Unbeknownst that they were merely a mile away from the refugees on the North Mountains, a berserk Sven reared on his hind legs and brayed to the sky, almost sending the cargo behind toppling into the snow. Kristoff jumped off the sled and ran a comforting hand down the reindeer's coat, a consoling carrot ready in the other.

The sisters disembarked as well. Elsa paused to catch her queenly train from snagging on the sled's sharp edges while Anna, on the other hand, approached the other two in her ankle-high winter coat, her blue eyes darting quickly all around. Even though the blizzard had yet to reach this point, almost everything was already covered with layers and layers of snow. All the white blinded the mere humans to anything out of the ordinary,

She anxiously handed Kristoff another carrot for the reindeer. "What's wrong? Is Sven okay?"

"Don't know..." Kristoff shook his head wonderingly, brow creased with worry. "He never freaks out this strongly. What's the matter, buddy?"

Sven finished off the vegetables but they hadn't done much to calm his nerves. As Elsa joined them he pawed the ground and cried out, nudging his head to the North Mountains, which was almost completely obscured by the blizzard at this point. Kristoff looked back and forth and quickly interpreted the reindeer's meaning.

"It's Marshmellow," Kristoff said, becoming Sven's voice by speaking an octave deeper. "Sounds like he's... attacking something?"

Sven nodded frantically. He started glancing behind him as if wishing to go back.

Anna yanked Kristoff's arm, her blue eyes wide. "The refugees."

Suddenly, Elsa's concern for Sven became far outweighed by the prospect of innocent families getting torn apart by the work of her own hand. Distractedly, she picked up her skirts and turned back to board the sled once again.

Anna, meanwhile, put her arms around Sven and looked him dead in the eye.

"Sven, we've got to help those people. Elsa might be the only one who can stop it."

The reindeer didn't look so sure, but his heart was in the right place. He knew that, in the end, he had to be the one bringing the Snow Queen to the danger zone. Any other mode of transportation, and chances were she'd be too late. He turned his head to Kristoff pleadingly.

Kristoff did not hesitate, nor did he break eye contact as he placed a hand protectively on Sven's head.

"Of course I'm coming with. You'll be fine, Sven. I'll buy you a sledful of carrots when we get back."

Sven wore a look swearing he was going to hold Kristoff to his promise the moment they got into a grocer's vicinity.

"Anna! Kristoff!" Elsa was leaning on the front of the sled, biting her lip urgently.

The other two hopped back on the sled. Sven took a deep breath, and then whisked them towards the storm at full speed.

At this same moment, Ralph was busy doing his best to stay alive face-to-face with a twenty foot giant.

The Nicelanders were useless. They scattered and screamed bloody murder as they dived into piles of snow in the hopes it would shield them. However, it turned out they needn't have worried. The giant only had eyes for the biggest target.

Again and again, a terrified Ralph dodged and backed around, narrowly avoiding a hailstorm of punches thrown against him. He found himself hugging onto Vanellope so tightly, his grip would have left bruises if she weren't covered in blankets.

The snow giant bellowed and tried a different strategy - it swung its arm far to the side and swiped. Ralph went flying sideways before he even knew what hit him. His torso jerked, and he was down.

Fortunately, this wasn't one battle that he had to fight alone. The instincts of Calhoun's soldiers triggered into action the moment they heard the sign of threat. When the monster leapt out of the snow, they had dropped everything save their battlegear, and by the time it had touched ground, they were already in formation for a land-based ambush. Now all they needed were their orders.

But Ralph didn't know any of that. He was busy lifting his dazed, frost-bitten face from the snow, ears ringing, and it was only through some miracle that he heard Vanellope's cry of, "WATCH OUT!" For a split second, he witnessed a great, icy fist embedded with sharp crystals speeding down right to his head.

His eyes widened.

"Sweet mother of monkey-"

Barely, just barely, he rolled out of the way. A shower of ice and snow sprayed after him from the impact of the creature's fist. Ralph swore he could feel the ground trembling from underneath.

"Wreck-it!"

Almost silhouettes in the blizzard, Calhoun stood with her men just two meters away, face flushed red in fury. "Visibility rate is lower than a suicidal scuba diver - so if you don't want to die, get the kid and your sorry behind out of my line of fire!"

It hit Ralph that he wasn't the only one in danger right now. He bent his head, expecting to see a sick and scared child looking back at him. Instead, his heart stopped. The blankets were empty. Vanellope.

"Ralph!"

He raised his head. The frost giant moved, and there she was almost invisible in the storm behind it. She was waving, hands high over her head. As if reassuring him - she had gotten out of the way, he didn't have to worry, she was going to be fine.

And she would have been, except the creature still had plans on killing Ralph and was already staging its next attack. It stepped back, creating distance to charge. Another step, not enough. One more, and it was going to stomp on a little girl.

It was if a switch clicked off in Ralph's head.

Dropping the blankets, he leapt to his feet and ran a part of a circumference around the monster, yelling mightily. The monster got angrier, shifting mid-step to correct its trajectory and missing the girl by inches.

Startled, Vanellope fell. She tried to struggle upright, except then was overtaken by a fit of coughing. It'd be near impossible for her to escape the monster's vicinity now.

Ralph knew what he had to do. He dug his black boots into the ground, back bent, shoulders tense. Fists before torso, eyes trained on the twenty-foot opponent, beckoning it with a glare. This time, he wasn't scared. This time, he was ready.

The monster charged and threw a hand forward with a terrible roar, aiming to tear Ralph's head off. Ralph swerved, grabbed the extended limb, and with all the strength in his being he flung the creature high into the air.

"IT'S IN THE AIR! SHOOT IT NOW!" he roared.

The Heropians immediately redirected their strange weaponry to the sky. But that was all - not a single shot was fired.

"What are you doing?!" Ralph cried. He looked and found out the answer himself - the thrown monster had disappeared into the storm. And certainly the men wouldn't shoot without something to aim at.

Swearing under breath, Calhoun reholstered her long-distance shooting device and returned the sword in her other hand to its sheath. She signaled her troops, shouting. "Break formation! Our priority is to get the civilians to safety. ASAP, ladies - I wanted us out of this hellhole yesterday!"

Leaving her soldiers to pick up their gear and herd panicking Nicelanders back to a group, Calhoun approached Ralph, who rushed over to Vanellope the moment she announced the change in plans. Listening to the pair, she pieced together what happened. Ultimately, she disagreed so much with those events that she knocked Ralph in the head with a powerful punch and called him something Vanellope shouldn't have heard.

"It's your duty to protect her, you numbskull!" she shouted, waving an angry finger in front of his face. "Dropping her in the middle of a potential firefight - if you were one of my men - which I'm glad you aren't -, I would have kicked you off to get court martialed so fast, your pea-sized brain wouldn't have registered what just happened by the time you get there."

Vanellope, realizing the consequences of her actions, tried to help. "Stinkbrain didn't drop me. It's my fault, Sarge."

Calhoun's look didn't get any softer as she turned her attention to the child. "Your fault or his, you're still his responsibility. And you! You are not supposed to make his job harder with all your spontaneous hocus pocus! Quit the surprises."

She straightened up, glaring. Then, remarkably, her expression transformed. First anger, to slight confusion, and then to alarm. She gripped Ralph by the shoulder, speaking urgently.

"Where did you throw?"

Ralph's head was still sore, no thanks to her fist. His head was ringing more than ever now - or was that something else in the actual world? He couldn't tell, but it was getting louder. "W-What're you talking about?"

Calhoun gritted her teeth and leaned in. "In which direction did you throw the giant?"

He shrugged and looked up. The sound was getting louder. Wait, was that someone shouting?

Just as he was pondering this, a mysterious group of three adults on a sled pulled by a reindeer emerged from the storm, all looking exceptionally harassed. One of them - a slender girl of remarkably ginger hair that it almost appeared orange - stood, raised her hands in a display of non-aggression, and took a deep breath.

"We're here to help!"

Then Marshmellow, still roaring and all, slammed to the earth with the full force of gravity.