A/N: Okay, let's see here. This takes place during iChristmas, leading off right before Carly gives up on Mitch showing up again. The idea was basically, what if it was a movie-length episode instead of the regular 22 minutes? So now, instead of the quick fix, we've got a bit of interesting stuff and a more involved conclusion! Say it with me: yay!
This will probably mostly read like an episode, so it should be cool to read for anyone who would care to. I'll be sure to note clearly if there's a change. As well, obviously, there's many a spoiler to read here. If there are episodes you haven't watched yet, especially iChristmas though there are others, too, and you hate to be spoiled, don't read until you're sure. There's also a level of necessity to at least understand the plot of iChristmas, at least to start. Fair warning
As for shipping, I have a possible plan on that, but for the moment it'll remain vague. Suffice to say, I will not be shipping either of the main 'canon' pairings, but it shouldn't be too out there. If you can't stand to see any other pairing, then I would suggest you tread carefully.
Lastly, as for reviewing, I keep an open policy. If you want to just read anonymously, I am not a hog for ego-building. If you do wish to review, as long as you keep it civil, I can promise I will enjoy reading them and might send you a line in response, especially to any questions. I mostly write for my own enjoyment, and just post in case someone else wants to join in on it, so anything is a bonus. In other words, no pressure.
I think that's all, except enjoy.
Disclaimer: Dan seems to be above suing children, so if anyone asks, I'm 5 years old, okay? Yeah, that's not creepy at all. Just read!
Legend: Italics are thoughts, except when single words.
Summary: Picks up pretty much right before we leave the Normal-Spencer-Verse (to be referred to by me from now on as NSV) in iChristmas. "Finally, Carly gave up. Giving a box a swift kick, she bolted out of the room. 'Fine, if that freak won't help me, then I'll fix it myself. I can do that, can't I?'"
iFix It Myself: An iChristmas Extended Episode Fic
By:
David Armstrong, AKA Leafsdude
Chapter 1: I Am Slowly Going Crazy
"Mitch!" Carly shouted once more. Where is that short, evil angel, she wondered. He always seemed to show up on command, as if shouting his name was like Mrs. Benson blowing Freddie's whistle. Why was it, now that she was completely freaking out, he was still conspicuously absent?
Another moment passed, and Carly looked around for the presence of Mitch, looking over the boxes that would easily hide him.
Finally, Carly gave up. Giving a box a swift kick, she bolted out of the room. Fine, if that freak won't help me, then I'll fix it myself, Carly paused, the door to the studio…correction, attic, slamming shut behind her. I can do that, can't I? I mean, I know he's magical, but that doesn't mean I'm trapped like this forever, does it?
Carly shook her head, waiting for an idea to pop into her head. C'mon Carly, Sam always says you're great at figuring things out… Carly trailed off from her thought. "Sam!"
*Flashback*
"How do you know my mom has a tattoo of a foot on her foot?" Sam asked angrily, a hard glare at Carly, wondering what this…girl was up to. Was she some sort of spy? "How do you know all that stuff?"
"I told you!" Carly replied impatiently. "We're best friends!"
Sam paused. She didn't sound like a spy. Spies are supposed to be all subtle and emotionless, right? And they don't make slip-ups like saying they got you into juvie, clearly the worst place she'd ever been. Sam thought for a moment. If Carly really was her best friend, she'd know stuff that Sam had never told anyone, right?
"What's my favourite colour?" She asked confrontationally.
"Brown," Carly replied without missing a beat.
"Why?" Sam asked. A spy would still be trained to make it sound like they were sure when they were only guessing. Maybe she just got lucky.
"'Cause it's the colour of gravy," Carly answered as swiftly, giving her best 'duh' look.
Sam paused. She's good.
"What's my favourite junk food?" She pressed again.
"Fat cakes," Carly replied absently. Would this Sam, who wasn't her best friend, and was locked up in juvie, still be obsessed with fat cakes?
"What's my favourite book?" Sam asked in rapid-fire.
Carly caught on, without even thinking about it. So far, everything about Sam was the same, except she was on the other side of a jail, and she didn't know Carly.
"Boogie-Bear 3: The Return Of Boogie-Bear."
"What do I hate most?"
"People!"
"What do I want to be when I grow up?" Sam asked. No one knew that one, and there surely wasn't anyone who could figure it out by spying on her.
"An invisible ninja!" Carly replied, keeping eye-contact with Sam the whole time.
Sam stared in awe. "Wow…"
*End Flashback*
Sam didn't just toss her, granted, insane-sounding problem out the window like Spencer and Mrs. Benson, and even Freddie did. And if anyone could think of something when Carly couldn't, it would be Sam.
Carly hurried down the stairs, too lost in her plan to pay attention in front of her.
"Hey, Carly, are you…?" Smack. Carly ran hard into Freddie, knocking the two off-balance. Luckily, Freddie was a bit more swift in this reality, catching hold of the railing while keeping Carly from falling the rest of the way down.
"Ouch," Carly said, rubbing her head, hoping there wasn't going to be a bruise.
"Yeah," Freddie agreed absently. "Hey, you sounded kinda crazy back there. You're not losing your marbles, are you? You know, not playing with a full deck? Maybe a few bricks short of a load?"
"Alright, I get it," Carly broke in, rolling her eyes.
"Well, are you?" Freddie asked after a pause.
"Umm," Carly gave Freddie a look before shrugging. "Yeah, maybe just a little."
"Oh," Freddie looked down dejectedly for a moment before his eyes shot back up. "Wait, did you just say you were?"
Carly shrugged again. She wasn't really sure if she was or not herself. It really didn't matter, though, did it? Why can't Freddie just leave me alone right now?
"Will you go out with me?" Freddie asked quickly, that hopeful look of the real Freddie in his eyes.
"What?" Carly asked incredulously. "But…but you're dating icky Rona Burger. I mean, not icky. Sweet, nice, totally not bossy Rona Burger."
"Oh, come on!" Freddie said. "Have you listened to her at all? She's crazy!"
"Well, yes, she is," Carly agreed without pause. "But then, why are you dating her?"
Freddie gave Carly a look. "I lost a bet," he answered.
"Oh," Carly gave Freddie a sympathetic look. "With who?"
"You," Freddie muttered.
Carly paused. I made Freddie date icky Rona Burger 'cause of a bet? I don't bet. "Umm, sorry?"
Freddie shrugged, dodging the comment by pointing down the stairs. "So, umm, where were you going?"
"Oh, umm, I was, uh," Carly paused. Did this Freddie even know Sam? And was he just blushing a little? "I was going to talk to Sam again. I thought maybe she could help me figure out…"
"SA…mmph, mmph, mmph!" Carly quickly covered Freddie's mouth to keep him from shouting out Sam's name. There's no way a normal-Spencer wouldn't hear him from downstairs, what with all the lack of loud noises damaging his eardrums. Unless there are lots of loud noises in court rooms, like 'you can't handle the truth!' Naa, probably not.
"Shhh!" Carly scolded, giving Freddie a hard look. Freddie nodded that he understood, and Carly removed her hand.
"Samantha Puckett?" He whispered in disbelief. "She's in juvie. And totally off her rocker! Why would you want to talk to her?"
"'Cause we were best friends," Carly said for the thousandth time. It was totally strange to have to say it to anyone. It was common knowledge that she was Sam's best friend, and vice versa. "And she's the only one who's even listened to anything I've said."
"What in all things plump and tasty could Samantha Puckett do to help you?" Freddie asked, not for a moment taking anything Carly just said seriously.
"I don't know, but I'm kind of running out of options," Carly said.
"Yeah, clearly," Freddie muttered, causing Carly to pause to shoot daggers at Freddie. "I'll be quiet."
"Usually when I don't know what to do, Sam does," Carly continued to explain. "Just like I do when she doesn't. And why do you keep using her full name? She's just Sam."
"'Just Sam'," Freddie repeated with a snort. "Alright, whatever. Have fun with the criminally insane 'Sam'!"
Freddie started to walk off, laughing at his own joke.
"Wait!" Carly said sharply in her authoritative tone, causing Freddie to stop cold, turning back to look at her. "I need a distraction. I don't think Spencer would let me wander out right now without an explanation, and I don't think I can lie my way past him."
"Oh, no," Freddie shook his head with dread. "I'm not helping you go see a psycho in jail. You're on your own."
Carly gave Freddie a look. "Uh huh," she said, not believing it for a second.
"I mean it!" he repeated, not faltering.
"Please?" Carly asked sweetly. "For me?"
Freddie's guard fell down in a second. "Alright," he said before realizing it. "Argh!"
"It won't be that bad," Carly offered grabbing Freddie's arm and pulling him back towards the main floor. "Just find some way to keep Spencer and the rest of them from looking towards the kitchen. I'll sneak out the back way."
"Fine," Freddie replied in disgust. "But I'm not going to like it."
"Yeah, yeah," Carly replied, not caring at all. "Oh, and Nevel. If you could do something mean to him, that'd be great."
Freddie perked up. "Really?"
Carly shrugged, giving Freddie another push. "I'll be down in a minute, so make sure they're not looking!"
Elsewhere, in parts unknown, Mitch was dealing with his role in all this about as well.
"Yeah, I know, but this isn't the way it's supposed to work," Mitch said, shaking his head and pacing around.
"Hey, don't worry, you'll still get your wings," a voice boomed back from nowhere and everywhere at once.
"I told her, though," Mitch started, an unhappy look on his face. "Once the wish granted teaches a valuable lesson, I get my wings and things go back to normal."
"Sometimes you have to change the rules in the middle of the game," Booming Voice answered. "And besides, this looks like it could be a lot of fun to watch."
"I still don't like it," Mitch said, shaking his head, even though he knew it probably would be. "Those wings better be good."
"I'll make them golden," Booming Voice responded with a slight laugh.
"That sounds good," Mitch replied after a moment's thought. "Alright, let's watch."
Freddie gave Carly a couple looks over his shoulder as he headed downstairs. What am I doing? He asked himself, looking around at the group in the main room. Carly might like you if you do it, he argued with himself.
Grabbing his camcorder out of his pocket, he wandered over, giving them an innocent smile.
"Hey, I was thinking, well, we're all here," he started, gaining everyone's attention. "Why not let me film you all to, uh, commemorate this lovely evening?"
"You're not going to put it on that digital photo frame, are you?" Rona asked, giving him a snide look.
"No, videos can't go on a digital photo frame," Freddie answered sweetly. "'Though I could make a DVD of it for everyone if you guys want."
"That sounds lovely, Freddie," Spencer nodded. "How about we sing some Christmas carols and drink some low-fat, non-alcoholic eggnog while Freddie films us?"
Nevel and Mrs. Benson smiled in approval while Spencer picked up the nog and a boom box from the counter, hitting play on the latter, causing the starting bars of "Carol of the Bells" to belt out of the speakers loudly.
"Whoops, forgot to turn the dial down," Spencer said nonchalantly as he calmly turned the volume dial to a more reasonable level. "Everybody ready?"
Everyone nodded, except Rona, who just stared daggers at Freddie. Freddie, for his part, was handling the stress well, keeping the cam steady, and masking his awkward glances towards the stairs every couple seconds from the group.
Finally, Carly made her way down, peaking around the corner and seeing everyone intently focused on Freddie, and completely ignoring what was going on behind them. She quietly tip-toed the rest of the way down before looking into the kitchen. To her surprise, the door was closed.
Erg! Evil normal Spencer and his over-careful ways, she thought as she took another glance towards the offending party. Making eye-contact again with Freddie, she finally noticed the camera. Ahhh! He's filming me!
Carly gave Freddie a not-so-hard-to-decipher look. Freddie gave a shrug, and pointed at the group, all of which were completely focused on something or someone else during the song. As they all turned back at Freddie, he masked his movements to give a 'you're doing perfect' sign at the rest as Carly snuck out the door. Hopefully he gets the hint and deletes that film as soon as they're done, she thought worriedly. Or I might only have as long as it takes them to find out I'm gone to figure this out.
Getting off of the bus at the designated stop for the Juvenile Detention Facility, Carly tried to wipe off the hobo drool on her jeans, a disgusted look on her face. She immediately looked around for any signs of Spencer or anyone else she knew. Seeing it was clear, she headed into the scary-looking building.
The previous time she was here, Mitch had magically set a visitation time. She wasn't sure if she had to pre-book. One way or another, I'm talking to Sam, Carly thought aggressively. I just hope I don't have to break any glass or nails doing it.
She walked up to the front desk, giving a wave at the woman at the front desk.
"Hey!" she said perkily. "Umm, I'd like to talk to Sam...uh, Samantha Puckett."
The heavyset woman gave Carly a hard look, before, pointing towards the visitation area.
Carly just shrugged, taking the direction noted. "Alright then," she muttered to herself. "And a good day to you, too."
Taking her seat, she waited for the guard to bring Sam.
As opposed to the first time, when Carly heard Sam before she saw her, there was no trademark Sam arguing as she slid down to her side of the glass. She gave Carly a snide glance that Carly immediately read as her 'I don't know what's going on, so watch it' look.
"Hey," Sam said, starting the conversation this time with feigned disinterest. Her incredulous tone from the first meeting was completely gone, replaced with the same awe from earlier.
"Sam, I need your help," Carly started, but was cut off by Sam.
"If you don't have what I asked you for, I'm not listening," Sam commented, raising her eyebrows. "You said you know what it's like in here, so help me out or get lost, okay?"
Carly looked softly at Sam. She wasn't as completely hostile towards Carly as she was before, but she still wasn't being nice. Or at least what Carly's defined as 'nice' for her best friend. Reaching into her pocket, Carly pulled out a fat cake, handing it to the guard who inspected it carefully before deciding it was okay.
Sam, for her part, looked possessively at the snack, only barely keeping the drool from escaping her wide open mouth.
"Will you listen now?" Carly asked impatiently, watching Sam scarf down the cake in record time, even for her.
"Yes, yes, what up?" Sam replied, giving Carly a bit more of a diplomatic gaze, though it still wasn't exactly friendly.
"Well, you remember what I told you, about the wish thing?" Carly asked, getting her expected nod back from Sam. "Well, it seems like Mitch has decided to ditch me now."
"So?" Sam asked, shrugging. "That creep sounds like the type of dude you'd want to lose."
Carly smiled in spite of herself. Dude… "Yes, but I have no idea how to fix all of this without him. I thought, well…You always seem to know what to do when I don't."
"Hey, I'm not even sure if I believe you yet," Sam retorted, giving Carly a surprised glance. "What makes you think I'd have any idea how to fix it?"
"You're…you're resourceful," Carly offered, a hopeful eyebrow cocked. "And you know how to get out of stuff. I mean, Spencer's the one with the 3 days of law school, but you always seem to know how to get around those little things better than he does."
"Momma does have her ways," Sam agreed wistfully. "But it's not like I have any idea on how to reverse some magical spell I don't even believe in. And even if I did, hello! That'd mean I'd, like, not exist anymore!"
"Don't say that, Sam," Carly cut in, giving her a look. "You're still the same person, you're just, umm, not my friend, and in juvie. But everything else about you is the same. You'll still exist."
"Well, that does sound good," Sam finally agreed. "Juvie's such a bummer. Being out again would be nice."
"How, umm," Carly paused, trying to find a nice way to ask. "How long are you here?"
"Two more days," Sam said perkily. "Mom said she'll pick me up and get me some ice cream from the cafeteria."
"Cafeteria?" Carly asked, before looking behind her in the direction Sam glanced towards, spotting the cafeteria. "You're going to eat icky cafeteria food right after you're released? And what kind of juvie has a cafeteria in the first place?"
"I asked that, too, but, hey, it's better than the nothing she gives me at home," Sam retorted simply, her hands raised in a 'give me a break' gesture.
"Well, forget that," Carly offered, her voice dropping slightly, giving the guard a subtle glance to make sure he didn't hear. "You must know some way out of here."
Sam shrugged. "Well, yeah, but I tried it, it's impossible."
"The barred windows that only open from the outside?" Carly asked knowingly, raising an eyebrow.
"I like the way you think, Shay," Sam said with an evil smile.
"I know," Carly replied with an equivalent smile.
"Great, now I'm an accessory to an escape," Mitch muttered in disbelief.
"What, she always helps Sam escape," Booming Voice replied with a chuckle. "You need to relax a bit."
"You know, the more I get to know you, the more I think you gave Sam your personality," Mitch retorted.
"That's insulting," Booming Voice shot back, clearly not impressed. "Sam doesn't deserve such badmouthing."
"Yeah, yeah," Mitch shrugged. "Though, hey, with her out now, maybe they'll…"
"Hey, don't ruin it," Booming Voice cut him off.
"Oh, uh, right," Mitch stuttered. "Spencer's going to go wild."
"Yeah," Booming Voice agreed. "Should be fun."
Mitch just sighed in reply.
TBC
A/N: Ooo, is Mitch actually a part of an evil organization? Of course not, you fool! *Smirk*
On a more serious note, just a few clarifications on this chapter. Well, one, really. Some people might me asking themselves, "how did Freddie know that Carly was talking about that Sam when Carly used just her first name?" And if you did, good for you. Of course, the simple, yet cop-out, answer for that is, she's the only person they know named 'Sam'. I know, far fetched, but go with it. Without it, it gets long and tedious, so revel in the lack of sense at some points.
Now, one final thing before I go. I have stuck in a few interesting tidbits (or, if you prefer, references) for the readers to find. There's some simple ones, and some hard to spot ones. I stick them in 2 catagories:
In-Show: Referencing one-time gags or moments. Running gags do not count. Same with anything that is directly referencing a scene, nor anything from iChristmas, for obvious reasons.
Pop-Culture: Referencing media from outside the show. Most are well-known, and largely quoted ones, but there's a few rare ones that only those really into pop-culture will catch.
In this chapter, there are 4 in-show references, and 3 pop-culture references. See if you can name them all!
That's it for now.
Happy reading!