Archive of Our Own ^beta

He knew it was a stupid idea.  Reckless.  He was always so careful about everything—his survival had depended on it for years—but he couldn’t help but take a risk that night.

He was back to his old hideaway again, secure behind the walls of Game Central Station.  It’d been so long since he’d had to use the place, he’d forgotten how mind-numbingly boring it was.  The only thing that kept him mildly entertained for more than five seconds at a time was the people-watching.

And that was exactly what had lured him out of his hidey-hole.

There was a tiny crack in the wall—so small that he had to practically touch his eye to the wall to see out of it.  He was peering out, minding everybody’s business but his own, when he spotted him.

Felix.

Seeing him walk by was nothing new; Felix was a creature of habit, always was.  Shortly after the arcade closed for the day, he’d head to one of two places:  Tapper’s, or that newer game they’d put in, that Hero’s Duty game. 

He had a wedding ring on, the gold band glinting on his left hand over the leather of his work glove.  Married now.  But to who?  Someone he met at Tapper’s every other day, or someone from Hero’s Duty, one or the other.  Probably the latter.

But presently, something was wrong.  Felix came out of Hero’s Duty walking a lot quicker than he usually did.  His hat was pulled down over his eyes.  He passed right by the crack in the wall, so close that the faint smell of his cologne drifted through it.

His face was streaked with tears.

Oh, God.

Turbo clenched his fists.  Anger bubbled within him, licking up from his gut and going straight to his brain.

Without another thought, he was picking his way through the inner workings of Game Central Station.  It was almost completely dark in there, but Turbo had gotten used to it.  He knew how to navigate without his eyes.  He climbed over ductworks and swung from pipes, his movements swift and quiet as he made his way to Felix’s game.

When he was pretty certain he’d gone far enough, he lowered his hands to the floor and trailed them across the ground.  He groped around until he found what he was looking for—the handle to a hatchway, one he’d used many times before.  Silently, he lifted it up an inch and peered through.  Felix passed underneath and boarded the tram that would take him home. 

Turbo waited until the tram came back to its starting point sans a passenger, then estimated about ten minutes.  When he thought he’d waited long enough, he dropped through the hatchway and landed flat on his ass.  He stuffed a fist to his mouth and bit down on his index finger to keep from hissing in pain. 

Well, he’d felt worse.  Lots worse.

Ignoring the ache in his backside, he slunk along the cylindrical passage until he’d reached the mouth of Felix’s game.  God, he used to spend so much time here.  Nearly every other bit of his past was long gone, but this place…it was still kickin.  He wished he could just waltz in, amble along the familiar sidewalks for awhile, skip a few rocks in the lake, all that kinda jazz…but those days were long gone.  Not only was he uninvited, he was very much unwanted.

Good thing he was so good at getting into places where he wasn’t wanted.

****

Turbo took a deep breath.  He knew this wasn’t going to go well.  Then again, what did he have to lose?

He was near the top of Niceland Apartments, sitting on Felix’s bedroom windowsill.  His legs dangled over the edge of the sill like this was something he did every day.  From here it’d be, oh, about a 300-foot drop, give or take.  If he fell from that height, he would definitely die, no questions asked.

Again:  what did he have to lose?

Luckily, Felix didn’t take long to come into the bedroom.  Turbo had only been waiting for thirty minutes or so when Felix walked in.

Felix hung his cap on a hat rack, then undid his tool belt and deposited it into a dresser drawer.  This drawer, Turbo knew, could be locked from the outside.  Felix always locked up that golden hammer of his before he went to sleep.  Pointless, really, since the only person that could use said hammer was Felix himself.  It wouldn’t do a thief a whole hell of a lot of good, unless they were aimed to sell it for scrap or ransom it, or something—

He’s looking this way.

It was now or never.  Turbo rapped on the window with a knuckle—dink, dink, dink.

Felix looked.  The handyman’s eyes grew wide and his lips tightened into a thin line.  His body jerked as if he were about to run out the door (to fetch Wreck-it, no doubt; Felix was lousy when it came to fisticuffs), and Turbo took this as his chance to smile and wave.

“Hey,” he said, loud enough to be heard through the glass. 

Felix’s face paled.  He took slow, cautious steps over to the window, his hands balled into fists.  His lips were moving, but his voice was too quiet for Turbo to hear.

“Huh?” Turbo said.  He took his helmet off and balanced it on his lap, so that he could put his ear up to the glass.

Suddenly, Felix stomped over to the window and flung it open.  The abrupt movement sent Turbo reeling, teetering on the edge of the sill.  He would’ve fallen, had Felix not grabbed him and flung him into the room.

Felix’s face had regained its color and then some.  Now, instead of frightened, the handyman looked livid.  Rarely had Turbo ever seen Felix this angry.  Of course he’d be mad; Turbo would be a little concerned about him if he wasn’t, actually.  But it had been so long since he’d seen him at all, he’d take what he could g—

A leather-clad fist connected with Turbo’s left jaw, sending Turbo down on one knee, as if he were about to ask Felix’s hand in marriage.  His helmet fell from his hand and thunked to the plush carpet flooring.  One of Turbo’s gold teeth had cut the inside of his cheek; he tasted blood. 

I deserve that.

As Turbo straightened himself back into a normal standing position, Felix hissed at him through gritted teeth, “What are you doing here?”

Turbo sucked on the inside of his cheek where his tooth had just cut it.  He’d have to handle this situation very carefully, or this whole situation could easily become irreparable.  Proceed with caution, he told himself.

He held his hands out in front of him, fingers splayed.  Easy, easy.  “Okay, yes,” he said.  “I owe you an explanation.  I can do that.  I can explain.”

“How did you get in here?” Felix said.  “How did no one see you?  And where did you come from?  How in the world were you outside my window—how did you get up there?  How are you—how—h-how—“  His voice broke.  “How are you still alive?”

Even before he came here, Turbo knew that last question would be inevitable.  As far as the whole alive-or-dead thing went, Turbo must’ve put Felix through a hell of a roller coaster ride.

First, there was the whole RoadBlasters thing, which—hell, Turbo didn’t really know how he survived that one, to be honest, but he had.  Everyone had presumed him dead.  And surely by now, Felix knew about him posing as King Candy for all those years.  In fact, Felix had probably been inside the Sugar Rush cabinet when King Candy-slash-Turbo had plummeted into the diet cola and Mentos volcano.  That’d be another time when Turbo should’ve died…

But here he was.

“I know,” Turbo said stupidly.  “Look, I’ll explain.  Or I’ll try to, anyway.  Maybe we could—“

“No,” Felix snapped.  The handyman’s sudden, clipped tone took Turbo by surprise.  “You are the last thing I need right now.”  Felix jabbed a forefinger into Turbo’s chest.  “I have had a long day and I’m not in any kind of mood for you.”

Turbo tried to grin at him.  “Well, maybe we could—“

“Get out.”

Felix’s tone was cold.  He pointed at the window with a trembling finger.

It didn’t take a genius to see that Felix was far beyond pissed off.  And even though Turbo was dying to see him again, to talk to him, to stay, he knew the best thing to do would be to leave.  Come back later when Felix had cooled down, maybe.  He nodded once, grabbed his helmet from the floor, and headed for the window.

He had one foot on the sill, preparing to climb out, when Felix said, “Wait.”

Turbo removed his foot from the window and turned around.  Felix was walking towards him.  Was he going to hit him again?  Probably.  And you know what?  Turbo didn’t even mind getting socked in the face again.  It’d be a small penance for all the things he’d done to the only person he’d ever loved.

“Your helmet,” Felix said, pointing at the item in question.  “It’s cracked.”

“Cracked” was an understatement.  It looked like someone had taken a jackhammer to it, followed by giving it a thorough bonking with a baseball bat for good measure.  He kept it as clean and polished as he could, but it didn't do a whole lot of good; it was in awful shape.

“I can fix it,” Felix muttered, crossing the room to fetch his golden hammer from his tool belt.  When he came back with it, he gave Turbo’s helmet a tiny tap.  The cracks that spiderwebbed the helmet’s surface began to disappear.  Chunks of fiberglass that had chipped away were being refilled.  Once all the damage had mended itself, the helmet seemed to scrub itself clean; it glinted in the light, sparkling with newness.

Honestly, it was such a relief seeing his precious helmet in good shape again, Turbo felt like he could cry tears of joy.  Naturally, he wouldn’t allow himself to do that, but he gave Felix what he hoped was a grateful grin.  The corner of Felix’s mouth twitched, but his face remained neutral.  He slid the hammer into his back pocket.

“You used to smile like that all the time,” Felix said.  He was staring at the floor.

Fleeting images sped through Turbo’s brain.  Felix clutching his blue hat to his head as Turbo sped them down the Turbo Time raceway after-hours, the late afternoon air whipping around them.  Standing at the edge of Niceland lake, watching Felix toss bread crumbs to the ducks.  Stumbling home from Tapper’s, their mouths feverishly meshing together, yanking each other’s clothes off before they could even get through the penthouse door—

“Yeah,” Turbo said.  “Guess I did.”

Felix said nothing more to that.  He just kept staring at the floor.  Turbo knew the handyman was waiting for his uninvited guest to make his leave.  He’d respect the request.  Under normal circumstances, he wasn’t the type to cater to people’s whims, but this was Felix, here.  This was different.  Turbo wouldn’t stay if he wasn’t wanted.

Fine.

“Hey, I just saw you today, is all,” Turbo said, hoping Felix would let him stay just long enough to offer up an explanation.  “I saw you comin’ out of that Hero’s Duty game, cryin’.  I just wanted to”—Turbo shrugged—“I dunno, come see if”—another shrug—“you were, uh…okay?  I guess?”

“What if I’m not okay?” Felix asked his voice devoid of any emotion.  “What would you do then?”

It wasn’t like Felix to talk this way.  Sure, he probably hated Turbo, and had every right to, but Turbo still didn’t think that was the only thing going on, here.  Whatever happened to Felix in Hero’s Duty must’ve been a lot worse than Turbo first imagined.

That, or…maybe Felix had changed.

Maybe Turbo was the one who kickstarted that change, all those years ago, when he first disappeared…leaving Felix all alone…

“What would I do?” Turbo said.  He stroked his chin with a thumb and forefinger.  “Uh…hm.  I dunno, I guess I didn’t think that far ahead.”  Turbo tilted his head to one side, giving Felix a suggestive look.  “We could make out.  Wanna make out?”

Felix’s lip trembled, and Turbo thought the other man might start crying again.  Instead, a poorly-suppressed laugh hissed out of the handyman’s mouth.

“Oh my,” Felix said, smiling bitterly.  He put a hand up to his cheek.  “Can this day get any stranger?”

“I think I know a few ways it could get stranger,” Turbo said, waggling his eyebrows.

Felix moved his hand from his cheek to his mouth, trying and failing, yet again, to keep from laughing.  “I just want this day to end,” he said with a smile.  “Am I dead?  Did Tamora kill me?  This couldn’t possibly be the afterlife, could it?”

Oh, so her name was Tamora, huh? 

“Well, you ain’t dead, if it’s any consolation,” Turbo offered.

Felix sighed.  “You better get outta here before anybody sees you.  The whole arcade’ll be on a manhunt for you, if anybody so much as thinks they saw you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Turbo said, climbing onto the window sill, preparing to make his leave.  “They’d hafta catch me, first.”  He winked at Felix.  Felix rolled his eyes in response.

As Turbo began his clumsy climb down the brick wall, Felix hung his head out the window.  “I oughta be way more mad at you than I am,” he said.  “I really should’ve punched your face at least one more time.”

“Howsabout I come back tomorrow?” Turbo grunted up at him, fumbling his hand along the wall, looking for a good handhold.  “You can punch me all ya want, how’s that sound?”

“I’ll pass,” Felix said.  Turbo risked a glance up at him.  Tears freely flowed down the handyman’s cheeks, and this time, Turbo was most definitely the culprit.  Ah, great.

Felix stuck his head back inside his room and shut the window.  Turbo clambered the rest of the way down the wall and made his way back to the safety of the exit tunnel, hoping nobody spotted him in the process.  From there, he went back to the game’s entrance and climbed yet another wall—lots of wall-climbing and parkour-type moves, when you’re Public Enemy Number One—back through the hatchway, making his way back to his little hidey-hole.

He lie on his makeshift bed and stared up at the ceiling.  He’d just wanted to check in on Felix and make sure he was okay.  And when Turbo found out that Felix was not, in fact, okay, what did he do?  Not a damn thing.  Unless you count making Felix feel worse.  Which, he had very much succeeded in doing that. 

And his cheek still stung from where Felix had socked him a good one.  Well, maybe Felix did feel a little better after getting to punch his estranged, presumed-dead, all-around-asshat of an ex-lover.  That’d make anybody feel better, right?

Tamora.  He’d said her name was Tamora.  Maybe he needed to pay this Tamora a little visit.  All these newfangled games that came to the arcade had complicated code, code he was still trying to learn, but he wasn’t completely helpless.  Maybe Tamora’d like to wake up tomorrow with nary a head on her head, eyebrows and eyelashes included.  Or perhaps she’d like her entire wardrobe turned a lovely beige color.  Maybe both of these things.  And her sugar and her salt might accidentally get switched around while he was in there, too…

He couldn’t sit still any longer.  He slipped out of his hidey-hole and slithered over to Hero’s Duty to find somebody named Tamora.  Come tomorrow, this Tamora person’d be having a doozy of a day, if Turbo had anything to say about it.