CHAPTER 7

Taffyta knew she was going to float, because she'd seen King Candy do it seven years ago. Still, knowing that didn't prepare her for the terror of diving into black nothingness, not when she'd always been terrified of heights and falling. She hated that sensation, the loss of control and the complete consciousness before hitting the ground, the long second of knowing exactly what was going to happen to you and how much it was going to hurt. Except here there was no ground to hit, and so when she realized she was shrieking, several seconds after she'd jumped into the code vault, she clamped her mouth shut.

She wasn't falling. Whatever force was in effect in the vault caught her, and for a moment, she just floated there, kicking her feet and moving her hands like she was treading water. Treading air? It was a weird feeling. For a second, she chanced looking down—and instantly regretted it. Her gorge rose into her throat and she had to shut her eyes tightly. Okay, don't do that again.

How was she supposed to move in here? Experimentally, she kicked her legs harder, and she began moving through the air. It really did feel like swimming, just easier. She added in some arm movement to help, and soon she was moving through the blackness, drawing closer and closer to the tangled mass of code. She reached the edge of it, where the code boxes were spread thinly and the glowing filaments connecting them were longer. But she stopped before going past the first boxes, hesitating.

The closer she'd gotten, the larger the game's code had loomed over her, and her task had seemed to go from daunting to impossible. How was she going to find his code in there? You could spend days floating around looking for the right box and still not find it. It had all looked so condensed from the doorway, but now she could see the density of boxes varied. Some were clustered together, but then there were vast empty spaces between those and the next cluster, with maybe one or two boxes to fill it, blinking forlornly. It was a huge space and there were thousands and thousands of boxes to comb through.

She realized her heart was hammering with nerves and she took a deep breath to try to calm it. And then, unbidden, a memory popped into her head, right from the beginning of her coding lessons with King Candy.

She was frustrated, and just like, totally not getting it. And it was driving her crazy because he made it look so easy. But every time she tried to do anything, she'd get stuck, or she'd think she was doing everything perfectly but then it wouldn't work the way she wanted it to. "Ugh, what am I doing wrong?" she demanded, resisting the urge to fling the terminal they were working on across the room, instead slapping it down on the couch. Definitely not as satisfying.

King Candy picked it up. "No no, this is good. But look, you just want to move this bracket here, see, you have one too many, you want it outside this comma."

He handed it back to her and she pouted. "It sounds so obvious when you do it. How did you ever teach yourself to do this, anyway?"

Leaning back into the couch and pulling one leg up onto the cushion, he said, "Well, for startersth, I had a lot of time on my hands."

"I'm serious."

He grinned at her and unwillingly, she smiled back. "What, too flippant? It's true. But, okay, I suppose—well the thing is, after long enough hiding down there, I sort of started…I guessth it was like I could hear the code, you know?"

Raising her eyebrows, Taffyta shook her head and said, "Um, no. How do you hear code? It's not like it talks."

"Well, hoo-hoo, that's the thing, it does. Kind of, I mean, in a way—you know, you're looking at me like I'm totally crazy. You do know that, right?"

With a laugh, she said, "Yeah, I know, because I am! It sounds totally crazy."

He pulled his other leg up onto the couch and sat crossed-legged, leaning forward intently. "Look, sometimes you just sort of have to…listen, I guess you could say, but it's not like…" He paused and waved a hand vaguely. "It's no substitute for actually learning, but you know, sometimes when I was stuck on something, it…helped." When she continued staring at him, her eyebrows raised to her hairline, he said, "I'm not explaining this very well, am I? Well, maybe it'sth—I suppose it's the sort of thing that doesn't explain very well."

Taffyta picked up the terminal and stared at the code on its screen. "No, I think I get it. When you're like, really tuned into something, it's like it tells you what it needs." Glancing up at him, she said, "But this code's definitely not talking to me."

Ruffling her hair, he grinned and said, "Give it time. Someday you'll sound just as crazy as me."

Taffyta wrapped her arms around herself and drew in a deep, shaky breath. She missed him so much. If this didn't work…if he wasn't really here, or if she couldn't find him…

She didn't want to finish the thought. Maybe everyone else thought she'd been starting to accept King Candy's death, but they were wrong. The past couple hours, with the faint hope of his survival dangling there in front of her, felt like real life. The previous two weeks had felt like a nightmare.

But she had to find him. Licking her lips, she looked up at the vast tangle of code looming over her. Where would he be in there? Her eyes moved down the mass of code and she made the mistake of looking down again, which made her stomach churn and flip over. She straightened up and closed her eyes. Think. Listen.

She floated there in silence, straining to hear something. Anything. All she could hear, though, was a low, ambient hum, and all she felt was…well, silly. Opening her eyes, she kicked her feet a few times, bringing her closer to the code. The filaments strung between the boxes flickered around her, light sliding along them like blood through veins, and the boxes seemed to close around her, filling her vision with a kaleidoscope of purple and pink.

Vertigo clutched at her, and in a panic, she flailed for the licorice rope tied around her waist. She hadn't checked it once since she'd entered the code vault, what if it had come off?

Her fingers met nothing but air for several long, sickening moments, but then they closed around the rope, tied securely around her waist and leading out of the code, out of the black, and back to the real world.

King Candy might say that this was the real world. This was what made all of them…well, them. The thought made her feel dizzy.

Taking in another slow, deep breath, she moved further into the code, swimming slowly through the air. A large cluster of boxes and lines above her made her slow and kick up towards them, squinting so she could read the print underneath the symbol on all of them. "Jumbotron," she read out loud. She glanced at the other boxes surrounding it and realized they all had the same symbol on them, and underneath, the name of each one of Sugar Rush's tracks. Understanding dawned on her. Duh, the code was arranged so that similar things were together. So all the jumbotrons in the game were all tied together, and they were physically close to each other, right here.

She needed to find where the racers were.

Determination flooded through her and she headed for the center of the code, boxes flickering at the edges of her vision and snatches of words grabbing her attention before she moved on. Something was pulling her towards the center of the code vault, and she knew, somehow, that she was on the right track.

And then, suddenly, a pink flash caught her eye. She stopped, staring at it in fascination. On it was a stylized drawing of a girl with a bobbed haircut and a strawberry hat. Taffyta Muttonfudge, the box said. Her mouth dropped open and she was hit with a weird, dissociative feeling as she floated there, staring at her own code box. It was like she could feel someone watching her, like she could feel herself watching herself, like looking in a funhouse mirror and seeing nothing but your own reflection over and over, reflected within itself until your mind folded over into crumples.

She shook her head and tore herself away. This place both creeped her out and thrilled her.

As she looked around, she spotted Jubileena, Rancis, Candlehead, and then—

Her heart stuttered, skipped several beats, and then found the right rhythm again. There, right in front of her, was King Candy's code box.

Taffyta almost started crying again, but she swiped the back of her hand across her nose and kicked over to it. Him. Unlike all the other boxes in the code vault, his was dark and lifeless, untethered to anything around it. The filaments waving from it looked like they'd been ripped free of whatever they'd been hooked into. Something was obviously wrong with it. Her stomach sloshed with queasiness. At least it was still here. She'd passed the code clusters for the weather and the day/night cycle and they were gargantuan, sending out tendrils that seemed to connect to everything else in the game, like some kind of creeping vine or fungus. Seeing that had brought home how fundamentally their game had changed.

But now that she was here, no lightning bolt hit her with a magic fix. She floated there, staring helplessly at his code. She had no idea what to do. Well, of course she had no idea what to do; she was able to do cosmetic changes, make modifications to go-karts, and she knew how to change a tire (admittedly totally useless, which he'd laughed about as he'd shown her; who was going to go to the code vault to fix a flat tire, after all, totally impractical). Oh, and she could code herself a clean house. Had she really thought she was going to get here and miraculously come up with the skills to fix whatever was wrong with him? They'd barely even talked about fixing broken code.

"I'm so stupid," she mumbled. And then, because the hum of the code swallowed her voice, she said it again, louder: "I'm so stupid!" It wasn't going to make her feel better in the long run, but it felt kind of good to yell it with no one to jump in, no one to reassure her that no she wasn't, they knew how she felt, she'd feel better eventually, she just needed to give it time.

King Candy's code flickered.

Taffyta's attention snapped to it. She stared hard, but it was as dark and lifeless as the moment she'd first laid eyes on it. "Did…did you just…light up?" she asked. Nothing happened. Obviously nothing happened. Feeling silly, she said, "Er…maybe do it again? To prove I'm not crazy?"

Ha, to prove she wasn't crazy? She was floating there talking most likely to herself, expecting to get a response from King Candy's dark, lifeless code. That was pretty much the definition of crazy. What was she doing? Why had she thought she could help him? This was idiotic; she was going to have to wait for Surge after all, and who knew if King Candy could even survive like this for that long, and—

Then, his code box flashed, much brighter than before. There was no mistaking it. She gasped and lunged forward, putting her hands on either side of the box. "You're in there," she said, her throat closing up with emotion. The box flashed again and she let out a sob of relief and happiness. Was it stupid to hug a box? She didn't care. She hugged the box, resting her forehead on the top edge with her eyes shut tightly and happy tears leaking out. He was alive. He was alive. She hadn't lost him.

After a second, though, she let go and floated back a bit, the effusive grin that had lit her face fading a bit. He was in there, but she couldn't talk to him.

Come on, Muttonfudge. Think.

How did you talk to a code box? You didn't. Your code box was you, but you were actually outside the vault, walking and talking and living, while ones and zeroes coursed through these filaments and tendrils and talked to each other and made up your whole world.

Your code box was you. She turned around slowly and looked at her own box, flashing bright pink. The filaments running in and out of it were talking to other code boxes. What if she hooked King Candy up to her own code?

"Hold on a second, okay?" she said to him. Er, his code box. "I'm going to try something." She swam over to her box and tried to remember what you did to open it up. Oh, right! She tapped it twice, and the box expanded to show all the individual elements that made her her. Race cars, candy, something that might have been glitter, something that was definitely the poison symbol. She gulped. There were tons of lines she could pull out, but what if she screwed up something really integral to herself? What if she like, made it so that she got her left and right confused, or—the thought made her feel ill—what if she destroyed her racing ability?

She looked more closely and felt her nausea ease. Some of the boxes had unattached lines, like they were waiting for more code to get added on. Okay. She could work with that.

Armed with a plan, she collapsed her code box back down again, then physically shoved it closer to King Candy's. The distance wasn't far and her code box wasn't big, but the thing didn't want to move. She had to brace herself against Snowanna's box to get some traction. Once the two boxes were close enough, she expanded hers again, grabbed one of the loose filaments, and dragged it out. Then, she reached out and took hold of one of the lines of King Candy's code box.

She brought them closer together, holding them up in front of her. Was this actually going to work? Looking at his box—was it her imagination, or was it now glowing dimly?—she said, "Well, here goes nothing."

Slowly, she brought the two lines together until their ends touched.

And…nothing happened.

She wanted to cry. Or scream. Or both. She'd been so sure—

Then there was a loud buzz, a spark of electrical current, and the lines fused together. Taffyta shrieked, dropped the line as the shock passed through her, and fell back. "Ow," she muttered, rubbing one hand with the other.

"That was impressive, my dear."

She jumped, making herself tumble end over end until she banged her head on Candlehead's code box. "Ow," she said again as she reached out and grabbed at one of the many filaments around her, steadying herself.

"Sorry." The voice was contrite."Look, I know it's probably unsettling, but yes you are hearing voices in your head, no you're not crazy, and also no, you have no idea how happy I am to see you, Taff. I mean, not really see you, it's not really like seeing in here, it's more like…well, I don't really know, like hearing? Feeling? So much of code is kind of, you know, outside the normal sensory experience, and things are funny in here—"

"King Candy?" she whispered.

"In the flesh. Well, not really at all, I suppose. Kind of exactly the opposite, actually."

She clapped her hands over her mouth, not sure she if she was going to start laughing or crying. A wave of intense emotion crashed over her, a jumbled mess of soaring relief and blazing happiness, and in the end it was some combination of both, and she spent several minutes getting her watery laugh-sobs under control.

"Are you okay?"

Taking a deep breath, Taffyta said, "I am now. You're okay. That's the important part."

"I mean, I don't know if I'd call this okay, exactly."

Having his voice in her head was odd. It was like hearing her own internal monologue, but it wasn't her, and they weren't her thoughts. It was a good thing he'd reassured her that she wasn't losing it, though she supposed if she was losing it, that was the first thing her brain would tell her.

Taffyta swam closer to his code box. "Everyone thought you were dead. I—it's been—" She sucked in a breath. She wanted to appear strong and smart and capable, even though she felt decidedly like none of those things. In fact, she felt like she was one kind word away from a hysterical breakdown. "I'm just really glad you're not."

There was a hesitation—how did she know it was a hesitation, and not just silence?—and then King Candy said, "You must have gotten my message."

"Just today. A couple hours ago." She reached out and put a hand on his code box. It felt warmer now than it had, or maybe she was imagining things. "It was an accident, really."

"Well, it would've had to be. Sorry, it wasn't a great plan, but it was sort of all I had."

His voice was a blend of King Candy's and Turbo's, the sort of thing that she once would have found disconcerting but which now seemed totally natural. "It worked, that's all that matters." The urge to stay in physical contact with the box was hard to fight, but with effort, she pulled her hand away. She couldn't decide if this felt like a wonderful dream or like finally waking up from the nightmare she'd been living in. It seemed to change from moment to moment. One minute it felt completely normal that she was floating in the code vault, surrounded by the flashing programming of her game and conversing with her best friend, who until a few hours ago she'd thought was dead and was now a voice in her head. The next minute it all seemed totally insane.

She reached out and touched the box again. Finding him still alive in here was a miracle, but this wasn't him. "So," she said. "I'm definitely going to fix your code, and like, totally save the day and everything, but I kind of need a favor from you."

The box flickered as he laughed, "Hoohoohoo! At this point, I'd say I owe you, wouldn't you? I mean, not only have I been living rent free in your house for what, seven years now? But you just tracked me down in here with a hunch and mostly your brains. 'Anything' probably doesn't cover it. But—anything, Taff."

Taffyta hugged her arms around herself. "I don't know how to fix what's wrong with you myself. I need your help."

"Oh, that's nothing."

"Do you know what's wrong?"

"Pfft." It was easy to imagine the look that he'd have on his face if he was there with her, instead of a few bits of code clinging to life. He'd wave a hand, as though fixing his own code was no big deal. As though directing her to fix his code, while he couldn't see what she was doing, was something he did every day. His eyes would be half-hooded, and he'd be giving her that smile that was a mixture of smugness, confidence, and wicked intelligence. "My dear, don't forget who you're talking to. When do we start?"

Even though he couldn't see her, she gave him the smile that she'd always responded with—crooked, devilish, and totally ready to meet him on his level. "Right now."