(Two short, unrelated drabbles regarding the Vanellope/Candlehead ship.)
Noticed
She thought Candlehead was the thickest one out of the racers. Vanellope's tongue twisted in her mouth, voice lost and words failing her as Candlehead turned around and stared at her. She was not supposed to be seen, and after all she had done to stealthily make her way to racetrack suddenly seemed like a waste effort. For Candlehead to look over her shoulder at that precise moment, assuming she was the very last racer, brought crushing defeat to Vanellope's chest. Vanellope hid her stolen medal behind her back, chewing her chapped lower lip. Panic swarmed in her gaze as Candlehead, frozen, simply stared back with the tiniest gape.
"Please, please, don't tell," Vanellope managed to choke out, reaching out as Snowanna threw her coin. "I just want to race. Please, Candlehead."
Candlehead quickly looked around, finding Taffyta and Rancis were too busy absorbing the crowd's cheers. No one saw Vanellope besides her, and realizing it, her hand pressed against her pouting lips, wondered awe forming in her gaze. How had no one noticed her? Compared to everyone else, Vanellope stood out with her ratty, tattered hooded jacket, an outfit unsuitable for racing. The hood would flap about, covering her eyes at crucial times, and her style was similar to that of a hoodlum sulking about in Tapper's. She glanced over her shoulder, finding Jubileena just finishing up.
"You snuck in?" Candlehead whispered. "But you can't do that. You'll ruin the game. King Candy and Taffyta said-"
"Please, it's not like the gamers are gonna know. The arcade is closed. Just…just once, Candlehead. Just let me race with you guys, and I'll never bother you for anything ever again. Please."
Vanellope reached out, still hiding her medal behind her back and clutched onto Candlehead's shoulder. She willed herself with all of her might to not glitch, hoping to bring some sense of peace to Candlehead's troubled mind. Glitching now would ruin her chances of ever racing, and her very core screamed for her to enter this race now that she had the proper chance. She bit down on her teeth, almost with enough force to crack them, refusing to lose her will to race and silently urging Candlehead to let them be equals for only one race.
Candlehead found herself reeling as her expression tightened in dumbfounded horror, staring down at the hand. She expected for Vanellope's glitching to kick in, ruining her own code and sending her scrambling into electrical squares throughout Sugar Rush. Her body tensed, lips pursing as she gazed down to her treasured coin and mulled with her thoughts.
She was not glitching, and that seemed fine. If Vanellope glitched, she feared Sugar Rush would fall to a dismal ruin where gamers would shun them, and they would be forced to evacuate their game permanently. She waited briefly, finding not even the faintest trace of a light blue spark dashing from her or Vanellope's body. If Vanellope could control herself, perhaps she could race. There would be no reason to not allow her to if she contained her glitching, which she assumed Vanellope was doing at the moment. Without her troublesome glitching, Candlehead had assumed Vanellope would make for a fine racer as the raven-haired troublemaker always boldly proclaimed it was in her corrupted code.
As a racer herself, Candlehead loved new challengers. The old crew was beginning to become too vain or she could read their moves with such ease that she was tiring of racing. She had watched Vanellope whenever she had the chance, which was when the racers had finished bullying her. Sometimes, Candlehead would drive her kart behind a sugary hill and observe her. There was something about her that screamed that she was a proficient racer, and she had witnessed it in secret. Vanellope would craft makeshift karts, pedal-powered, and race them in circles. She had the control and the talent, but Candlehead still feared what would happen in the race today. Did she even have a kart? Was it pedal-powered as well? If so, maybe Vanellope would not be a problem? At the very least, she would noteven be considered a challenge if that was the case, more like a comical inclusion for the racers and gamers' laughter.
"Candlehead," Vanellope urged, removing her hand and hid it behind her back as Swizzle finished his coin toss. "Please, don't tell. Please."
"I didn't see you," Candlehead suddenly spoke, whirling around and flashed a smile at the crowd. She approached the tosser, flinging her coin in and went on her way.
Vanellope's grin stretched across her cheeks, clutching her medal with delightful eager. Fondly, Vanellope kissed her gem and approached the belt with the change she had waited an eternity for.
Peer Pressure
She was just doing what Taffyta told her to do. If she did not listen to Taffyta, she was certain she would be made an outcast just like the glitch. Taffyta was, for the most part, the leader of the Sugar Rush racers whenever Vanellope reared her dirty little head. Candlehead was told to denounce her by King Candy, and to do everything in her power to keep her at bay because the gamers would panic if they saw her glitching during an actual race. The children ate up his words, knowing it was for the best to keep Vanellope away to preserve their game, but she became a consistent nuisance that their antagonism went much further than they anticipated.
Yet, Vanellope was strong, and she tried her best. She crafted her own karts, tried to talk to the other racers, but she was always rejected because she was a glitch. Even the color-swapped racers denied her existence, leaving Vanellope to stumble away with hurt tears pinching at the corners of her bright eyes.
Candlehead knew she was wrong. She had always known from her core that Vanellope was sly and eager, and she had a sincerity that seemed missing among her fellow racers. Candlehead would sometimes find Vanellope off on her own, skipping little candies into the chocolate rivers or climbing the candy cane trees to watch races. She wanted to talk to her, to try to get to know her better because she felt there was something more to her than just being a glitch. There was an edge to her with her confident jeers and an impressively large heart in her code that welcomed everyone that dared come near her.
Taffyta would never allow it. Taffyta refused to acknowledge Vanellope's existence, and if she even dreamed of disobeying Taffyta, Candlehead feared the retribution of being excluded by Taffyta, Rancis, and the rest of the racers. Associating with the glitch would certainly mean they would gang up on her, too, leaving her to wallow in the caramel and chocolate puddles or having to evade thrown, heavy whipped-cream balls at her. She could only imagine the horrors they would bestow upon her in an actual race. Taffyta could make anyone's life miserable as the second-best racer in Sugar Rush, and her popularity and cruelty made her an influential reckoning among their fellow racers. No one dared go against Taffyta, fearing the social retribution that would immediately follow.
Candlehead looked down at the sullen, bleak expression of the dirtied girl before her. Her cherub cheeks were stained with hot red fury, but her eyes spoke of misery, silently crying for help, for someone to stand up for her. Candlehead's mouth broke open, ready to say something, ready to apologize, but the other racers shouted at her. Rancis told her to move on, and Taffyta grabbed her shoulder, heaving her towards her kart with such a quick movement that she nearly tripped over her feet. Taffyta led the pack, guiding everyone out, but Candlehead sat in her kart and watched Vanellope.
Vanellope wearily rose, grabbing the fragmented remains of another destroyed Lickity Split. She held up two cinnamon sticks that were used as breaks before ramming them both into the ground with a strangled shriek of rage. Noticing Candlehead's stupefied presence, she narrowed her eyes to furious slits, shouting, "And what are you still doing here? Go on! Get outta here! Doesn't Taffyta need you to lick her boots?"
Candlehead cringed, the words icy and piercing against her ears. Shakily, she revved her engine, starting her kart, but before she left, she mumbled very feebly, "Sorry."