issues. The small smile he was wearing increased and for a moment he felt like his old self.

That's it, ol' boy, just think positive. Make the best of it. You want her to quit feeling sorry for ya, right? Well, here you go! You can do this.

Will the Bad-Anon meeting go smoothly? Or will it just make things worse? Turbo said he needs lots of support guys, don't let him feel alone ;)

And yes, I swear, Felix, Calhoun, and Vanellope (and the other Sugar Rush-ians) are involved in this story, it's just taking longer than I thought to get everyone in here.