Smokescreen2814 & Agent BM: Yes they better beware, but im sure Rancis will end up protecting Nelly if need be.
Sweetprincess900045: Thank you, glad you're enjoying the story so far.
Bubblina Gumdrop: Yes I can almost promise that Zazz will be everybody's favourite Deadly Six member by the end of this story.
riverraiden: Eh, i'm sure Sonic would enjoy a break from beating them up. Let's just say it's the demo version of Lost World, which the Deadly Six don't appear in.
A/N: Thank you for all the reviews and support thus far. Last chapter, we met two of the six members of the Deadly Six, and in this chapter, more Vanilla Buttery stuff (YAY!)
Down at the starting line, the avatars of Sugar Rush were all hanging around, chatting to one another like always. Jublieena and Adorabeezle were happily playing Rock Paper Scissors with each other. Swizzle was teasing Gloyd about how he had a secret crush on Candlehead, and Taffyta was sitting off to the side, sucking her lollipop like usual. However she seemed to be waiting for something, or someone, in particular as she kept checking down the road for any incoming karts. A few moments passed before she finally looked to see Rancis' Kit Kart come speeding down the track. "He's finally here." Taffyta thought to herself with a smirk as she tossed her finished lolli-sitck over her shoulder.
Rancis slowed his peanut butter cup kart to a halt in its regular place it took during roster races. He was only coming to throw his coin into the cup to qualify for the next roster race and then leave. His head was still spinning from what happened with Vanellope; it was like being friends with a criminal. If anyone found out about this, it could ruin his life. Rancis had been so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he didn't notice Candlehead following him until she tapped him on the shoulder.
"Huh what?" He turned to see the birthday themed racer smiling at him. "Oh hey Candlehead." Rancis said to her as he continued to head toward the coin catapult.
Candlehead skipped behind her friend happily. "And people sometimes say I zone out." She giggled at the fact that she was usually the one to get lost in trances from staring at her candle. Rancis didn't want to draw too much attention to himself at the moment, so he just nodded his head to make Candlehead happy. He walked up the steps to the main platform, passing the other racers as he made his way to put his registration coin in for the roster race.
"Hey Rancis, do you remember the time that me, you and Taffyta all want to Mt. Sundae and made ice cream snow angels and went skating on fudge lake? That was super fun." She asked in a loud, excited tone, attracting the attention of some of other racers. Rancis started to tense up a little when he saw a few heads turn in his direction. He quickly pulled his gold coin out from his pocket and tossed it onto the coin catapult. The contraption tossed his coin up from on arm to the next, eventually tossing it into the large cup above the finish line.
"RANCIS FLUGGERBUTTER!" The announcer boom as the coin landed in the cup, securing his position for the next roster race. Rancis was glad that that was over with and turned to leave. But as he turned to head back to his kart, a gloved set of hands placed themselves over top of his eyes.
"Guess who." The playful voice of a girl from behind Rancis cooed to him.
The peanut butter racer sighed, knowing full well who it was that was covering his eyes. "Hey Taffyta, what is it?" he asked her, really wanting to leave right about now. But deep down inside, he knew if Taffyta wanted to see him, he wasn't going anywhere for a while.
"Oh nothing special. I just wanted to see if we could hang out for a while." Taffyta explained as she removed her hands from his eyes. This was an obvious lie. Rancis knew that she wasn't usually like this towards him. So unless she had gained a sudden crush on him within the past day, she was most likely trying to suck up to him about getting him to do something she knew he wasn't up to doing at the time. Taffyta had a creepy way of knowing when he wanted to be left alone.
So he reluctantly rolled his eyes and turned to face her. "Where did you have in mind?" Rancis gave in, knowing that if he declined, it would only clue her in that he was hiding something. Even though her face didn't show it, he could have sworn he had seen a small smirk of victory cross her face.
"I knew I could count on you." Taffyta happily gave him a thumbs up. "Come on, we're going for a little drive." She told Rancis as she led him and Candlehead over to their karts. The way she had said that last part rubbed Rancis the wrong way for some reason. All the other racers saw them leave and walked over to their vehicles as well, as if planned. He got back into his Kit Kart and followed Taffyta's Pink Lightning as she, along with Candlehead's Ice Screamer, pulled out. Rancis turned to see the other karts follow suit as well, making him a bit nervous about where they were heading.
(Lollipop Meadow)
The karts rolled along the path leading through the field of suckers. Taffyta rode over one of the hills while Rancis and the others slowed down as they saw her park a little ways ahead. Finally, Rancis would get his answer as to why the alpha diva had brought him here. Lollipop Meadow wasn't anywhere really that exciting; just your typical field to frolic in on a nice day like today. But Rancis doubted that that was the reason Taffyta had brought everybody out here. He removed his helmet and started to climb up the small hill. Hoping he'd find his answer at the top.
However his heart sank when he saw said answer. A little ways away from them, was Vanellope. She was sitting in the field, picking unicorn pop flowers for herself. "Oh no" was the one thing that came to Rancis' mind as soon as he saw her. This was another trip to torment Vanellope. But he couldn't bring himself to bully her, not after what he had promised her earlier. But he also couldn't let the other racers know how he was friends with her now. Either way, he'd lose something.
Rancis' stomach knotted up at the thought of having to throw an insult at her, or pulled her hair, or push her in mud. Little did he know, that this was all part of Taffyta's plan. She knew that he wouldn't be able to bring himself to hurt the glitch after she had seen their meeting, and she was going to get him to admit this in front of everyone else one way or another. "He'll be more of a loser than he already is with his measly trophy collection." Taffyta thought to herself as they all made their way through the lollipop grass towards Vanellope, who turned when she heard the sound of feet trudging through the candy grass.
"Nice to see you again, glitch." Taffyta greeted with a smirk as the racers fanned out around her. Rancis tried to stay hidden in his usual position behind their leader. "Now what would we be doing today?" she questioned Vanellope in mock curiosity as she took out one of her lollipops and stuck it in her mouth.
"Oh, nothing much. Just picking some unicorn pops." She told her tormentor, holding up the bouquet she had gathered. "Aren't they as beautiful as I am." She got up and twirled around jokingly, speaking in an elegant tone. She really didn't care about that kind of girly stuff. The reason she gathered these flowers was to give to Rancis as a thank you gift. She wanted to show how much it meant to her that he befriended her.
Taffyta began to laugh when she heard Vanellope say she considered herself beautiful. "Oh please tell me you're joking Vanellope." She laughed at what she had said. "Like anyone of us would ever consider you remotely beautiful. I mean look at you. There's that glitch." She stated, taking a lick of the sucker.
"Those dirty rags you call clothes." Crumbelina spoke up from the gang.
"That overbite." Adorabeezle pointed to her teeth.
"Your squeaky, annoying voice." Snowanna told her, mocking her voice.
Each hurtful comment made Vanellope's face fall a bit more. "Not to mention that dirty candy mess you call hair." Taffyta insulted her further as she finished her lollipop and flicked the stick away. It flew through the air and landed in Vanellope's hair. "Guess you can add that to your collection, you filthy mess of a mistake." Taffyta told her while the other racers laughed at Vanellope. "What do you think of miss glitch over here, Rancis?" She asked the peanut butter cup racer.
This was all going according to plan. All eyes turned to Rancis, who had tried to hide himself so Vanellope didn't get the wrong idea. Vanellope's face lifted a bit, hoping her new friend would stand up for her. Taffyta figured either he'd insult Vanellope and break her heart, or he'd be pushed far enough to stand up for her and become just as hated as she was. Either way, she'd win.
Rancis got gummy butterflies in his stomach when everyone, including Vanellope, turned to hear what type of insult he would throw her. "Well…um…" He stammered as he tried to think of something that would convince them he was on their side, but hold back enough so he didn't hurt Vanellope's feelings. "Yeah, she's an accident waiting to happen." Rancis added to their onslaught of insults, although it hurt him inside to say that. But when he looked over to see Vanellope's face fall in sadness, he felt worse. She looked like she could start crying any moment.
Just then, Swizzle came up and grabbed the bouquet of flowers and held them above him, out of Vanellope's reach. "Guess you won't be needing these since you'll never be as nice as they are." He taunted, waving them over his head. Swizzle saw Minty signaling him to toss the flowers to her and he did.
"Hey! Give those back." Vanellope yelled at them, glitching up as they played Keep Away with the bouquet. Minty caught them and tossed them over to Taffyta before Vanellope could run over to Minty to try to get them back.
As Taffyta caught them, she threw the bouquet to the ground and stomped the flowers with the sound of unicorn pops crunching under her boots. When she had finished, there was nothing left but a pile of rainbow crumbs. "Please, stop it!" Vanellope cried out to Taffyta.
As the raven haired girl approached the platinum blonde, she just got shoved to the ground. "Don't touch me you filthy mistake. Now because of your garbage, I have to get my boots cleaned." She angrily sneered at Vanellope, who was crying in the lollipop grass. The peanut butter cup racer was lowering his head in sadness, wanting to do nothing more than to put a stop to all of this.
Then Taffyta got an idea. She figured if anything would push Rancis over the edge, this would be it. "Tell you what, why don't you prove how pathetic you are by licking my boots clean. After all, you are the one responsible for getting them dirty." Taffyta held out her boot, showing the unicorn pop chunks smeared with the chocolate dirt from the field. Vanellope tried to get up and run, but Taffyta just shoved her right back down. "Get cleaning, before I stomp you flat." Rancis raised his gaze up in anger. THIS was going way too far. Some of the other racers started to chuckle and laugh as Vanellope slowly started to stick her tongue out to lick the dirty substance. Tears of humiliation now covered her face, She thought she had no other choice but to lick her worst enemy's boots clean infront of everyone. Just as the glitch was about to eat the dirty remains, Taffyta was pulled back by her hair and thrown to the ground as well.
"Leave her alone, right now!"
Everyone turned in shock to see that Rancis had shoved their leader over. He had stood up for the glitch. Taffyta pushed herself up, but instead of being angry, she had a victorious smirk plastered across her face. She had won. She had made Rancis give in and reveal his true feeling for Vanellope. And best of all, she knew Rancis knew this as well.
After Taffyta picked herself up, she crossed her arms and stared at the blonde boy. "So you're like, one of her? Honestly, I'm not surprised you'd do such..." She asked him. But he cut her off, having had enough of her.
"CAN IT, FUDGEHEAD!" Rancis yelled angrily, causing the others to gasp at what they just heard. Did he really insult their leader? "Yeah, so what if I'm friends with Vanellope. At least she's actually nice, unlike most of you. I'd rather be friends with someone as sweet as her over you warheads any day." Vanellope smiled up at him as he held out his hand to help her up.
"Well since you put it like that, I guess you won't be needing your kart anymore." Taffyta smiled, turning to signal to Jubileena. The cherry themed racer pulled out a cherry bomb and gave it a toss. It landed in Rancis' Kit Kart, blowing it to smithereens.
"My kart!" Rancis cried out in disbelief as chunks of peanut butter cups flew all over the area.
Taffyta smirked at him as he shot her a death glare. "You know, you two are perfect for each other. You both don't belong in a racing game." She spoke down to the two as the racers started to advance towards them. "To celebrate your little friendship, why don't you two take a nice dip in that taffy pond over there." She pointed to a nearby pool of green taffy. The rest of the racers grabbed the glitch and former racer and started to push them towards the pond. The two of them knew that if they were pushed in there, they wouldn't be getting out any time soon. For the first time, Rancis was worried about something other than his hair. He looked over at Vanellope as she looked back at him, knowing there was no way out. The group was about to push the doomed couple in when a high-pitched, crazy laugh filled the air.
"Jeez Taffyta, I know this must be exciting to watch, but you sounded like a crazy person there." Swizzle said to her as the rest of the group stopped to stare at the pink racer.
However she was just as shocked as they were. "Uuugh…that wasn't me Swizzle." She looked at him in confusion.
"INCOMING!" Jubileena suddenly cried out, pointing toward the sky. Everyone turned to see a large jawbreaker fly through the air. All of the children ran away as the giant candy landed in the pond with a large green splash, sending the goo everywhere. All the Sugar Rushers recovered to see a tall, pink monster land in front of the lake.
"HEY THERE, SQUIRTS!"
A/N: Well, looks like Rancis is out of a kart. But at least he stood up to Taffyta and protected Vanellope. Leave a review of what you though and I'll see you on the next chapter.
Next Chapter: Zazz