That Little Game Called Life

Chapter Seven

Ralph thought the sewers made for a miserable living situation but then again he wasn't a mutant or a reptile so he couldn't really say anything. The turtles probably would not have liked living in a brick pile or a penthouse for all he knew. Vanellope was skipping along ahead of them, glitching as she did so to go faster.

"How is she able to teleport?" Donatello asked at one point.

Ralph didn't feel like going into details about her being a former glitch in her own game. "It's just her special super power," he said instead.

"Huh. Interesting. I wish I could take a look at the programming but that would require leaving the console."

"I think it's pretty rad!" Mikey declared. "I wish I could just zip around...sure would make getting pizza a lot faster!"

"You and your stomach," Raphael joked, who had started to not be as upset as he was earlier.

They finally made it to the turtles' home, which was more like a sewer cave to Ralph. It was pretty cramped for him to squeeze inside their living room. At least they had a couch, he had to admit, which was more than what he had when living in the brick pile.

He was surprised to see that their mentor, Master Splinter, was not another turtle but an anthropomorphic rat. Splinter himself was shocked to see visitors in their home but the turtles quickly explained what had happened. Ralph further explained what was going on with the Hero's Duty soldiers running amuk, with some interjecting by Vanellope of course. Splinter sat in silence as everyone talked, letting the rush of information soak in.

"What you are telling me is that Turbo is back from the dead and has supposedly rearranged some coding in this Hero's Duty game?" Splinter summarized after hearing what they all had to say. "And that is what could be causing them to act differently from their usual state?"

"Yes," Ralph answered. "We don't know why or what his purpose in this was, but he said himself that he was responsible. And some nonsense about the General of the game making him do it, but that's probably just him lying some more."

"Anything is possible," Splinter said wisely. He motioned for Mikey to come to him. "Go fetch the girl and bring her here. I believe that this is something she should hear."

Ralph and Vanellope exchanged confused glances. Girl?

Splinter noticed.

"We've been sheltering an outsider for some time now," he told them. "I am aware that it is breaking our self-made laws, but I felt that she was troubled and needed a place where she could ease her mind. She's done very well here with us. No one knows she is here except for that holographic blue security officer in the Station. She wanted it to be kept that way and we have obliged...until now."


Michelangelo entered the workout room that he and his brothers used on occassion. He could hear her using the punching bag in the room. The normally energetic turtle sighed. He didn't like the idea of the girl getting hurt again. She had been through so much and had been for the most part happy living there with them like an extended family. It was hard to believe she had been there with them for the better part of two decades. She was like a sister to them now.

"Hey, Rosie!" he called out in his usual peppy voice. "Got a sec?"

The teenager turned around, her long red hair swinging as she did so. A friendly smile spread across her pretty face, her green eyes shining bright. Rosie had been doing well these last few years being out of society's eyes. If she had to hear one more ugly comment from someone about what Turbo had done back in 1987 she would have really gone crazy. She had to struggle to remember all the good times in their four-year relationship, think of him as the champ he used to be and not the murderer that everybody liked to talk about. The turtles had saved her from a never-ending life of booze and depression. Sure, living in the sewers was a far cry from her old life consisting of parties, sporting events, and of course a love life, but she couldn't ever get that back.

When her own game Slam Dunk! had been unplugged in 1992, she had gone to live with her co-cheerleaders at Street Fighter II, where she learned a few fighting moves from Chun-Li. Seeing as how she was already a skilled gymnast, this wasn't too much of a stretch forward. Afterwards, she snuck off to live with the turtles. She'd never forget the day she had "proved her worth" by doing an impressive flip-kick on Raphael, who had been so humiliated at being kicked by a girl that he'd held a grudge for a while.

"Hey, Mikey!" Rosie returned the greeting. "How's it going, homey?"

She grabbed her towel to wipe her face down and skipped over to her "brother". They exchanged a little handshake that they'd come up with one day just goofing off.

"Sorry to interrupt the extreme workout," Michelangelo apologized, trying to act normal, "but the master kinda wants you to go talk to him. He sounded pretty serious."

"Oh, sure! Let me rinse off real quick, then we'll go." Rosie thought of Splinter as a father, just like the turtles did. He had been nothing but kind to her since her arrival and was a great person to talk to about mental troubles. She'd be the first to admit she'd shed many a tear on his shoulder.

After taking a quick shower, she changed into her everyday attire of pastel yellow tee shirt (it was more comfortable than her old cheer top), her pink and yellow old-school cheer skirt from her game days, and little white shoes with ankle socks. Back then, she'd always worn her hair up in a ponytail but she decided the last few years that she liked it down better. Made her look a little older than eighteen, she thought.

"Geez, Mikey, you're being so uncharacteristically quiet! Did you switch costumes with Don or something?" she kidded, elbowing him in the side in jest.

Michelangelo sighed. "Okay, here's the deal," he said. "Master Splinter's going to tell you some news and you may or may not like it. I'm just preparing you is all."


The young former cheerleader stared at Splinter for a long time after he'd told her the news. She couldn't believe it. How could she? It was impossible.

"He's alive."

That was all he said. He didn't need to say anything else.

Turbo was alive? How could that even be? Everyone had seen him go inside TurboTime after causing RoadBlasters to be unplugged and nobody had seen him come out in time for his own unplugging. How had he managed to escape? How had he avoided being discovered all these years?

The first thing that came to Rosie's mind when she heard the news that her old boyfriend was not quite as dead as they all thought was naturally confusion. Then she thought Splinter was joking with her. Splinter didn't joke around though, so that couldn't be right. Once that realization hit her, she was momentarily thrilled. Exalted even. She even forgot to wonder about why the heck Wreck-It Ralph was there in their living room.

Rosie had come to the conclusion years ago that she'd always be in love with "her champ", no matter what crazy stunt he'd pulled that horrific day. She had wished on more than one occasion that he was still alive and that this whole nightmare could be erased, that they could just be together and be happy like they used to be. It was a silly wish, perhaps childish, but it was a nice thought. She knew realistically if he were ever turn up alive he wouldn't be the same. She wasn't even the same.

He's alive. All these years he'd been alive and nobody ever knew about it.

All these years...he'd been alive and she never knew.

She frowned as the reality of the situation hit her.

All these years...he'd never once tried to see her.

As quickly as she had grown happier than she'd been in a long time, she just as quickly deflated. It was the worst feeling she'd felt since the day he "died".

"Oh my God," Rosie whispered, tears welling in her eyes. "He hates me."

That's all she said before busting out of the room, down through the sewers and through her secret passage she used to get to her little bedroom, crying the whole way there.


"Well, that didn't go over like I hoped it would," Leonard noted sadly after the girl ran out of the room.

"Who was that?" Vanellope asked.

"That," Ralph began, hardly believing what he'd seen himself, "was Turbo's old girlfriend."

Her eyes bugged out. "He had a girlfriend? Someone actually liked him that much?"

Something clicked in her head and suddenly she understood something about her former nemesis.

He said his favorite color was red. That's what color her hair is.

"That's what he was talking about," she said quietly. "That's why he got sad when he answered my question."

"What are you babbling about, shortstuff?"

Vanellope ignored him and without any warning or explanation whatsoever, she quickly glitch-ran out of the room and into the sewers where she teleported herself wherever she could go into until she randomly happened into Rosie's room. Rosie was currently on the bed, curled up in fetal position facing towards the wall and hugging a pillow, noticeably crying. She hadn't heard Vanellope come in, obviously, since she had not used a door to enter and thus not made any noise.

The decor was a stark contrast to the rest of the game, a pretty big clue that it didn't belong there originally. There was pink everywhere with splashes of yellow, just like the teen's outfit, with a small vanity table on the opposite side of the bed. The wall had a few game posters on it, including Street Fighter individual character sheets and one of her home game and even one of TurboTime with a signature and the phrase "Happy anniversary from your champ xoxo" on it. That had been mostly an inside joke to her on her first anniversary of Slam Dunk!.

Vanellope tiptoed over to the vanity and saw little things like ticket stubs, pom poms, some peppermints in a dish, some hair products, but the thing the stuck out the most was the little framed picture. It looked like it was taken at the finish line of what Vanellope assumed was at TurboTime, with both Turbo and Rosie in the picture. Judging by the confetti and trophy, he had just won another race and was cradling his girlfriend in both arms and trying to hold the trophy handle in one hand at the same time. Rosie's eyes had closed as she had been laughing about something crazy Turbo had just said and he was giving her this adoring look that Vanellope had seen Felix give to Calhoun many times before.

"Miss Rosie?"

"Ahh!" she flipped over from her position on the bed, putting a hand to her chest. "Geez, kiddo, you trying to scare me to death? How'd you get in here?"

"I can walk through walls," she replied matter-of-factly. "So you're Turbo's girlfriend?"

Rosie sighed, wiping the tears from her face. "More like was. I thought he was dead. Jerk." She grabbed a tissue and blew her nose. "I can't believe he's been fine this whole time while I've been sitting around trying to keep my sanity. He had to have known I'd be upset when his game got unplugged."

She started crying again.

"He could have at least came by my old home and said he was okay, give me peace of mind. I thought he would have cared at least that much but apparently not." She buried her face back into her pillow. "I'm such a stupid baby."

Vanellope frowned sadly. "Maybe he thought you'd be mad at him for crashing that road-blasty game."

Rosie considered that, looking back at her guest. "Maybe. I was only mad for a second though. I knew he was upset about the possibility of getting unplugged due to lack of players, but I never dreamed he'd try to actively crash a rival game to prevent it from happening. He acted so crazy that last week I saw him. It was like talking to a different person sometimes."

She winced at the horrible memory of that last night she saw him, the night of his tenth anniversary party, the night he'd gone nuts on that creep Teddy and then trashed all his Trophy Rooms in the house, the last words he'd ever said to her ringing in her ears: "DAMN IT! I SAID LEAVE ME ALONE!".

She grabbed another tissue. "He said he hated himself, can you believe that? Who says things like that? Then he wanted me to hate him, but I just couldn't do it. I could never hate him."

"You still love him, huh?"

Rosie smiled sadly at the floor. "Yeah," she had to admit. "Crazy as that sounds. You don't get over feelings like that even when they act like jerks to you."

She rested her face in her hands. "I'm hopeless. Clinging to memories of days gone by and he's off gallivanting around like he doesn't give a shi...crap," she corrected at the last second, remembering she was talking to a little kid.

Vanellope didn't know what to say to that. If this romance stuff was going to be this painful to deal with, she wasn't sure if she wanted to try this boyfriend thing for herself. Obviously, Turbo had loved her at some point so she couldn't understand why he would let this poor girl suffer all these years thinking he was dead.

He really was a doodie-head.

"So what kind of game are you from?" Rosie asked, wanting to change the subject. "In case you can't tell, I was a cheerleader in a basketball game."

"I'm president of Sugar Rush," Vanellope said proudly, hopping on the bed to lay on her stomach, head propped up with her hands. "It's a candy-themed racing game. My name's Vanellope von Schweetz."

Rosie's eyes got big. "Oh...oh crap."

The main reason she had left her first surrogate home at Street Fighter II was because of Sugar Rush's arrival. It had been the first racing game Litwak bought after...the "going Turbo" incident. He had thought of racing games as a jinx for a long while but took a chance on Sugar Rush. Just the idea of having another racing game around had made Rosie so upset that she left to go live with the ever-secretive Turtles.

"Please tell me Turbo didn't crash your game," she blurted out. "I'm really sorry if he did."

"No, he didn't," Vanellope was quick to say. "Though he did kinda...steal my castle."

"He...what?"

Vanellope was getting nervous. She felt bad telling Rosie more of Turbo's miscreant behavior, since it bothered her so much. "Let's just say he was the king for a while."

"King? He was playing king this whole time?!" Figures, he always was a show-off. Unbelievable. I oughta slug the shit out of him. How dare he!

"But then Ralph burnt him up in the volcano so I got my castle back."

"Volcano?!" the teen shrieked unexpectedly. She regretted wanting to slug him now...sort of. "Holy Konami, is he okay?"

"Don't worry, that was months ago," Vanellope assured her with a wave of her hand. "He's fine. We're not sure how, but he came back without a scratch."

Rosie sighed in relief, closing her eyes. "I don't know why I still even care," she said softly. "He obviously doesn't anymore."

To be honest, she wished she hadn't ever heard that Turbo was alive. She would have rather kept on believing he were dead than to find out otherwise and live with the idea that he didn't ever love her enough to tell her himself. It's not like he had an excuse; her home game stayed plugged in for five years after he disappeared so finding her would have been easy as pie.

"I think he does," Vanellope said in a sweet voice. "He said something that I thought was a little odd but it makes more sense now that I saw you. I asked him what his favorite color was and he got all weird on me. Then he said it was red but it wasn't because of his car. He got real sad and quiet for a long time after that. It's a long shot, but I think he was thinking about you."

Rosie got quiet for a while, dabbing her eyes dry with another tissue. She looked up at her poster of him, the one he signed for her. One of the first things he'd ever said to her was a joke about signing autographs. A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.

"Yeah, he did say something similar to that once," she reminisced, playing with the ends of her hair as she talked. She remembered that day fairly well. "Champ's got a cryptic way with words sometimes. I don't think a lot of people understood what he was talking about half the time but I did. He's not one to get right to the point."

Rosie rolled over onto her back to look up at her ceiling. "What's he doing anyway? You seen him lately? I hope you punched him for usurping your castle."

Vanellope giggled. "Ralph tied him up like a pinata for us. Then we stuck him to my kart's back bumper."

Rosie laughed for the first time since she'd heard the big news. She could only imagine how pissed off that made him. Vanellope was glad she was acting so sad anymore. She decided she liked this chick, even if her taste in guys was a little screwy.

"Good job, kid," Rosie commended her, giving her a little high five. "He's not still stuck to it, is he?"

"Nah, he escaped when Felix's warped wife started chasing us. That's when me and Ralph ended up in here."

"Fix-It Felix?" Rosie remembered him coming to a few of Turbo's parties. "He got married? That's nice to hear, he was always a sweetheart. Why was she chasing you?"

"Not trying to stir the pot here, but your boyfriend erased her memories. She doesn't recognize any of us and thinks we're criminals for some whack-o reason. She's a tall soldier lady with a giant gun so we didn't want to argue with her right then."

Rosie couldn't believe it. Air hissed slowly through clenched teeth as she let that settle in. "You know what, I don't even wanna know how or why he would do such a thing. I do know he wouldn't have appreciated someone doing that to me."

He would have killed them, she honestly thought. He could get pretty possessive sometimes. He nearly killed Teddy that night for almost slapping me that time. Ha, maybe he really did care after all.

She smiled as she pondered on that. She couldn't really make herself believe that Turbo never loved her in the four years they were together. He could have easily made her a one-night stand like the previous girls he'd seen before meeting her.

"How'd you guys meet anyway?" Vanellope wanted to know.

"Ah, you don't want to hear that. It's kinda sappy," Rosie answered her, but she smiled some more upon remembering the day.

"It can't be any sappier than what Felix says about his wife."

"Okay, you asked for it. It was the summer of 1983..."


Rosie belongs to me, as does anything involving the Slam Dunk! game she came from. If anyone gets confused about something, let me know; Now that I've thrown Rosie in, I'm starting to drag a few things in from my previous fic and I'm trying to summarize what happened there as best as possible here without bogging it down too much. Next chapter is one that I've had a few people look forward to since the last fic, it's really long and it's mostly one big flashback except for the tail end. The chapter after that gets back to the main story. BTW I'm going out of town for a few days, will try to post at least twice while I'm gone so please be patient guys! Keep those reviews coming, they're most appreciated :)